January 31, 2005

Ansar al Islam Claims British Plane Shot Down

UPDATE: This is an archive page. If you are looking for more recent news about terrorist communiques or videos, please go to our MAIN PAGE HERE. Updated daily.

UPDATE: I knew it! 1920 Revolution Brigade claims downing of British Plane on Video. This is the same group responsible for the kidnapping of American Dean Sadek. (ht: Michelle Malkin)

10 are believed dead in the crash. Via Jeff Quinton this Times article:

The Ansar al-Islam group said in a statement on an Islamic website that its fighters tracked the Hercules aircraft, "which was flying at a low altitude, and fired an anti-tank missile at it".

The statement said: "Thanks be to God, the plane was downed and a huge fire and black clouds of smoke were seen rising from the location of the crash."

Established after the 9/11 attacks, Ansar al-Islam is one of Iraq’s older extremist groups and has been linked to al-Qaida.

First, Ansar al Islam has not been active in over a year. Unless the report is wrong and they mean Ansar al Sunna, which happens from time to time. The fighting remnants of Ansar al Islam seemed to have joined Ansar al Sunna. The only Ansar al Islam related activities in the past year have been fundraising and planning by a cell in Germany.

Second, wrong area. Ansar al Islam's base of operation was in Kurdistan. Ansar al Sunna has been operating in areas that were formerly Kurdish but which were 'Arabized' under the Saddam Hussein regime. The plane was apparantly shot down only 20 miles north-west of Baghdad which is in the Sunni triange but nowhere near al Sunna's normal base of operations.

Unless of course the terrorists were referring to this....