Masked militants attack Cairo Christians

CAIRO -- Masked militants riding in three SUVs opened fire Friday on a bus packed with Coptic Christians, including many children, south of the Egyptian capital, killing at least 28 and wounding 22, the Interior Ministry said.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, the fourth to target Christians since December, but it bore the hallmarks of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS). The attack came on the eve of the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

Local health officials said the attack happened on Friday while the bus was traveling on the road to the St. Samuel Monastery in the Minya governorate, about 140 miles south of the Egyptian capital.

Eyewitnesses told Egyptian media that around 8:45 a.m. local time, about 10 masked men with assault rifles, some dressed in military uniforms, emerged from vehicles and sprayed the bus with bullets.

Some of the gunmen went into the bus and continued to fire on the passengers, many of whom were women and children, according to the witnesses. The attack lasted just a few minutes, after which the attackers fled the scene. They governor of Minya said Egyptian police had launched a manhunt for the attackers and set up roadblocks in the region.

Khaled Mogahed, the Health Ministry spokesman, said the death toll stood at 28 but feared it could rise further. According to Copts United news portal, only three children survived the attack. It was not immediately known if most or all of the victims were children.

In April, ISIS suicide bombers struck hours apart at two Coptic churches in northern Egypt, killing 44 people and turning Palm Sunday services into scenes of horror and outrage at the government that led the president to call for a three-month state of emergency.
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BREAKING: Cairo Embassy warned of imminent terror attack.

ABC NEWS: The U.S. Embassy in Cairo issued a security warning about a potential threat posed by a group it referred to as a "terrorist organization."

"The embassy is aware of a potential threat posted on a website by the Hassm group, a known terrorist organization, suggesting some kind of unspecified action this evening," the embassy said in a security message. "The embassy has no further information about this potential threat but is in contact with Egyptian authorities."

Hassm is described as "a non-Salafi revolutionary jihadist group" that uses "violent insurgency tactics against Egyptian security forces, which they refer to as occupiers," according to the Terrorism Research & Analysis Consortium, a digital database of research and analysis focused on terrorism.

Hasam is a splinter group of the Muslim Brotherhood, a Sunni Islamist organization and political party, according to TRAC.

The message urges Americans living in Egypt to follow security guidelines provided by the State Department for dealing with possible threats.

"U.S. citizens should continue to follow sound security practices and adhere to the security guidelines provided in the travel warning for Egypt issued by the State Department on Dec. 23, 2016," according to the message.

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US State department issues warning after Manchester exp!osion

JUST IN: U.S. Embassy London issues emergency message after Manchester Arena incident urging U.S. citizens "heed guidance from local authorities"http://abcn.ws/2ruwTec

U.S. airstrike targets pro-Syrian government forces.

ABC NEWS: U.S. officials say an American airstrike has hit pro-Syrian government forces in southern Syria as they were setting up fighting positions in a protected area.

The officials say the strike near Tanf hit a tank and a bulldozer and forces there, but it was not clear if they were Syrian army troops or other pro-government allies.

One official says the pro-regime forces had entered a so-called "de-confliction" zone without authorization and were perceived as a threat to U.S.-allied troops there. The officials say the strike was a defensive move to protect the U.S. allies. It wasn't clear if U.S. forces were there.

The officials weren't authorized to speak publicly on the matter and demanded anonymity.

—Lolita C. Baldor and Robert Burns in Washington.

Syrian opposition activists say a suspected coalition airstrike has hit a convoy of pro-government forces in the desert near the border with Jordan.

There was no immediate response from the U.S.-led coalition following the reports. A U.S. official confirmed that an airstrike in southern Syria occurred on Thursday, though it was unclear if Syrian government troops were there. The official was not authorized to talk publicly on the matter and spoke on condition of anonymity.

Several Syrian opposition media groups with activists in the area say the airstrike hit a convoy of government troops and allied militiamen on the road to the Tanf area, where Syria's borders with Jordan and Iraq meet.

One opposition media group, the Palmyra News Network, says the attack at the Zarka juncture, about 27 kilometers or 17 miles from the border, destroyed a number of vehicles and caused casualties.

The area has been a source of tensions as both government forces and U.S.-backed rebels advance there. Both the government forces and the rebels are trying to rout Islamic State militants from the area.

The Revolutionary commandoes or Maghaweer al-Thawra, a U.S.-backed group, shared a report about the airstrike on their Twitter account.

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Hackers hold auction for stolen NSA cyber-weapons

SITE: A group has claimed stealing malware developed by the “Equation Group,” a sophisticated hacking group suspected of being the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA), and put the files up for sale to highest bidder in a bitcoin auction.

On August 13, 2016, an untitled document uploaded to Pastebin.com by the account “THESHADOWBROKERS” detailed the nature of the hack, the files taken, and the terms of their sale by auction. In the document, the group first introduced the “Equation Group,” a moniker dubbed by Kaspersky Lab, as the creators of highly advanced malware such as Stuxnet and Flame. “Equation Group” has been suspected by security experts of having ties to and/or being the NSA.

The group then claimed hacking and obtaining “many many Equation Group cyber weapons,” and provided links to images of file directories and encrypted packages of the malware, including 316 MB worth of “free” samples. Finally, the document listed a bitcoin address and stated that the party with the highest bid would receive decryption instructions for the rest of the files, which they claimed are “better than Stuxnet.”

A copy of the Pastebin.com document follows. A copy of the malware samples and encrypted files are available upon request.

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA256

From:

bitmessage = BM-NBvAHfp5Y6wBykgbirVLndZtEFCYGht8
i2p-bote = o1uHOkOcMoFEa7O7dbEilzfMvWzo7bDu~td3x9gYz4b4t5OriJ7U6GUWr5GZoWxQ9f2TrIY5RzhpIMVP6hTLXZ

Equation Group Cyber Weapons Auction - Invitation
- ------------------------------------------------

!!! Attention government sponsors of cyber warfare and those who profit from it !!!!

How much you pay for enemies cyber weapons? Not malware you find in networks. Both sides, RAT + LP, full state sponsor tool set? We find cyber weapons made by creators of stuxnet, duqu, flame. Kaspersky calls Equation Group. We follow Equation Group traffic. We find Equation Group source range. We hack Equation Group. We find many many Equation Group cyber weapons. You see pictures. We give you some Equation Group files free, you see. This is good proof no? You enjoy!!! You break many things. You find many intrusions. You write many words. But not all, we are auction the best files.

Picture Urls
- ------------
http://imgur.com/a/sYpyn
https://theshadowbrokers.tumblr.com/
https://github.com/theshadowbrokers/EQGRP-AUCTION

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Sheikh Abdul Hasib leader of Islamic State’s Afghan faction was killed by US Special Forces

By Carlo Muñoz - The Washington Times - Monday, May 8, 2017


The leader of Islamic State’s Afghan faction was killed in joint night raid by U.S. and Afghan special forces in eastern Afghanistan last month, American commanders confirmed Monday.

Sheikh Abdul Hasib, the so-called emir of the Afghan cell known as Islamic State in Iraq and Syria-Khorosan Province or ISIS-K, was killed along with 35 other fighters and several of the group’s senior leaders during the April 28 operation in Nangarhar province.

Two Army Rangers, Sgts. Joshua Rodgers and Cameron Thomas with 3rd Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment, were also killed during the operation. Command officials at coalition headquarters in Kabul are investigating whether the deaths of Sgts. Rodgers and Thomas were the result of friendly fire.

Hasib is the second ISIS-K leader to have been killed by Afghan and coalition forces in the last year. Former chief Hafiz Saeed was killed during a U.S. drone strike on the group’s stronghold in Nangarhar province last August.

“This successful joint operation is another important step in our relentless campaign to defeat ISIS-K in 2017,” Gen. John Nicholson, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, said in a statement issued Monday on Hasib’s death.

“For more than two years, ISIS-K has waged a barbaric campaign of death, torture and violence against the Afghan\

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