Abu Mohammed al-Golani, the militant leader who led the stunning insurgency that toppled Syria’s President Bashar Assad, has spent years working to remake his public image and that of his fighters.

President-elect Donald Trump says the U.S. should avoid engaging militarily in Syria, where an opposition offensive is threatening the rule of the country's Russian- and Iran-allied leader.

Over the past dozen years, Syrian militant leader Abu Mohammed al-Golani has worked to remake his image and the insurgency he commands.

Army troops have subdued Islamic militants who attacked a military training camp and the airport in Mali's capital, but some soldiers were killed.

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has spoken for the first time on his decision to throw out a plea deal for the accused mastermind of al-Qaida’s 2001 attacks and two other defendants.

Dozens of Wagner mercenaries were killed by jihadis and rebels over the weekend in northern Mali in what one analyst describes as the largest battleground blow to the shadowy Russian group in years.

The International Criminal Court has convicted an al-Qaida-linked extremist leader of war crimes and crimes against humanity in Mali’s historic city of Timbuktu.

Violent extremist groups linked to al-Qaida and the Islamic State group are growing in size and influence across Africa, fueling worries that as they improve their tactics, they could attack the U.S. or Western allies.

A new report says there is mounting evidence that jihadi fighters who had long operated in Africa’s volatile Sahel region have settled in northwestern Nigeria after crossing from neighboring Benin.

The U.S. military said an airstrike in Syria in May 2023 that was targeting an al-Qaida leader killed an innocent civilian instead.

Russian military trainers have arrived in Niger to reinforce the country’s air defenses as the western African nation pulls away from close cooperation with the U.S. in counterterrorism efforts, turning instead to Russia for help as it fights Islamic insurgents in the Sahel region.

The leader of Yemen’s branch of al-Qaida is dead.

Syria's activists and pro-government media say Islamic State militants have killed at least 18 people in an attack on villagers collecting truffles in eastern Syria.

Mali’s military government has announced an investigation into the Tuareg rebel leaders who signed a peace agreement in 2015 and now accuse the government of failing to comply with it.

Islamic State extremists have almost doubled the territory they control in the West African country of Mali in less than a year.

The United Nations says five staff members who were kidnapped in Yemen 18 months ago by an al-Qaida affiliate have walked free.

A onetime al-Qaida courier has been released after serving more than 16 years at the Guantanamo Bay detention center and enduring torture at clandestine overseas CIA sites.

Violence linked to al-Qaida and the Islamic State group, which has wracked much of West Africa’s inland Sahel region for more than seven years, is spreading to the region's coastal states and Benin is the hardest hit.

The Treasury Department said Monday that it has sanctioned a group of high-ranking members of the Somalia-based al-Shabab militant group, who act as key middle men between the group and local companies in Somalia.

The CIA has revealed the scale model of the safe house where it found and killed al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahri in Afghanistan.

A year after America’s tumultuous and deadly withdrawal from Afghanistan, assessments of its impact are divided — and largely along partisan lines.

U.S. intelligence agencies are shifting more money and resources to China.

The Biden administration is holding out the CIA operation that killed al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahri as a monumental strike against the global terror network responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks of 2001.

President Joe Biden’s “loose cough” has returned as he faces a rebound case of COVID-19, his doctor said Tuesday, though he “continues to feel well.”.

The U.S. drone strike that killed al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahri is intensifying global scrutiny of Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers.

The seeds of the U.S. counterterrorism operation that killed al-Qaida's leader were planted over many months.

A U.S. drone strike in Afghanistan this weekend killed Ayman al-Zawahri, who helped Osama bin Laden plot the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States and helped ensure al-Qaida survived and spread in the years after.

President Biden will deliver remarks on a successful counterterrorism operation from the Blue Room Balcony of the White House.

President Joe Biden has announced that al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahri was killed in a U.S. drone strike in Kabul.

An Iraqi man who has been held at the Guantanamo Bay detention center for more than 15 years has pleaded guilty to war crimes charges for his role in al-Qaida attacks against U.S. and allied forces along with civilians in Afghanistan.

U.N. experts say Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers are maintaining close ties with al-Qaida as they consolidate control over the country, and their main military threat is coming from the Islamic State extremist group and guerrilla-style attacks by former Afghan government security personnel.

The United States has removed five extremist groups, all believed defunct, from its list of foreign terrorist organizations.

Hunger is soaring across conflict-ridden Burkina Faso, a result of increasing violence by jihadi rebels linked to al-Qaida and the Islamic State group, which has killed thousands and displaced millions, preventing people from farming.

A rare video has appeared of al-Qaida’s chief praising an Indian Muslim woman who in February defied a ban on wearing the traditional headscarf, or hijab.

The United States and its allies clashed with Russia and China in the U.N. Security Council over the usefulness and impact of U.N. sanctions, currently imposed on countries from North Korea to Yemen and Congo as well the al-Qaida and Islamic State extremist groups and their affiliates and supporters.

The top U.S. commander in the Middle East says the al-Qaida extremist group has grown slightly inside Afghanistan since U.S. forces left in late August.

Qatar’s diplomatic point man for talks with the Taliban says countries should engage Afghanistan’s new Taliban rulers, warning that isolation could lead to a wide-reaching security threat, as happened when al-Qaida used the country as a base to plot the 9/11 attacks.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken has endured a second day of harsh bipartisan criticism of the Biden administration's Afghanistan withdrawal.

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin says the al-Qaida extremist group that used Afghanistan as a staging base to attack United States 20 years ago may attempt to regenerate there following an American withdrawal that has left the Taliban in power.

The speedy Taliban takeover of Afghanistan has revived alarms about a resurgent al-Qaida and new terrorism threats against the U.S. The group's danger to the United States had been eclipsed in the past two decades by other threats, but experts are concerned that al-Qaida could again be given unfettered safe harbor by the Taliban.

President Biden says that even with the Taliban in power in Afghanistan, he sees a greater threat from al-Qaida and its affiliated organizations from other countries.

America’s top general says the United States could now face a rise in terrorist threats from a Taliban-run Afghanistan.

The U.N.’s top envoy for Afghanistan is urging the international community to do everything possible to push the Taliban and the government from the battlefield back to the negotiating table.

Top Pentagon leaders say there is a “medium” chance that extremist groups will present a threat to the U.S. homeland within two years of the American military departure.

It's official: The United States and NATO have begun their final withdrawal from Afghanistan, ending America's "forever war" after nearly 20 years.

At its start, America’s war in Afghanistan was about retribution for 9/11.

At its start, America’s war in Afghanistan was about retribution for 9/11.

“Their tactics are appealing to new groups across the ideological spectrum, including racially, ethnically and politically motivated violent extremist groups,” Voronkov said. Coninsx heads the committee’s Executive Directorate, which was established in 2004 to assess how the U.N.'s 193 member nations are implementing counter-terrorism measures, recommend ways to address gaps, facilitate technical assistance, and analyze counter-terrorism trends. “The proliferation of extreme right-wing terrorism is also a cause of increasing concern,” she said, adding that included racially and ethnically motivated violence. Chinese Ambassador Zhang Jun rejected Cleverly’s remarks as “groundless attacks,” calling them “purely politically motivated” with no basis in the facts. “As a victim of terrorism, China has taken resolute measures to firmly fight terrorism and extremism,” Zhang said.

WASHINGTON – Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Tuesday accused Iran of having secret ties with the al-Qaida network and imposed new sanctions on several senior Iranian officials. In a speech to the National Press Club just, Pompeo attacked Iran for alleged secret ties with al-Qaida, citing newly declassified intelligence suggesting Tehran harbored the group’s No. Pompeo claimed that ties between al-Qaida and Iran vastly improved in 2015, when the Obama administration, along with France, Germany and Britain, were finalizing the nuclear deal. “Iran decided to allow al-Qaida to establish a new operational headquarters, on the condition that al-Qaida operatives inside abide by the regime’s rules governing al-Qaida’s stay inside the country.”He said that since 2015, Iran has given al-Qaida leaders greater freedom of movement inside Iran and have provided safe havens and logistical support to al-Qaida. He said Iran has had “a crystal-clear and defendable record” in fighting al-Qaida and IS terrorism.

WASHINGTON – The Pentagon's acting defense secretary has made a rare visit to Somalia, a conflict-plagued nation in the Horn of Africa where American forces have been assisting in the fight against al-Qaida affiliate al-Shabab. Just hours after Miller's visit, the Somali government announced that a suicide bombing in Mogadishu killed at least seven people, and the al-Qaida-linked al-Shabab extremist group claimed responsibility. Trump is expected to order a withdrawal of most or all of the 700 U.S. troops based in Somalia before he leaves office Jan. 20. Miller has been in the Middle East and parts of north Africa this week on his first international trip as acting defense secretary. Miller, who previously headed the National Counterterrorism Center, has not been nominated by Trump for Senate confirmation as Pentagon chief.

Acting Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller speaks during a meeting with Lithuanian Minister of National Defence Raimundas Karoblis at the Pentagon, Friday, Nov. 13, 2020. “We support the Afghanistan peace process, and as part of it, we continue to adjust our presence,” Lungescu said. At least two government security troops were killed and four others wounded on Friday in a suicide car bomb attack in Kabul. Last week, Trump fired U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper, installing three staunch loyalists in top defense jobs, with Miller, who mostly recently served as director of the National Counterterrorism Center, as acting defense secretary. Esper had worked with military leaders to talk Trump out of complete troop withdrawals from Afghanistan and Syria.

The United States and Israel worked together to track and kill Abu Mohammed al-Masri, a senior al-Qaida operative in Iran earlier this year, a bold intelligence operation by the two allied nations that came as the Trump administration was ramping up pressure on Tehran. (AP Photo/Sayyid Azim, File)WASHINGTON – The United States and Israel worked together to track and kill a senior al-Qaida operative in Iran earlier this year, a bold intelligence operation by the two allied nations that came as the Trump administration was ramping up pressure on Tehran. The revelations that Iran was harboring an al-Qaida leader could help Israel bolster its case with the new U.S. administration. Iran denied the reports, saying the government is not harboring any al-Qaida leaders and blaming the U.S. and Israel for trying to foment anti-Iranian sentiment. Hezbollah never commented on reports and Lebanese security officials did not report that any citizens were killed in Tehran.

This image released by the FBI shows the wanted poster of al-Qaida propagandist Husam Abd al-Rauf, also known by the nom de guerre Abu Muhsin al-Masri. Al-Qaida did not immediately acknowledge al-Rauf's reported death. The violence and al-Rauf's reported killing threaten the face-to-face peace talks and risk plunging this nation beset by decades of war into further instability. The agency released a photograph late Sunday afternoon it described as al-Rauf's corpse, which resembled FBI images of the militant leader. Al-Qaida did not immediately acknowledge al-Rauf's reported death.

PARIS The Charlie Hebdo caricaturist who was forced at gunpoint to open the satirical newspapers door to two al-Qaida extremists described on Tuesday the moments of sheer terror from the attack in January 2015, and the feelings of guilt and powerlessness she endured long afterward. Seventeen people, including 12 in and around Charlie Hebdo's offices, four at a kosher supermarket and a policewoman, were killed. The attack at the newspaper happened during a weekly meeting, and the victims included most of the paper's editorial staff. Sad and Chrif Kouachi targeted Charlie Hedbo because they believed the newspaper blasphemed Islam by publishing caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad. It is the law of men that rules, and not the law of God, as the terrorists would have it.The day the trial opened, last week, Charlie Hebdo reprinted the caricatures.

It did give critics of the deal another reason to say the Taliban shouldnt be trusted. So far the U.S. has reduced U.S. troop presence in Afghanistan from 12,000 to 8,600 a target reached ahead of schedule. Critics of the deal like Rep. Mike Waltz, R-Fla., say the agreement is simply a cover for withdrawal.I have serious concerns with how this agreement has been pursued," Waltz said. I cant talk about the things that I have seen, Pompeo said on Fox News Channels Special Report. The U.N. report also reported six meetings between al-Qaida and Taliban senior leaders during the past 12 months while U.S.-Taliban talks were ongoing.

BAMAKO – BAMAKO, MaliFrench forces have killed Abdelmalek Droukdel, the leader of al-Qaida’s North Africa affiliate, the France’s defense minister announced late Friday, in what would be a major victory for France after years of battling jihadists in the Sahel. French Defense Minister Florence Parly tweeted that Droukdel and several of his allies were killed Wednesday in northern Mali by French forces and their partners. It was not immediately clear how his identity was confirmed by the French. He was widely seen as the symbolic leader of al Qaida’s North African branch, whose operational center for attacks shifted to northern Mali over the past decade. That led to the French military invasion of the region in 2013 seeking to counter Islamist extremist designs on southern Mali and the capital, Bamako.

The Supreme Court is allowing a bigger award of money to victims of the 1998 bombings by al-Qaida of the U.S. embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. The case the Supreme Court ruled in involves lawsuits filed by victims and their families against Sudan. A court initially awarded the group more than $10 billion, but an appeals court threw out about $4 billion of the award that was punitive damages. The Supreme Court said Monday that the appeals court was wrong and that a federal law, the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act, allows punitive damages in the case. The court reinstated a portion of the $4 billion in punitive damages and sent the case back to the appeals court for additional proceedings.

Defense Secretary Mark Esper told Fox News Channel in a late August interview that it was "my understanding" that Hamza bin Laden was dead. Video released by the CIA in 2017 that was seized during the 2011 U.S. raid that killed Osama bin Laden showed Hamza bin Laden with a trimmed mustache but no beard at his wedding. The kingdom stripped Osama bin Laden's citizenship in 1994 while he was living in exile in Sudan when Hamza bin Laden was just a child. On May 2, 2011, the Navy SEAL team raided Abbottabad, killing Osama bin Laden and his son Khalid, as well as others. In August 2015, a video emerged on jihadi websites of al-Zawahri introducing "a lion from the den of al-Qaida" Hamza bin Laden.