Ramadi Liberated? Not so Fast

Posted on December 29, 2015December 29, 2015 by Denise Simon

BAGHDAD — An Iraqi military spokesman says that the city of Ramadi, which was taken by the Daesh group in May, has been “fully liberated.”

Brig. Gen. Yahya Rasool announced on Monday[28 Dec] that government forces had retaken the capital of Anbar Province after a protracted siege. But Gen. Ismail al-Mahlawi, head of military operations in Anbar, said that troops had only retaken a strategic government complex and that parts of the city remained under Daesh control.

Iraq’s military flew the Iraqi flag above the central government complex in city of Ramadi, a military spokesman said on Monday[28 Dec], the morning after the army declared the city captured in its first major victory over Daesh.

“Yes, the city of Ramadi has been liberated. The Iraqi counter terrorism forces have raised the Iraqi flag over the government complex in Anbar,”

joint operations spokesman Brigadier General Yahya Rasool said in a statement broadcast on state television.

Victory in Ramadi is the first major triumph for Iraq’s US-trained army since it collapsed in the face of an assault by the militants 18 months ago.

The Liberation Of Iraq’s Ramadi And What Comes Next

MusingsonIraq: Both the taking of Ramadi by the Islamic State and its recapture by the Iraqi forces were a long time coming. IS attacked the city for almost a year, while the operation to free it took five months. The aftermath of securing the area, re-establishing governance and services will take even longer. Despite these difficulties the liberation of Ramadi was a huge setback for the militants proving that they lack the resources to hold urban areas in Iraq, and a boost for the Iraqi government that was severely criticized for losing the city in the first place.

Both before and after the summer 2014 offensive, which saw the seizure of Mosul and Tikrit, the Islamic State remained focused upon Anbar and its capital Ramadi. The province was one of its major bases, and was the first place it seized territory when the insurgency was reborn. Its Sunni population and its tribes were also seen as an enticing base for the organization to build within. The final push that took Ramadi came in two waves. First, in mid-April IS started a new series of attacks, which led to the seizure of several neighborhoods. On April 16 a security source told the National Iraqi News Agency that 70% of the city was under IS control. The final assault came in mid-May. IS sent in reinforcements from Mosul and Salahaddin, and began with men dressed in military uniforms and driving Humvees to infiltrate the defenses, and then unleashed thirty suicide car bombs against the government complex in the downtown. The Iraqi Security Forces and allied tribes quickly crumbled, IS took the city, and immediately began executing people. This was a huge victory for IS. It solidified the group’s control over more than half of the governorate topped off by capturing the provincial capital. It also caused dissent amongst local tribes and undermined the government’s attempt to create a new Sahwa in Anbar. Ramadi was the birthplace of the Awakening and its loss was a sign that Baghdad could not protect its allies there. For example, several sheikhs accused the government of betraying them during the battle as they felt abandoned when the ISF pulled out of the city. Anbar’s tribes would only back the side that would stand by them to assure their self-preservation, and after Ramadi the government did not look like it could play that role.

There were also repercussions for Prime Minister Haider Abadi. First, he was talking about freeing all of Anbar after Tikrit was taken in March. Then Ramadi fell and his strategy looked like a failure. Second, even before Ramadi was lost the premier was coming under increasing pressure from Nouri al-Maliki and pro-Iranian Hashd groups such as Badr and Asaib Ahl Al-Haq (AAH). They complained they were being kept out of the Ramadi fight, and being constrained in Anbar overall even though they were already operating in places like Garma. Even though Abadi is commander and chief and the Hashd are supposed to be under his command Badr’s Hadi Ameri said they would fight in Anbar no matter what the premier said. Third, the Anbar provincial council undercut Abadi as well authorizing the Hashd to deploy to the governorate since it was shell shocked after the fall of Ramadi. Finally, members of the prime minister’s own Dawa Party and State of Law (SOL) list came out against him. One SOL parliamentarian said that IS’s victory in Ramadi proved that the United States was helping the insurgents, and that Iraq should turn towards Iran instead. A Dawa official claimed elements of the security forces and the tribes the Abadi was arming were working with IS. Abadi had been riding high just a few months beforehand when Iraqi forces retook Tikrit the first major city to be liberated from IS. Then he lost all of that prestige with Ramadi. Not only that it allowed his rivals like Maliki and Ameri to attack his governance, and his alliance with the Americans as everything was blamed on the two. That split continued as plans were made to retake the city.

The divide between Abadi and the pro-Iranian Hashd continued when the offensive to retake Ramadi began. Immediately after the city was taken the prime minister said there would be a swift response to liberate it. Ameri contradicted him by saying he had his own plan for Anbar, and that did not include going after Ramadi right away. Ameri’s strategy was quickly revealed to not include the city at all, but going for Fallujah instead. That meant the day the Ramadi offensive began the Hashd started their own one in Fallujah. Hashd leaders like Ameri were directly challenging Abadi’s leadership of not only security in Anbar, but the entire country. Ameri and others had already been calling for them to take over command of operations instead of the security forces. Now the fall of Ramadi gave them the opportunity to claim the premier had failed, and now they were going to bring victory to the province. Not only that, it split the forces that could have been arrayed against Ramadi. That hurt because the lack of manpower has been an on going dilemma for the Iraqi forces as they have not been able to hold many of the towns and suburbs that they cleared. In turn, the Hashd did not have the fighters to be successful in Fallujah either causing problems in both cities.

On the other hand, the United States stepped up its support to make sure that Ramadi would be retaken. U.S. advisers in Anbar helped plan the operation. The Americans trained the army units fighting for the city, and a new force of tribal fighters. Washington also wanted to keep the Hashd out of Ramadi to make sure that it was an Iraqi Security Forces’ (ISF) victory. That eventually happened as Hashd units left bases where U.S. advisers were working, and then a mass exodus occurred by October under pressure from Baghdad. An Iraq Oil Report article claimed there was an agreement between the Abadi government, the U.S. and the Hashd to withdraw from the operation. The Americans got their tribal fighters into the Hashd so that they could get paid. Finally, the U.S. fired artillery from bases they were stationed at and carried out air strikes to support the ISF’s advances. The Americans were determined that Ramadi would be liberated. They also wanted to make sure that it would help PM Abadi after all of the criticism he received for losing the city. That meant building up ISF and Sunni Hashd units to capture Ramadi, and pushing the Shiite Hashd out that were trying to undermine the premier. While much of this happened behind the scenes by the end of the battle the Iraqi papers were full of stories of U.S. special forces and helicopters taking part. It’s not clear how much the Americans were involved in end, but their influence was apparent to all especially to the pro-Iran Hashd who were opposed to their presence and assistance.

The final attack on Ramadi started on December 22. The elite Golden Division led the operation crossing a bridge that was construction by the ISF to cross the Warar canal into the center of the city. Iraqi police units came from a different direction. Five days later the Khalidiya Council said that IS was withdrawing to the east taking civilians with them as civilian shields. Then the next day the ISF declared victory and hoisted the Iraqi flag over the government center that was taken by the Islamic State seven months earlier. This was a huge accomplishment for the ISF, which had been humiliated back in May. Not only was it able to liberate the city, the ISF did it largely on their own with Shiite Hashd units mostly on the periphery. This helped PM Abadi as well because he could say his forces and leadership were the right way to take in the fight against IS unlike the pro-Iranian groups who quickly got bogged down in Fallujah, and worked against the Ramadi campaign from the start. Most importantly it exposed the Islamic State. The group can put up a grinding defense, but it lacks the fighters to hold any city against a large and determined government force. At the same time, reaching the middle of a city is only the start of the larger battle to rid Iraq of the insurgency.

The taking of the downtown was not the end of the struggle for Ramadi or against the Islamic State. There are still IS elements in many of the surrounding suburbs and towns and it has re-infiltrated into others. A member of the Anbar council said that there were insurgents in 25% of the city and in the outlaying region that would have to be dealt with. It will take a lot to permanently clear out these fighters, something the ISF has always struggled with. The government is trying to create a new police force to carry out these duties, but the numbers that have appeared in the press are nowhere close to what is required. There are also fears that tribes will want to exact revenge upon those who worked with IS. For example, there was a story that claimed that tribes had lists of collaborators. Carrying out vendettas will not help bring stability to the city or prove that the government is back in control. Last, 80% of the city is reportedly destroyed, and a member of the Anbar Council believed that it would take 10 years worth of budgets to rebuild it. None of these issues are easy to tackle. Fighting will continue in the city and its environs and could quickly deteriorate to what it was like right before the city fell with neighborhoods under IS control. The tribal vengeance can only be deterred if the government is strong, but it may not have the forces or judicial capacity to fully deal with the situation. Finally, real stability can not return to Ramadi until it is reconstructed, services are restored and the authorities have real power over the entire area. These are the challenges that lie ahead and could very well be replayed in future military operations in places like Fallujah and Mosul. If the government can’t get Ramadi right it may not be up to the task of providing real security to other cities after they are freed of IS in the future. The victory in the city therefore, brings both promise and peril that will play out in the coming months.

Ramadi, capital of mainly Sunni Muslim Anbar province in the Euphrates River valley west of Baghdad, had been Daesh’s biggest prize of 2015, seized in May.

Iraqi forces launched an assault on the city last week and made a final push to seize the central administration complex on Sunday[27 Dec]. Their progress had been slowed by explosives planted in streets and booby-trapped buildings.

Security officials have said the forces still need to clear some pockets of insurgents in the city and its outskirts.

If the recapture of Ramadi is confirmed, it will be the first major city seized from Daesh by Iraq’s military.

The militias were held back from the battlefield in Ramadi this time to avoid antagonizing the mainly Sunni population.

The government has said the next target after Ramadi will be the northern city of Mosul, by far the largest population center controlled by Daesh in either Iraq or Syria. — Sources and citations

Covert Monitoring of Mosque Members Pays Off

Posted on December 29, 2015December 29, 2015 by Denise Simon

UK Muslim ‘Disneyland Family’ Linked to Mosque of San Bernardino Terrorists

by Raheem Kassam and Liam Deacon • Dec 25, 2015
Cross-posted from Breitbart

The British Muslim family banned from entering the U.S. this week was on its way to meet relatives in California who prayed at the same mosque as terrorists Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik, who murdered 14 people in San Bernardino this month.

On Tuesday, Mohammad Tariq Mahmood, his brother, and nine of their children were pulled from a queue at Gatwick airport by British Border Agency guards and barred from traveling to the U.S. on the instruction of the country’s Homeland Security agency.

Mahmood has claimed that they were stopped from traveling to California to visit family and Disneyland merely “because they were Muslim.”

It has now been revealed that his relative in California, Muhammad Mahmood, prayed at the same mosque as U.S.-born terrorist Syed Farook and his Pakistani born wife Tashfeen – believed to be the Tablighi Jamaat-run Dar Al Uloom Islamiyah mosque.

The mosque – linked to the “Army of Darkness” group Tablighi Jamaat [TJ], which itself has historical, indirect links to multiple terrorism cases – became the centre of the investigation surrounding the San Bernardino terrorist attacks, as Breitbart News reported from the scene early in December, revealing an extraordinary refusal of the mosque’s elders to co-operate with journalists.

Muhammad Mahmood (the relative) is a U.S. citizen who runs an auto repair shop in San Bernardino. He told the BBC that he “did not know him [Syed Farook] personally” and would not have recognised the terrorist and could not recall ever speaking to him.

A comment from a Muhammad Mahmood from the same mosque just days after the attack in the Sacramento Beereads: “It’s a sad thing… There will be a backlash, of course… Guess why: I’m a brown-skinned guy with a beard who is named Muhammad.”

Tablighi Jamaat is a Deobandi revivalist movement whose mandate is, according to its leading advocate Ebrahim Rangooni, to save the Muslim world “from the culture and civilisation of the Jews and the Christians…” To this end, he has suggested cultivating “such hatred for their ways as human beings have to urine and excrement.”

On Wednesday, a British, Labour Party Member of Parliament wrote to Prime Minister David Cameron accusing Homeland Security of widespread discrimination. A spokesman for the prime minister then confirmed he was considering the issues and would respond in due course.

However, it was reported yesterday how a Facebook account, set up at the London address of the family in the name of Hamza Hussain, has listed job titles such as “supervisor at Taliban and leader at al-Qaeda.”

Furthermore, on Wednesday it was revealed that Mr. Mahmood’s brother, also traveling, had been denied entry into Israel and detained eight years ago on a “lads” trip to Middle East with a “group of older gentlemen.”

American security agencies have also confirmed the brothers “hit positive for terror checks.” A U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokesman said that currently the “religion, faith or spiritual beliefs of an international traveler are not determining factors” when deciding if a person can travel to the U.S. However, the spokesman explained, people can be denied entry for a variety of reasons including health-related issues, prior criminal convictions, security concerns, or miscellaneous grounds.

Breitbart London has previously reported on Tablighi Jamaat members performing orchestrated public relations stunts that claim institutional “Islamophobia.” In June of this year, a TJ member claimed he had been discriminated against for his Muslim name. In turned out he had hidden his affiliation with the terror-linked Markazi Masjid mosque from his curriculum vitae (resume).

*** Cleric denies ties to San Bernardino killers as phone records surface

The cleric acting as spokesman for the San Bernardino mosque where terrorist Syed Rizwan Farook worshipped claims he barely knew Farook and didn’t know his terrorist wife at all. But phone records and other evidence uncovered by federal investigators cast doubt on his story.

The FBI has questioned the cleric, Roshan Zamir Abbassi, about his phone communications with Farook — including a flurry of at least 38 messages over a two-week span in June, coinciding with the deadly Muslim terrorist attack on two military sites in Chattanooga, Tenn.

Abbassi, a Pakistani, insists he had nothing to do with the shooting at a San Bernardino County government building five miles from the mosque. While he confirms the text messages with Farook, he claims they were merely discussing food donations for his Dar-al-Uloom al-Islamiya of America mosque.

Abbassi maintained at a press conference that he didn’t know Farook any better than he knew the reporters in the room. But members of the mosque say Farook was a fixture there. He had been coming to pray and study at least three times a week for two years. In fact, he memorized the Koran there, something you cannot do without learning Arabic, a subject Abbassi teaches.

His other assertion that he never even saw Farook’s wife, Tashfeen Malik, also strains credulity. Malik joined her husband in shooting 35 of his government co-workers at a Christmas party.

“No one knows anything about his wife,” assistant imam Mahmood Nadvi agreed. “She never came to prayer.”

But longtime mosque member Gasser Shehata, who claimed to have prayed “shoulder to shoulder” with Farook, said Dar-al-Uloom prepared a chicken-and-rice dinner to celebrate the couple’s wedding last year. Reportedly, hundreds of congregants attended the walima reception, including the mosque leadership.

Asked if Farook was radicalized at the mosque, Abbassi snapped, “Never.” He said the mosque teaches only peace, insisting no one has even an “extremist idea.”

“In Islam,” he said, “we are against innocent killing.”

Abbassi recently posted a message on Facebook condemning the United States and other Western nations for their Mideast policies, arguing they are equally guilty of violence to achieve political and religious goals. His mosque’s Web page features a video claiming that the San Bernardino shooting was carried out by the US government in a “false flag conspiracy,” and that Farook and Malik were “patsies” assassinated “by government-sponsored perpetrators.”

Another person of interest is Abbassi’s brother, Mohammad Sabir Abbassi, a Muslim activist who serves as a trustee and English teacher at the San Diego mosque once headed by the late al Qaeda cleric Anwar al-Awlaki.

FBI Agent Joel Anderson said in court filings that Farook indicated he was a big fan of Awlaki and listened to a series of sermons about jihad and martyrdom called “The Hereafter.”

In his filing, Anderson says Farook studied the ultra-orthodox Islamic sect Tablighi Jamaat. US officials say the cult, with 50,000 members, is rife with jihadists, and jihadi groomers are recruiting at mosques in at least 10 states.

“We have significant presence of Tablighi Jamaat in the United States,” said Assistant FBI Director Michael Heimbach, “and we have found that al Qaeda used them for recruiting.”

Homeland Security Department veteran Philip Haney said Dar-al-Uloom was among the mosques his agency was investigating as part of a probe of the Tablighi movement.

“Individuals who were already in the case in 2012 went to that mosque,” Haney claimed in a Fox News interview.

He said he ID’d some 300 jihadists and terrorists tied to the movement in the United States before the Obama regime pulled the plug on the investigation in 2012. Known Tablighi alumni include the Lackwanna Six, the American Taliban John Walker Lindh, shoe bomber Richard Reid, dirty bomber José Padilla and would-be Brooklyn Bridge bomber Iyman Faris.

“We have nothing to hide,” Roshan Abbassi asserted.

Investigators shouldn’t take his word for it.

Retired Adm. Kirby Needs Another Day Job

Posted on December 29, 2015December 29, 2015 by Denise Simon

Admiral John Kirby is the official spokesperson for the State Department under Secretary John Kerry. Things are real twisted in this agency and Adm. Kirby knows enough to question the media talking points and yet has joined the ranks of unsupervised liberals at the State Department with weird descriptions of achievements especially when it comes to Syria.

There are 60 million people displaced in the Middle East from their home countries especially when it comes to Syria. Russia is using old cluster bombs and hitting civilians, Bashir al Assad is using chemical weapons and Islamic State in addition to other al Qaida factions are in control of countless regions.

Where is the peace John Kerry?

State Dept.: We Brought ‘Peace’ to Syria

State Dept. counts ‘bringing peace’ to Syria as a 2015 win

The State Department is counting “bringing peace” to Syria as one of its wins in 2015.

A boastful recap of the State Department’s accomplishments, written by spokesman John Kirby, includes the bold subheadline of “Bringing Peace, Security to Syria” above a more modest entry talking about U.S. aid for those affected by the country’s turmoil and the U.S. push for a political transition from President Bashar Assad.

While Secretary of State John Kerry has played an integral role in the Syrian peace talks, the country remains embroiled in a nasty civil war and terrorized by the Islamic State.

“The United States and many members of the international community have stepped up to aid the Syrian people during their time of need — the United States has led the world in humanitarian aid contributions since the crisis began in 2011,” Kirby said.

Kirby wrote that the Syrians have “borne a heavy load” but that under Kerry’s stewardship the United Nations passed a U.S.-sponsored resolution to create a road map for Syria going forward.

The apparent declaration of a win echoes comments from President Barack Obama, who has been heavily criticized for calling the Islamic State a “JV team” in a January 2014 article and for calling the group’s territorial expansion efforts “contained,” just days before the Paris attacks.

Kirby also explicitly touched on the Islamic State, also called ISIL, saying that the U.S. is “winning [the] fight against violent extremists.”

“Although challenges remain, we have made positive strides over the last year, including in our fight against ISIL,” Kirby said. “This forward progress will only continue as more countries pledge resources to the anti-ISIL effort and as citizens around the world increasingly reject ISIL’s misguided ideology.”

Kirby cited the White House Summit on Countering Violent Extremism, hosted in February, which he called “monumental.”

Other things the State Department is counting as wins: re-establishing ties with Cuba, protecting the Arctic, clinching the Iran nuclear agreement, stopping the Ebola outbreak, committing to U.N. development goals, securing a free trade deal, preserving ocean health, and reaching the climate agreement.

How about the ‘Rape Handbook’ just published by Islamic State fighters?

New Rules:

It is not permissible for the owner of a female captive to have intercourse with her until after she has had menstrual cycle and becomes clean.
If she does not menstruate and is pregnant, he is not allowed to have intercourse with her until after she has given birth.
It is not permissible to cause her to abort if she is pregnant.
If the owner of a female captive releases her, only he can have intercourse with her and he cannot allow someone else to have intercourse with her.
If the owner of a female captive, who has a daughter suitable for intercourse, has sexual relations with the latter, he is not permitted to have intercourse with her mother and she is permanently off limits to him. Should he have intercourse with her mother then he is not permitted to have intercourse with her daughter and she is to be off-limits to him.
The owner of two sisters is not allowed to have intercourse with both of them; rather he may only have intercourse with just one. The other sister is to be had by him, if he were to relinquish ownership of the first sister by selling her, giving her away or releasing her.
If the female captive is owned by a father, his son cannot have intercourse with her and vice-versa. Moreover, intercourse with his wife’s female captive is also not permissible.
If a father had intercourse with his female captive then gave her away or sold her to his son, he is no longer permitted to have intercourse with her.
If the female captive becomes pregnant by her owner, he cannot sell her and she is released after his death.
If the owner releases his female captive then he is not permitted to have intercourse with her afterwards because she has become free and is no longer his property.
If two or more individuals are involved in purchasing a female captive, none of them are permitted to have sex with her because she is part of a joint ownership.
It is not permissible to have intercourse with a female captive during her menstrual cycle.
It is not permissible top have anal sex with a female captive.
The owner of a female captive should show compassion towards her, be kind to her, not humiliate her and not assign her work she is unable to perform.
The owner of a female captive should not sell her to an individual whom he knows will treat her badly or do unto her what Allah has forbidden.
Professor Abdel Fattah Alawari, dean of Islamic Theology at Al-Azhar University, said Islamic State has “nothing to do with Islam”.

CIA Stopped From Having Clandestine Assets in Iraq?

Posted on December 29, 2015December 29, 2015 by Denise Simon

The CIA is well known for having spies, double agents and in some cases triple agents. They are known for having ‘assets’ in all countries deemed to be adversarial to the West. Some assets were of great success while others betrayed the CIA and the West.

When came to Iraq, there were no assets and no chance of creating any with proven worth. After the Clinton administration, the CIA was operating at a profound handicap and today under Barack Obama, the CIA continues to be handicapped. Reliance on technology is no replacement for human intelligence.

Relying on walk-ins or other allied assistance in the world of espionage is not a viable objective, often it falls to scant military personnel or contractors to fill the gaps.

A senior Central Intelligence Agency official, who led the agency as its acting director before retiring in 2013, has said that not having sources in the Iraqi government’s upper echelons led to the intelligence failure of 2003. Michael Morell retired as deputy director of the CIA, after having served twice as its acting director, in 2011 and from 2012 to 2013. A Georgetown University graduate, Morell joined the agency in 1980 and rose through the ranks to lead the Asia, Pacific and Latin America divisions. In May 2015, Morell published his book, The Great War of Our Time: The CIA’s Fight against Terrorism from al Qa’ida to ISIS, which he has been promoting while working as a consultant in the private sector.

Morell spoke at the Aspen Institute earlier this month, and once again offered a public apology to former United States Secretary of State Colin Powell for the CIA’s erroneous estimates on Iraq. He was referring to the Agency’s claims prior to the 2003 US invasion that Iraq maintained an active weapons-of-mass-destruction (WMD) program. The claims formed the basis of Powell’s February 2003 speech during a meeting of the United Nations Security Council, in which he claimed that the regime of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein had “biological weapons and the capability to rapidly produce […] many more.” There was no question, said Morell, that Powell’s reputation “was tarnished” as a result of the speech, and that a public apology was in order. The same apology, said Morell, applied “to every single American.”

The retired intelligence official went on to say that the main cause of the CIA’s erroneous assessment of Iraq’s WMD program was that the Agency had failed to penetrate the highest echelons of the Hussein regime. “We were not able to come up with the right answer [because] we didn’t do our fundamental job of penetrating [Hussein’s] inner circles with a human asset,” said Morell. As a result, there was “no information to give to the [CIA] analyst to say ‘here’s what this guy is up to’,” he added. The author of The Great War of Our Time, went on to suggest that the CIA’s failure to penetrate the inner circle of the Iraqi government prior to 2003 was “quite frankly a national security failure.”

There is a feeble clandestine operation in Syria, with few results. We then must question the espionage efforts in Afghanistan with the Taliban, Daesh and al Qaida. The Taliban and the West once again have a common enemy in country in Islamic State. So are we forced to support the Taliban where they beheaded a handful of Islamic State fighters?

Who is the United States relying on when it comes to Iran? It is reported that Iran has shipped uranium out of country to Russia, but what uranium exactly? The next fight between the White House and Congress on Iran comes in January when Obama returns from his holiday vacation in Hawaii.

Obama removed spies from China in 2010, but why? The United States maintained a clandestine operation in Russia until under Barack Obama we didn’t and a few years ago swapped assets.

The question now, is what is the condition of the CIA’s espionage efforts across the globe today? How many countries need U.S. supported human intelligence and covert operations? The list is long.

2015: A Year in Review

Posted on December 28, 2015December 28, 2015 by Denise Simon

Dramatic and a year for historical significance. This photo essay is by no means a complete 2015 diary and is not in order of occurrence.

Charlie Hebdo Attack in Paris

Terror struck in Paris one week into the New Year when a group of men with extensive ties to terrorist organizations targeted the offices of a famed satirical newspaper. Two men shot their way into the offices of Charlie Hebdo while a third waited near the getaway car. The shooters forced their way into the publication’s offices, killing a maintenance man and police bodyguard assigned to protect the editor after he received death threats. Once arriving at the office, they proceeded to kill nine others, mostly editorial staff gathered for their weekly meeting, injuring an additional 11. A faction of al Qaeda claimed responsibility.

The attacks continued in France for two more days, taking the lives of six others, including two police officers and four people held hostage at a kosher grocery store in Paris. The three perpetrators also died.

PARIS 1/11/2015

More than 40 world leaders marched in honor of the 17 victims of terrorist attacks on the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo and a Jewish supermarket.

Germanwings Plane Crash

PHOTO:A screengrab taken from an AFP TV video on March 24, 2015 shows search and rescue personnel making their way to the crash site of the Germanwings Airbus A320 that crashed in the French Alps above the southeastern town of Seyne.

A major aviation mystery in 2015 differed from the series of crashes the previous year in that the plane’s recording device led investigators to a suspect shortly after the deadly crash: the co-pilot. The recording from inside the cockpit of Germanwings Flight 9525 during the March 24 flight from Barcelona to Dusseldorf indicated that co-pilot Andreas Lubitz locked the lead pilot out of the cockpit during a break and proceeded to direct the plane toward the mountains of the French Alps, killing all 150 passengers and crew on board.

“The intention was to destroy the plane,” Brice Robin, the public prosecutor of Marseille, said during the investigation.

PAYNESVILLE, LIBERIA 1/26/2015

Benetha Coleman, a nurse’s aide and Ebola survivor, comforted an infant girl with symptoms of the disease in a high-risk treatment area.

Amtrak Train Crash

PHOTO:Emergency personnel work at the scene of a deadly train derailment, May 13, 2015, in Philadelphia.

A train derailment in Philadelphia killed eight and injured more than 200 Amtrak passengers in May after the Northeast Regional train sped around a curve and went off the track. The train’s engineer. who survived, could not explain what caused the deadly crash. The National Transportation Safety Board led the investigation into the accident and determined that the train accelerated before the crash and had been traveling in excess of 100 mph, which was more than twice the speed limit for that area of the track.

MIRONOVKA VILLAGE, NEAR DEBALTSEVE, UKRAINE 2/17/2015

A child played cards in the local Palace of Culture, used as a bomb shelter during fighting between the Ukrainian Army and Russian-backed militants.

Prison Escape in New York

PHOTO:In this handout from New York State Police, convicted murderers David Sweat and Richard Matt are shown in this composite image.

One of the biggest stories of the summer seemed like something straight out of a Hollywood movie. It involved two prisoners, a sexual liaison with a prison worker who smuggled tools hidden in frozen meat and a midnight escape with a smiley-faced getaway note. David Sweat and Richard Matt, both convicted murderers, escaped from the maximum security Clinton Correctional Facility in upstate New York on June 6, crawling out of sewage pipes and digging through cell walls a la “The Shawshank Redemption.”

TAIPEI, TAIWAN 2/4/2015

A picture from a video of a TransAsia Airways plane as it struck an elevated highway before plunging into a river, killing 43 people.

On-Air Shooting in Virginia

PHOTO:WDBJ-TV7 news morning anchor Kimberly McBroom, center, gets a hug from visiting anchor Steve Grant, left, as meteorologist Leo Hirsbrunner reflects after their early morning newscast at the station, Aug. 27, 2015, in Roanoke, Va.

The gunman in another tragic shooting claimed it was the racism of the Charleston church shooting that prompted him to create a scene of carnage in the late summer. Vester Lee Flanagan, a disgruntled former news anchor, shot two of his former colleagues while they were on the air on location for a Roanoke, Virginia, TV station. The Aug. 26 shooting left reporter Alison Parker and cameraman Adam Ward dead. Flanagan later posted a video on social media of the shooting that he appeared to have filmed during the attack using a portable camera. He also sent a manifesto and called ABC News after the shooting. He shot himself to death during a car chase with police later that day.

SELMA, ALA. 3/7/2015

President Obama marched with thousands across the Edmund Pettus Bridge on the 50th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Major Murder Trials

PHOTO:Former Marine Cpl. Eddie Ray Routh stands during his capital murder trial at the Erath County, Donald R. Jones Justice Center in Stephenville Texas, Feb. 24, 2015.

Four of the biggest trials of the year all resulted in guilty verdicts and one of those murderers now faces a death sentence. The first verdict came in February when Eddie Ray Routh was found guilty of killing “American Sniper” Chris Kyle and his friend Chad Littlefield. Though Kyle was well-known before the trial because of his bestselling book, the case gained even more national attention when his biopic came out just over a month before the trial started. Routh received a sentence of life without parole. He has filed a notice of appeal.

HILLAR CLINTON email scandal

A key aid to Hillary Clinton is the focus of a separate FBI investigation into the former secretary of state’s use of a private unsecured server. Bryan Pagliano, who invoked his Fifth Amendment right more than 500 times to avoid testifying before a House Committee investigating the Benghazi terrorist attack. Investigators are trying to determine more about Clinton’s use of a private server that contained highly classified material.

OFFICE OF PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT HACK

The massive hack into federal systems announced last week was far deeper and potentially more problematic than publicly acknowledged, with hackers believed to be from China moving through government databases undetected for more than a year.

MONTREUX, SWITZERLAND 3/3/2015

Secretary of State John Kerry, center, took a break during a meeting with Iran’s foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, over limiting Tehran’s nuclear program.

PHOTO:Aaron Hernandez watches as Robert Kraft entered the courtroom during the murder trial of former New England Patriots tight end at Bristol County Superior Court in Fall River, Mass., March 31, 2015.

Former New England Patriots star Aaron Hernandez was found guilty in April and sentenced to life in prison without parole after killing Odin Lloyd, who was dating Hernandez’ fiancee’s sister. The case turned into a family drama as both Hernandez’s fiancee, who was granted immunity for her testimony, and her sister took turns on the witness stand. His appeal is underway.

PHOTO:In this June 24, 2015, file courtroom sketch, Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, right, stands before U.S. District Judge George OToole Jr. as he addresses the court during his sentencing, in federal court in Boston. — PHOTO:In this June 24, 2015, file courtroom sketch, Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, right, stands before U.S. District Judge George O’Toole Jr. as he addresses the court during his sentencing, in federal court in Boston.

In another case, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the surviving brother of a pair of siblings, was found guilty in April of all 30 charges that he faced in connection to the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing and his ensuing flight from police, which included the killing of an MIT police officer. One month later, he was sentenced to death after the conclusion of the penalty phase of his trial. The first of many expected appeals is underway.

BALTIMORE 4/28/2015

Community members formed a buffer between the police and protesters at dusk, a day after protests over the death of Freddie Gray turned violent.

EL CHAPO GUZMAN ESCAPE from prison

PLANNED PARENTHOOD VIDEOS, BABY PARTS

WASHINGTON 4/16/2015

President Obama, in the Rose Garden, signed the so-called doc-fix bill, which permanently ended automatic Medicare payment cuts to doctors.

CATHEDRAL CITY, CALIF. 4/3/2015

In California, where lush developments like this one abut bone-dry desert, the governor imposed mandatory water restrictions after a long drought.

BHAKTAPUR, NEPAL 4/29/2015

Residents retrieved belongings from homes four days after a 7.8 magnitude earthquake rocked the country and left over 9,000 dead.

IN THE ANDAMAN SEA OFF THAILAND 5/14/2015

Rohingya migrants on a fishing boat, part of an exodus in which thousands of people took to the sea to flee ethnic persecution in Myanmar.

ROOSEVELT ISLAND, N.Y. 6/13/2015

Hillary Clinton was joined onstage by her husband, former President Bill Clinton, at a rally to kick off her presidential campaign.

SANA, YEMEN 6/12/2015

Yemenis searched for survivors at a Unesco World Heritage Site after an explosion that witnesses said was caused by Saudi airstrikes. Saudi Arabia denied responsibility.

COLUMBIA, S.C. 7/10/2015

The massacre of nine black churchgoers in Charleston was a catalyst for the permanent removal of the Confederate flag from South Carolina’s state house.

ATHENS 7/10/2015

A pensioner waited to withdraw money from Greece’s national bank. The country implemented more austerity measures to address its debt crisis.

MANHATTAN 7/10/2015

The United States women’s soccer team celebrated at a ticker-tape parade after winning the World Cup.

KOS, GREECE 8/15/2015

Laith Majid, an Iraqi, broke out in tears of joy, holding his son and daughter, after they arrived safely in Kos on a flimsy rubber boat.

HORGOS, SERBIA 8/31/2015

A mother rested with her daughter and other relatives in a field during their almost two-month journey to escape violence in Syria.

JPOA IRAN NUCLEAR DEAL

European Refugee Crisis

PHOTO:A refugee holding a boy react as they are stuck between Macedonian riot police officers and refugees during a clash near the border train station of Idomeni, northern Greece, Aug. 21, 2015.

Tens of thousands of people fleeing war-torn Syria and other areas in the Middle East and Africa spent much of this summer making the laborious, and dangerous, trek through Europe toward countries including Germany and Sweden in hopes of finding asylum. The influx of refugee families prompted international disputes and policy shifts as countries such as Hungary started to close some of their borders and put up fences with razor wire to prevent people from entering. President Obama’s plan to allow 10,000 Syrian refugees into the United States met with stiff resistance from some House Republicans who have called for stricter certifications that none of the immigrants poses a security risk.

Same-Sex Marriage Debate

PHOTO:The front of the White House is lit in the color of the rainbow, June 26, 2015, after the United States Supreme Court issued the decision in the case of Obergefell v. Hodges ruling that same-sex marriage is legal in all states.

The Supreme Court made a landmark decision in June, voting to allow same-sex couples to marry nationwide. The 5-4 decision was praised by many, including President Obama, who called it a “victory for America.” But not everyone was pleased with the decision. A county clerk in Kentucky became a touchstone for the national debate after she claimed it was against her religious beliefs to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Kim Davis was jailed for nearly a week for defying a judge’s order to issue any marriage licenses in Rowan County.

Pope Francis Visits the US

PHOTO:Pope Francis places a white rose on the names of the September 11 victims at the edge of the South Pool of the 9/11 memorial in New York, Sept. 25, 2015.

One of the biggest moments of national excitement came when Pope Francis made his inaugural visit to the United States, sweeping the country up in a serious case of Pope-mania. His visit started in Washington, D.C., after a trip to Cuba, and he went on to visit New York and Philadelphia before returning to the Vatican. Some of the highlights of the trip included a historic address to Congress, frequent rides in his Fiat and a particularly memorable moment shared with a baby girl dressed up like a pope.

WASHINGTON 9/23/2015

President Obama welcomed Pope Francis to the White House during the pope’s first visit to the United States.

Another Terror Attack in Paris

PHOTO:A photo shows a makeshift memorial for a tribute to the victims of a series of deadly attacks in Paris, in front of the Carillon cafe in Paris, Nov. 23, 2015.

A series of coordinated terror attacks struck fear through the heart of the French capital on Friday Nov. 13. A combination of shooters and men wearing explosive vests targeted a football stadium, restaurants and a concert venue that evening, leaving 130 people dead.

French officials determined that the attackers had ties to ISIS, which has claimed responsibility. The alleged ringleader of the attacks was killed five days later when authorities raided his apartment in the northern Paris suburb of Saint-Denis. An international manhunt is still underway at this time for at least one other suspect.

GREECE-MACEDONIA BORDER, NEAR IDOMENI, GREECE 8/26/2015

A child stood near police controlling a rush of refugees into Macedonia.

CLEARLAKE, CALIF. 8/3/2015

A firefighter was silhouetted by his headlamp as he battled the Rocky Fire, a wildfire that spread over three counties and burned over 60,000 acres.

HAVANA 8/14/2015

Workers hanging the seal of the United States at the reopened American Embassy.

TIANJIN, CHINA 8/15/2015

Rows of motor vehicles were destroyed in chemical explosions that killed 160 people and were strong enough to register on earthquake scales.

Russia’s air campaign in Syria has killed hundreds of civilians and caused massive destruction in residential areas, according to a report released Wednesday by Amnesty International.

SHANKSVILLE, PA. 9/3/2015

A new visitor center and museum told the story of Flight 93, forced down by passengers after it was hijacked by terrorists on Sept. 11, 2001.

BUDAPEST, HUNGARY 9/5/2015

A Syrian father, center, slept with his son and other family members on the floor of a bus driving from Budapest to Vienna.

HUNGARY-SERBIA BORDER, NEAR HORGOS, SERBIA 9/16/2015

A man tried to save his child as Hungarian police officers fired tear gas, pepper spray and water cannons at migrants trying to cross into the country.

BODRUM, TURKEY 9/2/2015

Aylan Kurdi, the Syrian toddler whose drowning off the coast of Turkey drew public sympathy to the refugee crisis.

KOBANI, SYRIA 10/27/2015

Nine months after coalition airstrikes and Kurdish fighters repelled an invasion by the Islamic State, the city was still in ruins.

MANHATTAN 10/21/2015

New York City police officers stood at attention as the remains of Officer Randolph Holder, who was killed on the job, were taken from a Harlem hospital.

WASHINGTON 10/29/2015

Representative John A. Boehner hoisted a box of tissues to laughter during his farewell remarks before the House elected Paul D. Ryan to replace him as speaker.

The Metrojet Airbus 321, bound for St Petersburg and carrying mostly Russian citizens, crashed in Egypt’s Sinai desert just 23 minutes after take-off from Sharm el-Sheikh.

PARIS 11/13/2015

A victim outside the Bataclan theater, where 90 people were killed during coordinated terrorist attacks that left 40 more dead across the city and in a northern suburb.

SAN BERNARDINO, CALIF. 12/7/2015

A candlelight vigil commemorated the 14 victims of a mass shooting by a radicalized Muslim couple.

BEIJING 12/8/2015

Schools were closed, driving restricted and factories shut down after China’s capital issued its first ever “red alert” for air pollution.

WASHINGTON 12/12/2015

The lectern in the Cabinet Room of the White House where President Obama announced a historic agreement among 195 nations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

RAMADI, Iraq 12/27/2015

Iraqi forces with U.S air support are taking back ‘some’ neighborhoods in the Anbar Province.

DALLAS, Texas 12/27/2015

Tornado devastation in Texas killing 48.

Photo essay taken in part from the two websites below, that offer additional text and photos.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/year-review-13-biggest-news-stories-2015/story?id=35852690 and http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/12/27/sunday-review/2015-year-in-pictures.html?_r=0