A Belgian man accused of being linked to the ISIS terrorists who massacred 130 people in Paris has been arrested in Morocco.

Government bosses say the man, who is of Moroccan origin, was arrested in the town of Al-Muhammadiyah near the city of Casablanca.

Morocco’s interior minister gave only the militant’s initial in Arabic and said he fought in Syria with al-Nusra front before joining ISIS.

The suspect spent time in Syria getting military training and building relationships with IS field commanders, ‘including the mastermind’ of the Paris attacks, and others who threatened attacks in France and Belgium, the ministry said in a statement.

The ministry said in a statement that the man was arrested on January 15 after travelling through Turkey, Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium.

They did not identify the suspect or explain his suspected relationship to the attackers, but his initials could be translated to J.A. or G.A.

The attacks against Libya’s biggest oil terminals were lethal and sustained. The last two weeks have seen suicide bombings, huge fires at storage tanks, and a hole blown in a major pipeline.

The oil ports of Es Sider and Ras Lanuf had been closed for more than a year, and the Islamic State militants advancing on them backed off after three days of shelling and clashes.

But the escalation of violence in Libya’s coastal “oil crescent” has underscored the threat to an energy industry that, despite the political chaos plaguing the country, still provides vital income to the state.

Oil is central to Libya’s livelihood and the power struggles following the 2011 overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi often focused on the industry. The OPEC member’s exports plunged from 2013 as armed groups began shutting down production to press political demands.

Last year, as two rival governments competed for power from Tripoli and the east, Islamic State gained a foothold in the city of Sirte and launched its first attacks against oil infrastructure.

The group has not taken control of oil fields, as it has in Syria. But it has pushed along the coast from Sirte, consolidating its presence in towns including Ben Jawad, just 30 km (19 miles) west of Es Sider.

“I think the danger is very grave, especially in Es Sider,” Mohamed al-Harari, a spokesman for the National Oil Corp (NOC) in Tripoli, told Reuters by telephone. “The area seems to be secure, but nobody can guarantee anything.”

The recent spate of attacks began on Jan. 4 with a double car bombing at a Petroleum Facilities Guards outpost near Es Sider. As the violence intensified, the NOC posted a “cry for help” on its website.

And as a precaution against further attacks, the company said on Thursday that it had sent a tanker to remove oil from the terminals, though guards, citing security concerns, had not granted it access.

The guards are a military sub-division created in 2005 and paid by the NOC. Their numbers swelled to at least 12,000 after the uprising, but analysts say their allegiances are uncertain and their fighting capacity limited.

At least 18 guards were killed in the recent clashes, and spokesman Ali al-Hassi told Reuters the force expected another Islamic State attack “at the earliest opportunity”.

With militants threatening to puncture defenses at Es Sider and Ras Lanuf, “there is a very real risk” of an attack on the still-functioning Brega terminal another 115 km (70 miles) to the east, said Richard Mallinson, an analyst at research consultancy Energy Aspects.

They could also potentially strike the oil fields of Sarir, Messla and Nafoura, which account for about 60 percent of Libya’s current oil output of just under 400,000 barrels per day, he said.

Libya produced 1.6 million barrels per day before the uprising.

DESTROYING, NOT HOLDING

So far, Islamic State has aimed to destroy infrastructure to damage state revenue streams and undermine a U.N.-backed Government of National Accord (GNA) scheduled to take power in the coming weeks, said Claudia Gazzini, senior Libya analyst at the International Crisis Group.

Islamic State’s Libyan forces, estimated to number in the low thousands, might not be able to seize control of oil facilities from the guards, she said.

But control may not be a priority. Libya’s oil industry is largely structured on exports of crude oil across the Mediterranean, so it is hard to make significant profits locally.

“They’re aiming to create a deficit of the public funds and create social and economic upheaval,” said Gazzini.

Es Sider and Ras Lanuf — with an export capacity of 600,000 barrels per day — were processing about 300,000 bpd before they were shut in December 2014 amid fighting that had already damaged some of the terminals’ 32 storage tanks.

Two more tanks were hit, and the fires spread to a further five during this month’s clashes. NOC spokesman Harari said the company had not yet been able to assess the damage accurately, but he estimated that up to 850,000 barrels had been destroyed.

Backers of the unity government hope the threat from Islamic State, which also claimed a suicide attack this month that killed at least 60 in the western town of Zliten, will push Libya’s myriad factions to unite against a common enemy.

“The fight against Daesh (Islamic State) and the fear of Daesh expansion, this is one of the consensus topics,” said UN Libya envoy Martin Kobler. “I see a growing tendency to rally behind the political agreement.”

But the agreement for the GNA still faces fierce opposition from some factions, and it is unclear how and when the government will move to Tripoli.

“It’s a mountain to climb for the GNA to establish legitimacy, even before we start talking about organizing security against Islamic State,” said Mallinson.

reuters.com

The Islamic State claims to have established “provinces” in as many as 10 nations beyond Syria and Iraq, with radicalized followers carrying out a growing number of suicide and other attacks around the world, from Paris and San Bernardino to Jakarta, Beirut, Cairo and Istanbul.

But it’s the Syria-based jihadi group’s expanding grip on one nation — Libya — that is proving most worrisome to U.S. intelligence officials, who say the number of foreign fighters traveling to join the so-called “Libyan Province” of the group also known as ISIS and ISIL has surged in recent months, providing a critical fallback fortress as Russia and the U.S.-led coalition battle the group in Syria and Iraq.

“There has been a pretty big uptick,” said one intelligence source, who said U.S. analysts are increasingly of the view that Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi is bent on expanding the group’s footprint in Libya, even as his hold on Syria and Iraq is seen to be coming under increasing strain.

“Libya is the next ISIS hot spot in terms of trying to control a serious amount of territory, as well as oil fields,” said the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity because internal U.S. intelligence assessments on the Islamic State are classified.

Other U.S. officials, who also spoke anonymously, said the drive to develop the Libyan “province,” centered around the coastal city of Sirte, halfway between Tripoli and Benghazi, is not a response to increasing pressure from the U.S. and Russian military campaigns against the group in Syria and Iraq, but a strategic decision to develop what amounts to a second homeland.

“The key thing to understand here is that this is not about fighters flowing out of Syria and Iraq because they’re under pressure from the U.S. coalition or other forces,” said one of the officials. “It’s not like a toothpaste tube getting squeezed.”

While it has become tougher for foreign jihadi recruits to reach Islamic State’s main theater in Syria and Iraq because of increased border controls, “what’s actually happening is ISIL leadership is telling jihadist recruits from around the world to go join the franchise in Libya,” the official said.

Libya descended into chaos following the U.S.-backed ouster of longtime dictator Moammar Gadhafi in 2011. Rival governments, and the militias that support them, have since vied for control of both the government and the country’s vast oil reserves, which are estimated at 48 billion barrels — the largest in Africa.

Thriving in a vacuum

While not aligned with Islamic State, an Islamist-leaning militia alliance overran Tripoli in mid-2014, forcing a more secular and internationally recognized government to take refuge in the nation’s east. The U.N. has since brokered a power-sharing deal between the two, but it’s unclear whether it will hold — or whether a new unity government will emerge with enough power to contain the extremists who have thrived in the security vacuum.

In addition to Islamic State, a host of other jihadi groups have exploited the chaos in Libya, including al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and Ansar al Shariah, the outfit widely credited with carrying out the Sept. 11, 2012, attacks on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi.

Since the attacks, which killed U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans, the Obama administration has generally avoided heavy engagement in Libya, but has authorized sporadic airstrikes and at least one clandestine U.S. special forces raid that targeted those deemed responsible for Benghazi.

The administration also says it authorized the strike in mid-November that killed Islamic State’s senior commander in the nation — an Iraqi named Wissam Najm Abd Zayd al Zubaydi, who was also known as Abu Nabil.

Al-Baghdadi, the Islamic State overall leader, is believed to have deployed Abu Nabil to Libya in September 2014 with the specific task of establishing a regional province loyal to the Syria-based “caliphate.”

A Pentagon statement in November predicted that Nabil’s death would “degrade ISIL’s ability to meet the group’s objectives in Libya, including recruiting new ISIL members, establishing bases and planning external attacks on the United States.”

But the group’s recent surge in Libya suggests the assassination had little impact, and analysts say that, overall, the Western counterterrorism response in Libya has been limited even as Islamic State’s base has grown.

“As a result, what we’re seeing is an expansion of ISIS and other jihadist groups,” said Seth Jones, who heads the International Security and Defense Policy Center at the Rand Corp. “A drone strike here or there is not really doing much, when, ideally, you want to be taking back territory.”

Taking on jihadi rivals

Islamic State first announced its presence in Libya in early 2015, when it circulated a grisly, slickly produced propaganda video showing the beheading of 21 Egyptian Coptic Christians on a Mediterranean beach in the nation.

A report last year by the Quilliam Foundation, a British counterextremism think tank, found that Islamic State leaders used the video to lure fighters away from other — less media-savvy — jihadi groups operating in Libya.

Islamic State leaders in Syria and Iraq viewed Libya as a “source of great potential due to its asset wealth, strategic location and immense amount of weaponry still present there following the overthrow” of Gadhafi, according to the foundation, citing a strategy document that had circulated among Islamic State supporters in January 2015.

The document circulated emphasized how successful exploitation of Libya would relieve pressure on the central “caliphate” and would help the group defend against the “crusader coalition” of nations trying to destroy it. Islamic State fighters would be able to reach Europe “even by rudimentary boat” from Libya’s long coastline, the document said, describing the nation as an unparalleled platform for launching attacks on European states and shipping lines.

It also framed Libya as the geographic “key” to long-term jihadi penetration deep into Africa, including into Egypt, Tunisia, Sudan, Mali, Algeria and Niger.

By last summer analysts estimated that some 5,000 Libyan jihadis had joined with the Islamic State in Libya. The figure is seen to have grown significantly since then — as has the number of attacks being carried out by the so-called Libya Province.

The most notable came earlier this month, when Islamic State operatives detonated two suicide car bombs near the Es Sider oil export terminal on the Mediterranean coast. Many read the Jan. 4 attack as evidence the Libyan outpost is bent on trying to replicate the Islamic State’s success in Syria and Iraq, where the terror group has financed itself by smuggling oil from nearby fields and refineries.

While Islamic State has yet to fully seize any major oil operations in Libya, it has reportedly taken control of the strategic coastal town of Ben Jawad, roughly 20 miles from the Es Sider terminal. The terminal is near the heart of the nation’s so-called “oil crescent” between Benghazi and Sirte.

“Oil revenue has been a key component of ISIL’s economic viability, so it wouldn’t be surprising if ISIL tried to gain control of the oil crescent to augment its revenue streams,” said one of the intelligence officials who spoke with The Times.

The fight to control Libya’s oil riches could prove critical in the fight to come.

“If the Islamic State is able to gain access to those oil facilities and actually pump oil and sell it, that could be a potential game-changer,” said Bill Roggio, an editor of The Long War Journal published by the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

“That would make them the most powerful jihadist group operating in Libya — they’ll have a lot more ability to pay salaries to their fighters than al Qaeda has,” he said.

washingtontimes.com

Analysis: Having failed to form a unity government, Libya’s next challenge is to unite its many militias to defeat ISIL.

As the deadline for the formation of a government of national unity in Libya expires on January 17, the recent attacks, carried out by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group, throws into question the new government’s capacity to provide security for the country.

A peace agreement was signed on December 17 in which representatives from Libya’s two rival governments – the internationally recognised administration in Bayda and the unofficial Government of National Salvation in Tripoli – agreed on the creation of a Government of National Accord (GNA) within 30 days.

However, a series of devastating ISIL attacks rocked the country over a 10-day period beginning on January 4 and leading up to the January 16 deadline for the formation of the new government.

Between January 4 and 6, the group hit the oil infrastructure on which the country’s future economic prosperity relies. Two oil export terminals were targeted along the Mediterranean coast, at Es Sider and Ras Lanuf.

The facilities have a combined oil processing capacity of up to 700,000 barrels per day (bpd). Libya is currently producing less than 400,000 bpd, down from 1.6 million prior to the 2011 ousting of former leader, Muammar Gaddafi.

Car bombs were detonated at the gates of the terminals and shells were fired at oil storage units. The attacks killed 18 personnel from the Petroleum Facilities Guard (PFG), the militia responsible for protecting Libya’s oil infrastructure, and set seven oil terminals ablaze.

Each of the storage tanks contained an estimated 420,000-460,000 barrels of crude oil. The following day, on January 7, a truck bomb targeting a police training centre in Zliten, about 160km east of the capital, Tripoli, killed at least 65 people and wounded more than 100.

It was the most devastating terrorist attack in Libya’s history.

A power plant in Libya’s second city, Benghazi, has also succumbed to an ISIL attack in recent days, cutting electricity supply to houses and vital services such as hospitals.

On January 14, there were two more attacks against oil infrastructure: one against a pipeline south of Ras Lanuf, and the other, a shooting at a checkpoint outside the Mellitah oil terminal in the northwest, operated by Italy’s energy giant, Eni.

ISIL, say analysts, has been spreading its influence along the Mediterranean coast for several months. It has made the coastal oil town of Sirte its headquarters – having been ousted from Derna by rival Islamist groups in June – and has taken over the towns of Harawa, about 60km east of Sirte, Nufaliya, about 130km east of Sirte, and, most recently, Bin Jawad, another 20km east along the coast towards Es Sider.

The group is also fighting for supremacy in another key oil town, Ajdabiya, which would give it access to two more oil export terminals: Zueitina and Marsa el-Brega. ISIL launched a marine attack on Zueitina on January 10, but was repelled by the PFG.

ISIL has targeted oil infrastructure before. In March 2015, National Oil Corporation, the state oil company, was forced to declare force majeure on 11 oilfields in the Sirte basin, Libya’s oil-producing heartland, after a series of attacks on the fields.

The latest attacks, however, are by far the most worrying. Ras Lanuf and Es Sider are among the largest oil export terminals in the country, and the prospect of a resumption of shipments from the two facilities (which have been closed since December 2014 due to fighting between forces loyal to the two rival governments) has been lauded as one of the quickest ways for Libya to get its economy back on track.

ISIL struck the Es Sider terminal in October 2015, but did little more than attack the guards. Now, the armed group has proven that it can damage the terminals, hitting prospects of their reopening anytime soon.

Mellitah and Marsa el-Brega are two of only three currently functioning oil terminals – the third being Hariga in the northeast. If either or both of these are forced to close, it would further erode an economy heading rapidly towards bankruptcy.

“I’m extremely concerned about ISIL,” says Richard Dalton, former United Kingdom ambassador to Libya. “The peace agreement is a long shot, but everyone’s got to try to oblige the parties over which they have influence to abide by it.”

Oliver Miles, another former UK ambassador to Tripoli, concurs: “It’s very difficult to be optimistic,” he says. “Clearly there is a serious threat from ISIL both to Libya and potentially to Europe.”

The implementation of the December 17 deal has already hit problems. It is yet to be endorsed by the House of Representatives (HoR), the Tobruk-based parliament attached to the government in Baida. The heads of both the HoR and the General National Congress, the unofficial parliament in Tripoli, have spoken out against the agreement.

A nine-member presidential council has been appointed, headed by prime minister-delegate Fayez Sarraj. On January 14, the council appointed a security team to arrange for the relocation of the GNA from Tunis to Tripoli.

But the likelihood that the new government can resolve the security problems of a country not only targeted by ISIL but also divided between hundreds of often-competing militias is remote.

The Baida government has relied – in large part – on the military might of Khalifa Haftar, head of a group of militias known collectively as the Libyan National Army, and Ibrahim Jadhran, the head of the PFG.

Both men have often acted on their own initiative, and neither has been a proponent of the peace talks that culminated in the GNA.

Worse still, Haftar’s priority in the past 18 months has been to wipe out Islamist opposition to the HoR, however moderate – and Haftar and Jadhran themselves are rivals.

“Even if the new government is formed, which is possible, it is difficult to say it will be able to function,” says Mohamed Eljarh, a Libyan national and nonresident fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East.

“It might be able to move to Tripoli, but it will be difficult to exercise control over Libya. Given the realities on the ground, it is extremely difficult to imagine all the different groups being brought under one umbrella.”

Richard Mallinson, geopolitical analyst for Energy Aspects, agrees: “We’re a long way from a credible Libyan military under the authority of the government,” he says.

“Just as getting from an agreement on the formation of a unity government to establishing a government is a long and rocky path, the same has to be said for establishing a true national army, which is a concern for the rest of North Africa, and even for Europe.”

If Libya’s disparate armed forces are unable to pull in the same direction, and quickly, the growing threat of ISIL is likely to become increasingly unmanageable.

aljazeera.com

Israel, the Middle East’s sole but undeclared nuclear power, on Sunday remained pessimistic about the landmark Iranian nuclear deal with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accusing Tehran of still seeking nuclear military capabilities, destabilising the region and spreading terrorism globally.

Iran will continue to destabilise the Middle East and spread terrorism throughout the world, Prime Minister Netanyahu’s office warned after world powers decided to lift sanctions against Iran over its nuclear programme.

“Israel will continue to monitor Iran’s negative activities and will take all necessary measures to maintain its security and defend itself,” the Prime Minister’s Office said.

It warned that “Iran has not abandoned its aspirations to acquire nuclear weapons and continues to destabilise the Middle East and spread terrorism throughout the world.”

The historic nuclear accord between Iran and six major powers, struck in July last year, entered into force on Saturday as the UN confirmed that Tehran has shrunk its atomic programme.

Israel tried to prevent the accord, arguing the deal would not stop Tehran from developing an atomic weapon if it wished.

Iran has always denied the charge that it was seeking to build a nuclear bomb.

Unless there is an appropriate response to each Iranian violation of its deal with the six world powers “Iran will surmise that it can continue to develop nukes, destabilise the region and spread terror,” the prime minister’s office warned.

Israeli Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan said the deal’s implementation marks “a new and dangerous time in which Iran is free of most economic sanctions without having to stop its nuclear plan and without having to give explanations about its military activity as it had to in the past.”

Mr. Erdan alleged that Iran continues supplying arms to Hezbollah, Hamas and other terrorist groups, intervening in Gulf States’ internal affairs and violating UN Security Council decisions about developing ballistic missiles.

“This is a difficult day for all the countries in the region, which hoped that Iran will not be able to obtain nuclear weapons and stop its negative intervention in the area,” he was quoted as saying by Jerusalem Post.

“Israel will continue following and demand from the international community not to ignore Iranian violations, in order to ensure that they won’t be surprised like in the case of North Korea.”

thehindu.com

The Presidency Council led by prime minister-designate Faiez Serraj has postponed its announcement of the new national unity government by 48 hours.

The announcement, under the agreement signed in Skhirat on 17 December, subsequently endorsed by the UN Security Council, was supposed to have been made within 30 days – the deadline being midnight Saturday.

In its statement issued shortly after midnight, the Presidency Council said that it had been in continuous session since the beginning of the month, that it had been unable to meet the deadline but was giving itself another two days to do so.

There have been constant claims of heated rows within the council over names of the ministers and their deputies. The latest, allegedly, is over who becomes foreign minister.

It is said among the mass of Libyan politicians, activists, mayors who have been gathering for days in the lobby of the Residence Hotel in the Tunis seaside resort of Gammarth where the council is meeting that in addition to the nine-member Presidency Council, the government will comprise 22 ministers plus another 44 deputy ministers.

This makes a total of a massive 75, split equally between the country’s three historic provinces of Tripolitania, Cyrenaica and Fezzan. Additionally, the heads of 17 state institutions, such as the Central Bank and the National Oil Corporation have to be appointed (or reappointed).

For the past few days, the scene in the lobby has been akin to a medieval court with officials busy lobbying for particular interests or seeking preferment. Today, it was much more staid, with the various politicians and activists waiting quietly but expectantly for an announcement.

“It’s like a father at the hospital waiting for his wife to give birth, not knowing if it is going to be a son or a daughter”, said one politician hoping to be appointed a top ministerial post. “Except in this case we don’t know if the infant is going to be born damaged or with little chance of survival – or maybe stillborn.”

A number of Libyan mayors in attendance and even those working for the council expressed similar concerns.

Among them also there were rumours that the Libya Dialogue team who selected the Presidency Council had told it that if it did not chose a government by the midnight deadline, it would be sacked and new council chosen.

The rumour has not been confirmed.

libyaherald.com

As it turns out, Syria was merely a springboard for a much larger ISIS plan — replenishing terrorist coffers by taking over oil assets in war-torn Libya.

The terror group has largely taken control of the Libyan city of Sirte and its hundreds of miles of coastline, and has ransacked two key oil terminals in an attempt to wrest control from fragile Libyan officials, ISIS is banking on taking over these oil facilities, and is now reportedly recruiting its own oil and gas engineers.

Libyan crude should be an easier target than Iraqi oil, which has remained largely out of ISIS reach. If ISIS succeeds, it will have more revenues and more power.

Reeling from warring parallel ”governments” in a seething civil war, Libya is in no position to stop ISIS from filling the void.

Libyan oil officials say ISIS has ravaged oilfields south of Sirte, clashing with guards at key oil terminals, shelling storage facilities, and setting oil tanks on fire. All that’s left to do now is take over this part of the business in earnest.

Last week, ISIS targeted two of Libya’s largest export terminals—Es Sider and Ras Lanuf, which handle 80 percent of Libya’s oil reserves. Combined, they have the capacity to ship 500,000 barrels today, barring civil war and terrorist hindrances. For the past year, these two export terminals have been closed down, but ISIS has plans to reopen them—eventually.

After several days of clashes with ISIS and the death of at least 18 guards, Libya’s National Oil Corporation has regained shaky control over the terminals and scrambled to empty the storage tanks at Ras Lanuf as a precaution. Meanwhile, fires have been put out at both terminals.

So how are ISIS recruitment efforts coming along? So far, recruitment efforts are just in the planning stage, but if ISIS does manage to take firm control of these facilities, it may find a willing applicant pool from Libya’s plentiful group of desperate oil workers who felt the weight of unemployment for quite some time.

Can ISIS effectively take control of Libyan oil? To some extent, yes. The terrorist group already controls nearly 300 kilometers of Libya’s coastline west and east of the city of Sirte, which serves as its base in the country.

ISIS is also estimated by some to have around 3,000 fighters based in Sirte.

Given the ease with which ISIS apparently took control in Sirte and attacked the nearby oil facilities, there is a clear threat to two other key terminals, Brega and Zueitina, as well as two vulnerable producing oilfields that may be at risk, Amal and Nafoora.

If ISIS succeeds, it will generate significant revenues from selling Libyan oil domestically.

Libya has been in grave danger since the fall of Ghaddafi. Today, Libya is only generating half the oil revenues it was prior to 2011.

The chaos that has controlled the country since then has now metamorphosed into a civil war between two opposing governments–the internationally-recognized Council of Deputies based in Tobruk and the General National Congress (GNC) based in Tripoli. A peaceful power-sharing agreement is nowhere in sight as neither can agree on how to spit the oil revenues.

The Islamic State’s play for Libyan oil could lead the warring governments to speed up a power-sharing agreement to end the civil war and unite them in the face of an even greater threat. Or, they could lose all to ISIS, which would allow the terrorist group to seize control of an OPEC country. There is also a mid-way scenario that gives ISIS control of the oil facilities around Sirte and a major interim boost to its operational budget.

usatoday.com

naharnet.com

Islamist organization al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) threatened Spain it would annex its enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla located in North Africa on the border with Morocco.

One of the leaders of the al-Qaeda branch, Algerian national Abu Obeida Yusuf Annabi voiced the threat in a video message, the Europa Press news outlet reported.

Last week, AQIM released a new video in which it threatened to attack Naples, Rome and Madrid. Spain’s major private intelligence and security firm AICS told Sputnik that al-Qaeda was trying to copy Daesh extremist group in order to recover the power it was losing to Daesh militants.

The al-Qaeda leadership cut ties with Daesh group, outlawed in many countries including Russia, in February 2014.