A congressional joint task force (JTF) investigating allegations of intelligence manipulation at U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) last week released an initial report detailing persistent problems in 2014 and 2015 with CENTCOM analysis of U.S. efforts to train the Iraqi Security Forces and combat ISIS in Iraq and Syria. The JTF found that intelligence products approved by senior CENTCOM leaders typically provided a more positive depiction of U.S. antiterrorism efforts than was warranted by facts on the ground and were consistently more positive than analysis produced by other elements of the intelligence community.

ISIS and its affiliate organization in North Africa have found a new source for munition materials: Digging up old landmines from the Second World War and using them to fashion IEDs for terrorist attacks. The retreating German forces under the command of Field Marshal Erwin Rommel buried about seventeen million landmines under the surface in western Egypt and north-east Libya.

Recruiters for violent extremist groups, just like screenwriters and marketers, use storytelling techniques to craft their messages. Analyzing those narratives and producing counter-narratives may be one way to cut the success of terrorist recruitment, according to researchers. “No matter what the context is — whether it’s terrorism or health communication or organizational communication — the principles of persuasion all operate the same,” say a researcher.

Between 2002 and 2015, more than 4,900 terrorist attacks were carried out by groups or organizations affiliated with ISIS. These attacks caused more than 33,000 deaths and 41,000 injuries. These attacks represented 13 percent of all terrorist attacks worldwide and, 26 percent of all deaths, and 28 percent of all injuries due to terrorism during the same time period.

Urgent action is needed to provide farming and livelihood support to 385,000 people in parts of Nigeria’s northeast where food insecurity is rampant, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said. The UN agency noted that more than three million people are affected by acute food insecurity in Borno, Yobe, and Adamawa States. Failure to rebuild the rural economy will translate into lack of employment opportunities with possible harmful consequences including youth radicalization and enrolment into armed groups, resulting in continued civil unrest.

A Sweden-based evangelical church has announced it would airdrop thousands of copies of the Bible onto areas of Iraq controlled by the Islamist ISIS. The church said it was part of an effort to “pass the hope and love of the Christian gospel” to people living under ISIS control. The church said the air drops were not a provocation, but was rather motivated by “unfailing and never-ending love” for all people.

Sakhawat Hossain, a former member of parliament from the Islamist Jamaat-e-Islami party, was earlier today (Wednesday) sentenced to death by a special tribunal for commanding a paramilitary Islamist unit which killed, raped, and tortured unarmed civilians during the 1971 civil war in Bangladesh – then called East Pakistan. Jamaat-e-Islami, East Pakistan’s largest Islamist party, openly opposed secession from Pakistan and campaigned for continued Pakistani rule over East Pakistan. A few thousands members of Jamaat-e-Islami formed armed militias – trained and equipped by the Pakistani military – and fought along the Pakistani soldiers against fellow East Pakistanis.

The brother-in-law of one of the gunmen who attacked the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in Paris in January 2015 has been detailed in Turkey, and deported to Bulgaria, on suspicion that he was trying to join ISIS in Syria. Mourad Hamyd was first arrested in January 2015 on suspicion that he was the getaway driver for the Kouachi brothers, who carried out the attack.

The 28-page section of the 9/11 Commission’s report, the only portion of the report not to have been made public, was finally released in July by the Obama administration (the section was, in fact, 29-page long). The heavily redacted version released to the public found an “indirect link” between a Colorado-based company associated with Prince Bandar bin Sultan, a key member of the Saudi royal family, who, for many years, wielded influence as the Saudi ambassador to the United States, and phone numbers held by an al-Qaeda member held over the 9/11 terror attacks. Money from a charity run by Bandar’s wife found its way to a Saudi man who helped two of the 9/11 hijackers settle in San Diego.