The most disturbing thing in the newly released 9/11 files is not how little the United States knew before September 11, 2001. It is how much it knew and still failed to understand what al-Qaeda was becoming.
The newly released 9/11 Commission summary of the President’s Daily Briefs, or PDBs, shows that years before the attacks, intelligence reaching the president warned that Osama bin Laden wanted to strike inside the United States. It reported that his network had infrastructure in North America, warned about hijackings, described operatives testing airport security and, in September 1998, raised the possibility that a group connected to the East Africa embassy bombings might fly an explosive-packed airplane into an American city.
That was three years before American Airlines Flight 11 hit the North Tower. The United States did not fail to notice al-Qaeda. It failed to understand what kind of enemy it faced.
Washington knew bin Laden was a threat. The CIA tracked his organization, the United States launched cruise missiles against his camps, the FBI investigated his supporters, and presidents were repeatedly briefed on the risks. But the files released this week show that al-Qaeda was still being viewed largely through the framework of terrorism we already knew: bombings, hostage taking, attacks against American facilities overseas, and hijackings in which terrorists seized an aircraft to make demands.
Reading these documents through an intelligence and targeting lens, the problem was not simply a lack of information. Important pieces were already there. The harder failure was recognizing that those pieces were describing an enemy that was innovating operationally, taking familiar terrorist methods and repurposing them in ways our assumptions did not account for.
The Warning Was There
Intelligence is rarely clean. A report does not become fact because it appears in a classified document. Analysts have to judge sources, weigh reliability, challenge assumptions, and separate credible reporting from rumor. The lesson in these files is not that we should have believed every warning. It is that the reporting changed before our understanding of the enemy did.
A July 1998 PDB summarized reports that bin Laden was planning attacks inside the United States, including possible attacks in Washington. The sources were considered highly questionable, but the possibility of a homeland attack had reached the president.
After the East Africa embassy bombings the following month, the reporting continued. An August 28 PDB said bin Laden’s network remained intact and that he was considering attacks in the United States. On September 1 came UBL’s Infrastructure in North America. Three days later, another PDB reported that bin Laden had associates inside the country.
None of those reports, by itself, predicted September 11. But by the fall of 1998, the reporting was repeatedly raising a different problem than the one Washington had spent years confronting overseas. Bin Laden was not only threatening Americans abroad. Intelligence increasingly pointed toward the homeland. That should have changed how later reporting was viewed.
The Aircraft Was Already In The Reporting
A September 10, 1998 PDB, UBL’s Location and Intentions, reported that bin Laden’s preferred option was to strike the United States on its own soil in Washington. It also contained one of the most significant pieces of intelligence in the files: a walk-in source claimed the group responsible for the embassy bombings in Africa might fly an explosive-packed airplane into an American city.
The assessment cautioned that there was no conclusive information about bin Laden’s future plans. That caveat was appropriate. The reporting did not prove such an operation existed, but it gave analysts a scenario serious enough to test.
The 9/11 Commission later found that the CIA’s Counterterrorist Center did not analyze how a hijacked or explosives-laden aircraft might be used as a weapon. It did not develop indicators for that type of attack, and the intelligence community did not establish collection requirements to look for them. The Commission noted that such analysis could have identified one of the terrorists’ critical operational requirements: finding suicide operatives capable of flying large jet aircraft.
That is where this becomes more than a missed warning. Intelligence does not always tell you exactly what the enemy will do. Sometimes it gives you enough to start working backward from the operation. If al-Qaeda wanted to use an aircraft as a weapon, it would need people who could fly. Those people would need training. They would need access to the United States and its aviation system. The plotters would need to understand airport security and might test it beforehand. Once you identify those requirements, they become things you can look for.
Three months later, more pieces appeared. A December 4, 1998 PDB, Bin Laden Preparing to Hijack US Aircraft and Other Attacks, described preparations for attacks inside the U.S. A senior bin Laden operative was expected to meet with counterparts in the U.S. to discuss options, while reporting described plans that could include hijacking an American airliner. Two members of an operational team had apparently evaded security checks during a trial run at an unidentified New York airport. Members of bin Laden’s network had also received hijacking training.
That was significant reporting: hijacking training, U.S. counterparts and an airport security trial run. Yet the expected purpose of the hijacking remained familiar. The aircraft would be seized to secure the release of imprisoned extremists, including the Blind Sheikh.
That assumption mattered. Al-Qaeda did not have to invent hijacking. It only had to change what hijacking was for. The possibility that the airplane itself could be the weapon had already entered presidential intelligence, but it did not become the framework against which later reporting was tested.
The Assumption That Failed
By 2001, the reporting around bin Laden had grown substantially. The August 6 PDB, Bin Laden Determined to Strike in US, is now one of the best-known intelligence documents associated with 9/11. Read alongside the files released this week, it looks less like an isolated warning and more like the culmination of a threat stream that had been building for years.
The brief said bin Laden’s followers had been told to “bring the fighting to America.” It reported that al-Qaeda members had lived in or traveled to the U.S. for years and that the organization apparently maintained a support structure that could aid attacks. It also cited FBI information showing suspicious activity consistent with preparations for hijackings or other attacks, while noting that the FBI was conducting approximately 70 full-field investigations throughout the U.S. that it considered bin Laden-related.
It was the 36th PDB item that year relating to bin Laden or al-Qaeda, but the first devoted specifically to the possibility of an attack inside the U.S. Five weeks remained before 9/11. The brief also noted that earlier reporting about a possible hijacking had not been corroborated. That caution was warranted, but by then new information was pointing again to possible hijacking preparations. At that point, the older reporting should have been reconsidered in light of the new threat picture.
If the 1998 reporting was wrong about why al-Qaeda wanted an airplane, that did not necessarily mean it was wrong about al-Qaeda’s interest in aircraft. Those are different intelligence questions. New information can change the significance of reporting that once looked weak or incomplete.
Another August 2001 PDB noted that bin Laden’s operational practices had become “expert and flexible.” That phrase deserves more attention. An enemy that is expert and flexible learns. Al-Qaeda had already demonstrated that it could spend years preparing an operation, adjust after setbacks, and give operatives flexibility in how attacks were carried out.
Bojinka is a good example. The 1995 plot to bomb U.S. airliners over the Pacific unraveled, but the idea did not disappear with it. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed had already been thinking about using aircraft as weapons while working on the plot, and he later carried that concept into the operation that became 9/11.
That is why you cannot hunt that kind of network by asking only what it did last time. You have to ask what it learned from failure, what it kept, what it discarded, and what it might do differently the next time. That was the larger analytic problem. The United States recognized al-Qaeda as a dangerous terrorist organization, but it had not fully adjusted to an adversary that was studying American systems, identifying vulnerabilities and adapting familiar tactics to exploit them.
What September 12 Made Clear
A PDB prepared hours after the attacks described mounting evidence that extremists in Afghanistan and the Persian Gulf knew bin Laden-directed attacks were imminent. Extremists reportedly knew a probable operation existed. Bin Laden and Taliban leader Mullah Omar had also reportedly clashed over bin Laden’s determination to carry out attacks, and bin Laden told Omar that he had operations underway that would cause great damage to the United States.
After the attack, those pieces fit together in a way they had not before. That is why describing 9/11 simply as a failure to warn does not go far enough. America was warned. The deeper failure was understanding the adversary well enough to recognize what those warnings could mean before the operation was complete.
That is what makes these files worth studying beyond another round of anniversary headlines. The United States knew bin Laden wanted to strike America. It knew al-Qaeda could plan operations over years. It had reporting on operatives inside the country, hijacking training, airport security testing, and even the possibility of an airplane being flown into an American city. No single report predicted September 11, but together they described an enemy adapting faster than our assumptions.
That is the lesson worth carrying forward. Intelligence collection gives you pieces of the picture, but collection alone is not enough. Analysis has to determine what those pieces mean, and targeting has to ask what the adversary must do next for an operation to succeed. Before September 11, the U.S. had important pieces of that picture. It did not connect them in time. That was the gap the hijackers flew through.

Osama Bin Laden

The 9/11 Files Show America Heard The Warning And Missed The War

9/11 commission

al qaeda

osama bin laden

september 11 attacks

Three years before the September 11 terrorist attacks, U.S. intelligence warned President Bill Clinton’s administration that Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda could attempt to attack an American city with an “explosive-laden plane.” 
That portentous warning is contained in a newly declassified intelligence report released Friday by the CIA as part of the agency’s largest-ever public release of analysis related to the 9/11 attacks.
<a href="https://www.cia.gov/stories/story/cia-releases-presidents-daily-briefs-in-commemoration-of-the-25th-anniversary-of-9-11/">The CIA released 71 President’s Daily Briefs</a>, files covering the period from February 1998 through September 12, 2001, giving the public an unprecedented look at what intelligence officials were telling presidents about bin Laden and al-Qaeda in the years leading up to the attacks.
The documents include a September 10, 1998, report titled “Bin Laden’s Location and Intentions,” which warned that al-Qaeda “may fly an explosive-packed airplane into a U.S. city.” The intelligence did not know the precise details of the eventual September 11 plot, including the targets, timing, or use of multiple hijacked commercial aircraft, but the newly public documents show that American intelligence agencies had repeatedly warned successive administrations that bin Laden was seeking to strike the United States.
The 1998 warning was one of a series of reports that now appear particularly significant in hindsight. A July 1998 report told President Clinton that reports from several sources indicating bin Laden intended to attack the United States were “plausible,” while a 1999 assessment examined whether the large number of potential al-Qaeda targets being reported could have represented an intentional deception campaign.
By October 2000, another intelligence report stated that bin Laden was “committed to striking U.S. targets,” while noting that the CIA could not pinpoint the targets or timing.
And just over a month before the attacks, July 24, 2001, one such report told President George W. Bush that an “expected imminent bin Laden-sponsored terrorist operation” had been postponed, while warning that preparations for other attacks could still be underway.
The documents also include the now-famous August 6, 2001, presidential briefing titled “Bin Ladin Determined to Strike in US,” which had previously been released and warned that bin Laden had been preparing operations against the United States for years. The newly released material provides additional context for that warning and shows that it was part of a much longer series of intelligence assessments about al-Qaeda.
The CIA said the documents demonstrate the difficulty intelligence officials faced in distinguishing meaningful warnings from incomplete, contradictory, and sometimes unreliable information.
Before 9/11, counterterrorism was not yet the dominant intelligence priority it would become after the attacks. CIA analysts had information indicating that bin Laden wanted to attack the United States, but they often lacked specific details about the location and timing of an attack.
The agency also faced concerns about “warning fatigue,” with officials worried about repeatedly alerting policymakers to potential attacks without enough concrete information to explain how the threats could be stopped.
The 9/11 Commission ultimately concluded that American intelligence agencies had provided numerous warnings about al-Qaeda but failed to understand the scale and immediacy of the threat. The commission described the failure in part as one of “imagination,” alongside problems involving intelligence collection, information sharing, and the government’s response to the warnings. The newly declassified documents do not fundamentally alter that conclusion.
The CIA said the release contains more than 100 pages of analysis that are now publicly available for the first time. “Today, [CIA] Director John Ratcliffe declassified 71 President’s Daily Brief products in commemoration of the 25th anniversary of the September 11th terrorist attacks,” the agency said. The agency described the release as its “single largest release of declassified CIA PDB products related to 9/11.”
“Twenty-five years ago, the 9/11 attacks struck a blow to our Nation, but they did not break us,” Ratcliffe wrote in the release. “Generations of CIA officers have since dedicated their careers to securing justice for our fallen Americans and ensuring al-Qaida would never again harm our country.” Ratcliffe also said the release was intended to honor both the Americans killed in the attacks and CIA officers who later died during the war against terrorism.
The President’s Daily Brief is among the most sensitive intelligence products produced for the White House. It provides the president and a limited number of senior officials with intelligence analysis concerning threats and other national-security matters.

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CIA Releases Never-Before-Seen Intelligence On 9/11 Terror Attacks

john ratcliffe

It’s been 25 years since September 11, 2001. But while the terror attacks may be seared into the memories of survivors forever, 9/11 remains a tragic piece of American history we can&#8217;t afford to forget.
“Everyone&#8217;s got a story,” human rights activist <a href="https://sujojohn.com/">Sujo John</a> tells The Daily Wire. He was working in the North Tower at the World Trade Center. He says he survived by the grace of God.
Excluding the hijackers, almost <a href="https://www.fbi.gov/history/cases-and-criminals/911-investigation">3,000 lives</a> were lost that day. But the deadliest attack on American soil saw continued fatalities in the aftermath. More than <a href="https://usafacts.org/articles/how-have-military-deaths-changed-over-time/">7,000 U.S. military</a> personnel were killed in subsequent wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, along with nearly <a href="https://costsofwar.watson.brown.edu/costs/human/us-military-veterans-contractors-allies">8,000 U.S. contractors</a>. Those numbers don’t even account for the hundreds of thousands of allied troops and police who were also killed, and the millions of veterans now living with severe disabilities and PTSD.
Immediately following the attack, the congested air and debris surrounding the 14.6-acre Ground Zero site in Lower Manhattan became toxic. Decades later, many survivors and first responders endure an ongoing nightmare.  
“Victims of 9/11 who were exposed to all that stuff have died,” John reminds me. “There was a <a href="https://nypost.com/2026/09/05/us-news/nearly-6k-lives-lost-to-9-11-related-cancer-over-57k-others-diagnosed/">study</a> in the New York Post that said some 57,000 people have responded saying they have cancer.” Reported diagnoses include recent spikes in cancers of the thymus gland in the chest, stomach and bowel endocrine cancers, and breast cancer in men. Cases in survivors total <a href="https://nypost.com/2026/08/31/us-news/9-11-cancers-skyrocket-nearly-1700-ahead-of-25th-anniversary/">28,913</a>, now surpassing 28,131 of those in first responders. 
A quarter-century later, it’s still a political flashpoint. “You&#8217;re dealing with radical Islam,” John says, citing <a href="https://jewishonliner.org/p/inside-cairs-2026-2027-back-to-school-guide?utm_source=chatgpt.com">the Council on American-Islamic Relations</a>’ recent direction for schools not to &#8220;talk about 9/11 as a terrorist attack.” John describes a reporter who asked him, “If you were to face a group of kids, would you tell them it was a terrorist attack?” He’s shocked this is even up for debate. “It&#8217;s crazy that we were talking about something like that.”
John and his wife Mary had just moved to America from Calcutta, India, in February 2001. They were young and wanted to experience a new city early in their careers. He got a job in the North Tower; she worked in the South Tower. 
“I wrote an email at 8:05 in the morning,” John remembers, pulling up a message to a friend from church on his phone. He asks if I’m a person of faith. I say yes. He reads, “This is my sixth month in this country. God has been so good to us in so many ways … Back in India, although I had a secular job, I was involved in ministry. If church doors would be open, I would be there … Here, all I find myself doing is going to church on Sundays. I&#8217;m so ashamed to admit that I&#8217;m not involved in anything. Maybe this is what God wants me to go through right now, waiting for his will and purpose.” 
He had just signed a life insurance policy the night before, waking his wife up to alert her, “If something happens to me, this is who you need to call. This is the paperwork. We&#8217;ll never talk about this again.&#8221;
John had found real success in a short period of time. Still, there was something missing. “In the business world, you chase success and success shows up and yet there&#8217;s a hole in your heart. And you can&#8217;t fill that thing with stuff,” he explains. He employs a bit of gallows humor. “God reads email, I guess.”
American Airlines Flight 11 crashed into the 93rd through 99th floors of the North Tower of the World Trade Center 41 minutes after he sent that message. His office on the 81st floor became a chaotic scene of fire and twisted steel as walls immediately began to collapse. There were rumors that a wing of the plane had ripped through their floor. 
“Ten thousand gallons of jet fuel, flying at 440 miles an hour. You can only imagine how loud that was. But we all thought it was a small commuter plane. Nobody thought it was a large plane, let alone a terrorist attack.”
The E train stopped just short of the subway station at the South Tower, where Mary was headed into work. She was four months pregnant at the time, and running a little late that day. She stepped out onto the street as people jumped to their deaths around her. 
After rescuing a woman who had been trapped in a crumpled bathroom stall, John and his company made the hour-and-20-minute trek down the stairs. “We pass all these firemen, policemen, and we high-five them, saying, ‘You guys are the real heroes. God be with you,’” he recalls. “We had no idea that that would be the last time we would see their faces.”
“If you&#8217;ve heard the story of two men that carried a lady down in a wheelchair, both of them worked with me,” he says, calling his friends Michael Benfante and John Cerqueira heroes. “They brought a lady who was working for Port Authority down 68 flights, and then the building collapsed. They ducked under a firetruck. They all survived.”
“Nineteen Al-Qaeda terrorists attacked America that day. And the first response came through these men. They showed the world what this country is made of.”
John heard the second explosion from the stairwell, as United Airlines Flight 175 struck the South Tower at 9:03 a.m. Cell phones were jammed, so he made a desperate move to call his wife from a landline in an Asian bank on the evacuated 51st floor. His friends wouldn’t let go of him, but he remembers someone remarking, “What’s life for Sujo without his wife?” 
Moments later, a firefighter forced him back down the stairs. John says, “I&#8217;m absolutely sure that man that came and alerted me didn&#8217;t make it out of the building.”
When his group reached the concourse level, John recalls, “In between these towers, we see this picture of death and destruction. Bodies and body parts lying there.” Not knowing if his wife Mary was alive, he exited his building and headed toward the South Tower. 
“That&#8217;s when the unthinkable happens,” he remembers. “I made it through these revolving doors when I hear this incredible roar. This is the South Tower imploding and going down. I&#8217;m saying, ‘Okay, this is it. I&#8217;m going to die here.’”
“But I had this tremendous peace that if I were to die, I would make it to heaven.” He prayed with people near him, choking on thick soot. “That&#8217;s when I feel someone pull me. He says he&#8217;s with the FBI.” The two men followed a red flashing light from a crushed ambulance, leading them out of the ash and debris.
The agent told him, “‘I’ve got to go back and get more people.’ He runs back into the North Tower. The ground shakes again. The North Tower collapses. This American hero died that day.” Special Agent <a href="https://www.fbi.gov/history/wall-of-honor/leonard-w-hatton">Leonard W. Hatton</a> was the only active FBI agent to die in the 9/11 terrorist attacks. 
“Both the towers have collapsed and I&#8217;m saying, why am I spared?” Several excruciating hours later, John’s cell phone suddenly springs back to life. “When I said ‘Hello,’ it&#8217;s my wife on the other side … God had spared our lives.”
He couldn’t be more grateful to have survived that day. Along with becoming the least likely candidate to launch a public speaking career around his story of resilience and faith (he laughs about his Indian accent), he founded <a href="https://youcanfreeus.org/">You Can Free Us</a>, a global initiative to fight modern slavery. With a heart dedicated to helping others, he’s “involved in ministry,” just like he wrote in that email the morning of 9/11. His outreach works to free children from international sex trafficking and forced labor, providing the resources for kids to finally be kids. There are cartels and mafias. Enormous amounts of money. Predators setting traps in the not-so-dark fringes of Instagram and TikTok, promising fake summer jobs and modeling contracts. It’s difficult work, but he does it with purpose. 
I ask if there was ever a moment that he felt the pang of survivor’s guilt. “For the first few days and weeks, yes,” he says. “You used to hear these church bells. You used to see these funeral processions. But as I look back … I look at different small ways God has used my life.”
“We look at life on Earth in terms of years. But life on Earth is so short compared to life after this life,” John says. “What is important is living every day at peace within yourself, at peace with your loved ones, and at peace with God. That&#8217;s truly the secret to living a life that has purpose.”

The 9/11 Lesson This Survivor Says America Is Already Forgetting

9/11

human trafficking

radical islam

world trade center

With the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks fast approaching, only two states out of 50 have mandated that schools teach the history of the horrific Islamic terrorist attacks.
While students in Florida and Arizona learn about the history surrounding the deadly attacks in New York City and at the Pentagon — as well as the fourth attempt that was thwarted over Pennsylvania by passengers aboard the hijacked plane — ten other states have laws that simply &#8220;encourage&#8221; such lessons. But as The New York Post <a href="https://nypost.com/2026/09/05/us-news/schools-flooded-with-9-11-retellings-that-focus-on-islamophobia/?utm_campaign=nypost&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_source=twitter">reported</a>, there is no specific direction regarding what form such a lesson must take — meaning that it could be something as simple as a moment of silence or a brief assembly.
What appears to be filling the void could be more concerning than a simple lack of instruction on the topic, however, as at least four states — Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Wisconsin, and Oregon — have recommended revisionist curriculum such as &#8220;<a href="https://www.gse.upenn.edu/our-expertise/teaching-beyond-september-11th">Teaching Beyond September 11th</a>.&#8221; Developed by the University of Pennsylvania’s Graduate School of Education, the curriculum devotes far more time and focus to the post-9/11 rise of &#8220;Islamophobia&#8221; than to the motivations behind the attacks in the first place.
&#8220;On the 11th of September 2001, 19 hijackers flew two airplanes into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York, one airplane into the Pentagon in Virginia, and a fourth into a field in Pennsylvania. A total of 2,996 people were killed, including the hijackers,&#8221; one passage reads.
It does not delve into radical Islamist beliefs driving the attackers, and its treatment of al-Qaeda mastermind Osama bin Laden is noncommittal at best: &#8220;The U.S. accused Saudi national Osama bin Laden, living in Afghanistan at the time, of being the mastermind behind the attacks.&#8221;
Lesson plans include topics like &#8220;Islamophobia and the Oval Office,&#8221; &#8220;Right-wing Extremism,&#8221; &#8220;Islamophobia in Global Context,&#8221; &#8220;Surveillance of Muslims,&#8221; &#8220;Civil Liberties after 9/11,&#8221; and &#8220;The Muslim and African Ban.&#8221;
One lesson singled out by The Post discussed a Danish cartoon depicting Muhammad — which sparked riots that resulted in more than 250 deaths — and asked students to consider how the media response to the deadly riots had &#8220;presented certain values as more important than the fact that the cartoons were offensive and racist.&#8221;
New York state Assemblyman Matt Slater (R-Yorktown) criticized the curriculum, saying, &#8220;Nearly 3,000 innocent people were murdered by al Qaeda on September 11th. They were the victims. The terrorists were the perpetrators. Any curriculum that blurs that fundamental truth, or makes the victims secondary to a political narrative, isn’t teaching history, it’s rewriting it.&#8221;

Hijacked Plane Crashes Into The World Trade Center

Only Two States Mandate 9/11 Education — Others Teach ‘Islamophobia’ Instead

Only Two States Require Standard Curriculum On 9/11 Education

education policy

islamophobia

politics

school curriculum

An unlikely alliance between Somalia&#8217;s al-Shabaab and Yemen&#8217;s Iran-backed Houthis is giving al-Qaeda&#8217;s wealthiest affiliate access to more sophisticated weapons while extending the Houthis&#8217; reach across one of the world&#8217;s most important shipping corridors.
According to a <a href="https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/iran-oil-houthis-shipping-terrorism-bfa4fd9b">report</a> from The Wall Street Journal, the two groups — both designated terrorist organizations by the United States — have forged a partnership of sorts that could create more problems in the Middle East and further destabilize global energy markets.
The bond has developed despite a longstanding religious divide: Al-Shabaab embraces Salafi-Sunni Islam — and the Houthis adhere to Zaydi Shiism.
Because Somalia and Yemen sit on opposite sides of the Gulf of Aden — through which 12% of the world&#8217;s seaborne oil passes — their alliance gives them a unique opportunity to create and control a backdoor passage for Middle East oil that currently cannot pass through the Strait of Hormuz due to ongoing hostilities.
Jibril “One-Armed” Yahya Ali, the report noted, served as a go-between funneling money from al-Shabaab — al Qaeda&#8217;s richest wing — to the Houthis in exchange for more advanced weapons and technology. As far back as 2023, Jibril was smuggling weapons out of Yemen and into the hands of al-Shabaab militants — but he was killed in a U.S. strike two weeks before the war with Iran began, and the question remains as to what will become of the growing alliance.
“You have al-Shabaab, al Qaeda’s largest and most lucrative affiliate, gaining access to more sophisticated weapons and training,” U.S. Gen. Dagvin Anderson, commander of American forces in Africa, told the outlet. &#8220;On the other side, the Houthis are extending their geographic reach, gaining a foothold that could further destabilize one of the world’s most critical economic chokepoints. This isn’t just a regional problem. It has global implications.&#8221;
Evidence of cooperation between the two groups dates back to at least 2022, according to international nonprofit <a href="https://www.facebook.com/ACLEDINFO/posts/are-the-houthis-and-al-qaeda-in-the-arabian-peninsula-aqap-cooperating-in-southe/1339005748246402/">Armed Conflict Location and Event Data</a> (ACLED). According to ACLED&#8217;s data, open hostilities between al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and the Houthis dropped off and never really resumed.
&#8220;ACLED data shows AQAP’s drone use has increased by over 300% since its first recorded attack in May 2023. Yemeni and international sources also report drone technology transfers from the Houthis, while United Nations reporting documents smuggling links between the two groups within a wider regional network that also includes al-Shabaab in East Africa,&#8221; the group shared in a February Facebook post, but cautioned, &#8220;Claims of a formal alliance or coordinated attacks remain weakly documented.&#8221;
In 2024, The WSJ reported that al-Shabaab sent Sheik Ahmed Elmi Samatar to work alongside Jibril in his smuggling efforts. &#8220;Samatar presented the Houthis with a lengthy weapons wish list, viewed by the Journal, which included shoulder-fired antiaircraft missiles, 107 mm Katyusha rockets, Dragunov sniper rifles, explosive attack drones, antitank missiles and U.S. night-vision gear.&#8221;
Efforts made by al-Shabaab to obtain more advanced weapons and technology were confirmed to the outlet by U.S. intelligence officials.
Weapons shipments were reportedly disguised as civilian products and sent across the Gulf of Aden via speedboat or even aboard fishing vessels, most of which docked and were unloaded where officials would not see them.
Several al-Shabaab militants have also spent time in Yemen, training alongside the Houthis in drone operations and other areas.
“I don’t know what their plans are, but there’s definitely something cooking,” said Brig. Gen. Ahmed Abdullahi Sheik, a former commander of Somali special forces — and his concern is clearly shared with U.S. military leaders as well.
So far in 2026, the United States has carried out at least 40 strikes against al-Shabaab targets in Somalia — compared with 41 such strikes carried out in total in 2025.

TOPSHOT-SOMALIA-UNREST-SHABAB

Two Of America’s Terrorist Enemies Forge An Unlikely Alliance

Two Of America's Terrorist Enemies Are Forming A New Alliance

al shabaab

houthi movement

somalia

world

yemen

Almost a quarter of a century ago, 3,000 New Yorkers died randomly, and then more people continued to die due to American imperialism, and that’s all there is to that.
This is how the sitting mayor of New York City frames the terror attacks of <a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/05/The_Falling_Man.jpg?utm_source=en.wikipedia.org&amp;utm_campaign=parser&amp;utm_content=thumbnail_unscaled">9/11</a>, in which 19 Islamist extremists tied to Al Qaeda hijacked four planes and drove two of them into the Twin Towers, killing thousands of Americans.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
Nearly 3,000 New Yorkers died on 9/11; 22 years later, the death hasn&#8217;t stopped.
We mourn our neighbors who died that day. The hundreds of thousands who died in the wars that followed. The unknown millions injured &amp; displaced.
In their memory, we work toward a better world.
— Zohran Kwame Mamdani (@ZohranKMamdani) <a href="https://x.com/ZohranKMamdani/status/1701209223000916034?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">September 11, 2023</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.x.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
To say he is a piece of sh*t would be courteous. 
The attacks of 9/11 used to be one of the only things Americans could agree on. They severed and cauterized the 20th century. They united a lackadaisical, bored country through a trauma bond that was supposed to never be forgotten. They changed America&#8217;s mindset, putting her on guard against those who wished for her demise. They were destructive, deadly, purposeful, evil, and we knew exactly who was at fault. The Islamic terrorists. Al Qaeda. Osama bin Laden. We vowed to kill each and every last vestige of that satanic cult, and never let it happen again.
But memory is a strange thing. Time dulls even the sharpest edges of a terrorist act, as children grow up who did not watch the towers fall, and an empathetic West, to a suicidal fault, becomes too forgiving. Forgiving to a point in which they start to blame themselves.
Which brings us to the pathetic leadership class of the Left in 2026, who haven’t just forgotten; they have forfeited. Relinquished every last molecule of honor and respect from their beings and handed the box cutters, forged identities, and fake bombs right back to the terrorists, then shoved them right back on the plane. <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/rolling-stone-hearts-pompous-piker-and-his-claptrap-commie-imagemaxxing">Hasan Piker</a>, the Left’s influencer, says <a href="https://x.com/EndWokeness/status/1967623571259441190/video/1">America deserved 9/11</a>. Zohran Mamdani, the Left’s collective communist terror-sympathizer mayor, says Muslims were the <a href="https://x.com/EndWokeness/status/1981783487540605374/video/1">real victims </a>of the attack. A socialist congressional candidate, Melat Kiros, recently said <a href="https://x.com/DSA_Watch/status/2071215777731231874/video/1">9/11 was inevitable</a>. An ex-MSNBC host and radical freak, Mehdi Hasan, <a href="https://x.com/iAnonPatriot/status/1891954104714268714/photo/1">posts</a> things like “Make American Planes Crash Again” on X.
None of these vile hacks, save for anchor baby Hasan Piker, were born in America. Yet they now live here and have outsized influence all over it.
The Left excuses comments like this more and more every day. There is a growing class of people who either believe Americans deserved what was coming to them, or that the attacks simply didn’t happen at all. In fact, if anything, it was just a minor plane malfunction, probably at the hands of the state of Israel, which Hasan Piker also <a href="https://x.com/Awk20000/status/1895492182355890218/video/1">says</a> deserves violence against it and its people.
They hate born-and-bred Americans because we are, generally, successful, and they prefer to see themselves as oppressed, though most of these ghouls come from unrelenting opulence that left them spoiled, ungrateful, and starved for drama. So they flee toward this flawed republic. They settle inside the “original settler sin” in order to prosecute the experiment. They are trained to do this from the moment they take their first breath. Mamdani’s parents, for instance, were postcolonial theorists and activists who spent their lives teaching their son, in the comfort of their million dollar compound, that <a href="https://x.com/DrewPavlou/status/1982244264513089986">suicide bombers</a> are a category of soldier rather than a category of murder, and that the <a href="https://x.com/realMaalouf/status/2090910888928710924/video/1">empire</a> must be struck back against by running for city council, then mayor, then corrupting, sapping, cannibalizing the empire that gave them unbounding freedom and prosperity.
They produce children who turn real victims into apologists, and attackers into victims. 
Nineteen men, following an Islamist creed, taking orders from a theocratic commander who had declared war on the infidel, hijacked airliners heavy with tens of thousands of gallons of jet fuel and drove them into office buildings packed with secretaries, bond traders, firefighters, dishwashers, and children. The planes punched through steel and concrete. Fuel sheeted down elevator shafts. An inferno was ignited. The temperature boiled flesh. Everyone above the fire was trapped. Some held each other. Some prayed. Some jumped 100 stories down. Some tried to call families they would never see again. Nearly 3,000 people were slaughtered by Islamic terrorists in a matter of hours.
This was not random. This was not an accident. This was not a conspiracy. This was not deserved.
This was barbaric. This was a deliberate mass murder of almost 3,000 Americans because 19 men’s religion told them to.
And almost exactly 25 years later, an Islamist mayor runs the same city that watched its citizens 
fall a hundred stories from its two tallest buildings, and frames the atrocity as a random day when people died. The true loss, in his telling, was the hundreds of thousands who died in the “wars that followed,” and the unknown millions injured and displaced.
He could not be more perversely wrong.
Zohran Mamdani is disgusting. And it’s disgusting that we forgot.

The rubble of the World Trade Center smo

We Forgot What Happened On 9/11

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President Donald Trump may be looking at potential strikes on another growing Islamic terrorist hotbed in the coming weeks — this time in the West African nation of Mali.
The Trump administration has reportedly been considering strikes against Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM), an Al Qaeda-linked militant group operating in the Sahel region that has attacked both local militias and international forces and has endeavored to enforce strict Islamic law throughout its areas of control.
The Washington Post <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2026/07/22/trump-administration-weighs-military-options-mali-officials-say/">reported</a> on Wednesday that the Trump administration is divided on military action — and said that one of those in favor of such is the current National Security Council’s senior director for counterterrorism, Sebastian Gorka.
One official did tell the outlet that, despite that division, the United States had been encouraging other nations in the region &#8220;to purchase U.S. equipment and services to support their war efforts against the terrorists.&#8221;
The entire region has been in a state of upheaval in recent years as a series of Russia-backed coups upended democratically elected governments in Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger — and the three nations have increasingly rejected ties with Western nations, instead joining together as The Alliance of Sahel States.
As The Daily Wire <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/they-kicked-america-out-now-theyre-being-hunted-by-jihadists">previously reported</a>, Niger overtly rejected the United States when President Joe Biden&#8217;s administration delivered an ultimatum just as the West African nation was inking a deal to provide Iran with Uranium. The Biden administration demanded that Niger cut ties with Russia and Iran, but the military junta running things at the time was disinclined to acquiesce. Instead, in addition to refusing Biden&#8217;s ultimatum, Niger ousted all remaining American military assets from the country — including a drone base that was used to target terrorists in the region.
Zineb Riboua, a research fellow at the Hudson Institute’s Center for Peace and Security in the Middle East, told The Daily Wire that the Biden administration&#8217;s presentation may have been the crux of the problem: &#8220;Instead of presenting it as an ultimatum, they could have presented an alternative. Instead of doing a uranium deal with Iran, why don’t you do one with the United States, and you get a school program or something in Niger, something they don’t have.&#8221;
But once the United States was gone, it was soon quickly apparent that the Russian security forces with whom they&#8217;d cast their lots were more of a liability than an asset. As previously reported, &#8220;The Russians were killing untold numbers of civilians and still somehow managing to cede ground to the jihadists. In fact, in Burkina Faso and Mali, the Russians and government forces actually killed more civilians last year than the jihadists.&#8221;
The situation has only deteriorated in the years since, leading to the current consideration of possible military action.
&#8220;We urge regional partners and NATO allies to support the Alliance of Sahel States in their war against JNIM and ISIS,&#8221; the Trump administration official told The Washington Post, noting that partnership with Russia had clearly only allowed the terrorist factions to fester and grow. &#8220;We hope that other African nations take note of Russia’s terrible performance in combating terrorism.&#8221;
When asked, Secretary of State Marco Rubio did not say whether he supported military action. Instead, the State Department said that the United States &#8220;unequivocally condemns the terrorist activity in Mali.&#8221;

Trump Says Israel And Lebanon To Extend Ceasefire By Three Weeks

Trump May Have His Eye On New Jihadi Hot Spot To Bomb

Africa

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The kind of third-worldist brainrot that has long been an undercurrent of America&#8217;s far-Left is having a moment.
The &#8220;Blame America First&#8221; crowd used to be confined to the fringes — coffee shop discussions of a million dead Iraqis, Jane Fonda manning a Viet Cong anti-aircraft gun, DSA conference speakers deriding Barack Obama as a war criminal for taking out Based Pan-Africanist Socialist Revolutionary Gaddafi — but now it dominates the Discourse. Podcasters and newsletter writers from Left, Right, and the schizo middle draw millions of clicks by asserting that American projection of force and pursual of interest is the root cause of all the world&#8217;s ills, from Russia-Ukraine to &#8220;genocide in Gaza&#8221; to the Islamic takeover of Europe.
Sadio Camara would likely agree with some version of that anti-Western assessment if you asked him about it. You can&#8217;t, though, because he got blown up by a car bomb last month.
Camara was the Minister of Defense in the West African country of Mali until his untimely yet instructive death on April 25. It was only a few years earlier that he played a key role in overthrowing his own country&#8217;s government, kicking out the United States (and even more so the French), and entering a security partnership with Russia and its mercenaries.
Mali is part of the Sahel region of Africa, alongside Niger and Burkina Faso. The average American could be forgiven for not caring much about this part of the world, but they should at least a little: it&#8217;s rich in rare earth minerals, resources like gold and uranium, and Islamic terrorists. They also sit along key migration routes from sub-Saharan Africa to Europe, which is to say that they have some bearing on how non-European Europe will continue to become in the future.
All three of those countries previously had democratic-ish governments that worked with the United States and France on counter-terrorism. You might recall the <a href="https://www.csis.org/analysis/dods-report-investigation-2017-ambush-niger">tragic ambush</a> in Niger that killed four Green Berets (and 4 Nigeriens) in 2017. Africa has really become a hotspot for Islamic terrorist groups in recent years, and the United States had a major presence in Niger to fight them (and smaller special forces operations in Mali and Burkina Faso).
Then, in the early 2020s, they fell one-by-one to Russian-backed coups that installed military juntas and severed ties with the United States.
&#8220;Move on from the colonial past and hear the anger, the frustration, the rejection that is coming up from the African cities and countryside, and understand that this movement is inexorable,&#8221; Malian government spokesman Abdoulaye Maïga told the UN in 2022. &#8220;Your intimidations and subversive actions have only swelled the ranks of Africans concerned with preserving their dignity.&#8221;
There is a little bit of blame to be attributed to Washington, D.C., at this point in the story. Under President Joe Biden, a delegation of officials visited Niger and more or less gave the junta an ultimatum: stop cozying up to Russia and Iran and work with us instead, or else. At the time, Niger was nearing a uranium agreement with Iran. (Surely that won&#8217;t be relevant down the road!)
They promptly told the Biden administration to kick rocks and booted what remained of America&#8217;s presence from the country, including one of our most critical drone bases in the region which we used to kill terrorists.
&#8220;For Niger it was just very abrupt and very aggressive. They felt that it was the same attitude that the French had,&#8221; Zineb Riboua, a research fellow at the Hudson Institute&#8217;s Center for Peace and Security in the Middle East, told me. &#8220;The military junta asked them to leave.&#8221;
&#8220;Instead of presenting it as an ultimatum, they could have presented an alternative. Instead of doing a uranium deal with Iran, why don&#8217;t you do one with the United States, and you get a school program or something in Niger, something they don&#8217;t have,&#8221; Riboua said. &#8220;A lot of these countries have unemployment issues, and they&#8217;re landlocked countries, so it&#8217;s very hard for them to do trade and be integrated in the region.&#8221;
Alas, with the Western colonial powers gone, things should have been on the upswing for the Sahel. We&#8217;ve got Russia (primarily via its mercenary forces, the Wagner Group) doing security and fighting the terrorists. We&#8217;re trading with Iran and China. All is well.
Then they got mugged by reality. The Russians were killing untold numbers of civilians and still somehow managing to cede ground to the jihadists. In fact, in Burkina Faso and Mali, the Russians and government forces actually killed more civilians last year than the jihadists. The security situation was deteriorating rapidly. Then, things really came to a head in April, with the offensive that killed Camara and countless others.
The April attack even resulted in Russia&#8217;s own mini-Kabul moment, with Russian troops fleeing the region, forced to leave large amounts of weapons behind.
The Sahel juntas, just a few years after declaring themselves strong, independent, anti-Western governments that don&#8217;t need no protecting from Europe and America, found themselves being overrun by Jama&#8217;at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM) and ISIS.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
🚨Urgent – 🇧🇫 Burkina Faso
Une dissidence d’un groupe entier du JNIM a été signalée dans le nord du Burkina Faso, avec son ralliement à la branche de l’État islamique dans la province du Sahel ( ISSP)
Le nombre de combattants concernés serait important. <a href="https://t.co/AXpAFcMsnS">pic.twitter.com/AXpAFcMsnS</a>
— Sahel Alerte (@SahelAlerte) <a href="https://twitter.com/SahelAlerte/status/2044491770755453039?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 15, 2026</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
JNIM are a group of Salafi-jihadist groups, descended in part from al-Qaeda, which now operates in territory larger than every U.S. state besides Alaska, primarily in Mali and Burkina Faso. They&#8217;re the ones who rolled up to Camara&#8217;s house and detonated a car bomb. They&#8217;re probably the closest entity we&#8217;ve seen to peak ISIS since its downfall, seeing as their specific goals are to expel foreign forces and establish a caliphate under sharia law.
Of course, there is still ISIS itself, which is also active here. ISSP (Islamic State-Sahel Province) has taken over large swathes of Niger, and even launched an attack on the capital&#8217;s airport in January (which also housed some Russian mercenaries).
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
The JNIM/FLA coalition attacked and took control of the Malian military base in Hombori, Mopti region in central Mali this morning. <a href="https://t.co/r0k9NrbSHl">pic.twitter.com/r0k9NrbSHl</a>
— Brant (@BrantPhilip_) <a href="https://twitter.com/BrantPhilip_/status/2049780359336763836?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 30, 2026</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
The Trump administration has signaled some willingness to get involved and try to rectify the situation, potentially with a mineral deal of some kind, but who knows if it will come too late. The Islamists are taking all three countries by storm now, and have killed nearly 80,000 people since 2019.
&#8220;We are victims of our wealth — the wealth that imperialists want to seize at all costs, aiming to keep us in slavery. We will secure it,&#8221; said Burkina Faso&#8217;s &#8220;Interim&#8221; President Ibrahim Traoré in 2024.
They probably wish they had stayed under the boot of Western imperialism after all.

TOPSHOT-MALI-UNREST

They Kicked America Out. Now They’re Being Hunted By Jihadists

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New York City&#8217;s Democratic socialist Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani has named Ramzi Kassem — an attorney who previously represented Al Qaeda terrorists — to serve as the city&#8217;s chief counsel in his administration.
&#8220;I will turn to Ramzi for his remarkable experience and his commitment to defending those too often abandoned by our legal system,&#8221; Mamdani said of <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/mamdani-taps-controversial-lawyer-who-defended-al-qaeda-terrorist-top-role-powerful-advocate">Kassem</a>, adding, &#8220;City Hall will be stronger with him in it, and our work of building a more prosperous city for all will have a powerful advocate.&#8221;
&#8220;My sincere hope is that New Yorkers who have long felt on the margins of this city, the homeless veteran straining to survive, the patient searching for the care that they need, an immigrant trying to get by will feel that they now have leaders in their corner who understand their struggles and care to fight for them,&#8221; Mamdani continued. &#8220;That is the city I want to build. The prosperity I intend to deliver and the leadership that has too long been lacking.&#8221;
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Kassem said that the appointment, to him, represented a chance to give back to the city he loved: &#8220;I grew up in war-torn countries in the Middle East, authoritarian regimes, and New York City was really my first stable and permanent home. This is an opportunity for me to repay that debt. I&#8217;ve been trying to repay that debt ever since I came to this country, ever since I immigrated.&#8221;
Critics argued that Kassem, who once represented al Qaeda terrorist Ahmed al-Darbi in court, was a strange choice to be chief counsel in a city that was devastated by an al Qaeda-linked terrorist attack on 9/11, 2001. Al-Darbi pleaded guilty in 2014 in connection with a plot to bomb the French oil tanker MV Limburg off the coast of Yemen. He was convicted in 2017, and in 2018, President Donald Trump&#8217;s administration transferred him to the custody of Saudi Arabia.
He <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/us-sends-saudi-detainee-linked-911-home-guantanamo-rcna19078">also represented</a> Mohammad Mani Ahmad al-Qahtani, who allegedly attempted to assist in the 9/11 hijacking and was held in detention at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, for two decades. Kassem, who was teaching law at City University of New York at the time, had been working with students over the course of a decade to get him returned to Saudi Arabia. They succeeded in doing so in 2022.
In more recent history, Kassem represented pro-Hamas Columbia University agitator Mahmoud Khalil — and prior to that, he served in President Joe Biden&#8217;s White House Domestic Policy Council as a senior policy adviser.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
NEW: Zohran Mamdani announced the nomination of Ramzi Kassem as Chief Counsel of New York City.
Kassem returned to America from the Middle East in 2001, inspired by 9/11 to defend an Al Qaeda terrorist.
“I found myself pulled in the direction of doing rights work domestically… <a href="https://t.co/Duxc04q3b3">pic.twitter.com/Duxc04q3b3</a>
— Wall Street Mav (@WallStreetMav) <a href="https://twitter.com/WallStreetMav/status/2006164780369781045?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 31, 2025</a></blockquote>
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New York City Councilwoman Vickie Paladino <a href="https://x.com/VickieforNYC/status/2006301115113947275">responded</a> to the appointment, saying, &#8220;Less than 25 years after thousands of New Yorkers were killed on 9/11, the Chief Counsel of New York is going to be an Islamist lawyer who came to this country after 9/11 specifically to defend the very Al Qaeda terrorists we were fighting against. The fact that our immigration system post 9/11 even allowed him to step foot into the country is a monumental failure. Disgraceful isn&#8217;t a big enough word for what&#8217;s happening here. The federal government must get a LOT more involved in New York. We cannot allow these people to go unchecked.&#8221;

Protesters Gather Outside Pro-Palestinian Activist Mahmoud Khalil’s Court Conference In New York

Mamdani Names Al-Qaeda Defense Attorney As New York City’s Chief Counsel

Mamdani Names Al-Qaeda Defense Attorney As New York City's Chief Counsel

The Daily Wire&#8217;s October lineup of film and television programming features three mission-oriented documentaries and a popular faith-driven horror-thriller.
“This year, we’ve been quietly curating a powerful content library that goes far beyond our world-famous podcasts,” said Mike Richards, Chief Content Officer and President of Daily Wire Entertainment. “What unites our growing slate is a commitment to telling great stories that speak truth, reflect the values our audience cares about, and give voice to those long underserved by the mainstream.”
Here’s what was released on DailyWire+ in October and what&#8217;s still to come:
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<h3>USS COLE: Al Qaeda&#8217;s Strike Before 9/11</h3>
This three-episode docuseries from BIG Media chronicles Al Qaeda’s suicide bomb attack on the USS Cole in October 2000. Based on the book “Front Burner” by retired Navy Commander Kirk Lippold, the series tells the untold story of a blast in Yemen that left 17 sailors dead and became the blueprint for 9/11. More than a tragedy, it was the warning America ignored.
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All three episodes are available to stream now.
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/show/uss-cole-al-qaeda-s-attack-before-9-11">WATCH USS COLE: AL QAEDA&#8217;S STRIKE BEFORE 9/11</a>
<h3>The 1916 Project</h3>
Over a century ago, Planned Parenthood was built on racist “population control” — targeting the poor, the weak, and the unwanted. This feature documentary, directed and produced by David Coonradt, shows how the organization grew into the behemoth it is today — and reveals how much it still has in common with the eugenic organization it was launched as.
<iframe loading="lazy" title="YouTube video player" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/u7otoZHOHXY?si=6j6Ag5IsdoP2ruKJ" width="560" height="315" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe>
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/videos/the-1916-project">WATCH THE 1916 PROJECT</a>
<a href="https://get.dailywire.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">JOIN DAILYWIRE+ TO STREAM THESE TITLES &amp; MORE. 40% OFF ANNUAL MEMBERSHIPS DURING THE FALL SALE</a>   
<h3>Nefarious</h3>
On the day of his scheduled execution, a convicted serial killer gets a psychiatric evaluation during which he claims he is a demon, and further claims that before their time is over, the psychiatrist will commit three murders of his own. Starring Sean Patrick Flanery and Jordan Belfi, directed by Cary Solomon, and inspired by the novel “A Nefarious Plot” by Steve Deace, this popular Christian thriller is sure to delight DailyWire+ audiences.
<iframe loading="lazy" title="YouTube video player" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/8vkFMdrtnsY?si=xiZIdNLiy-eYTy2t" width="560" height="315" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe>
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/videos/nefarious">WATCH NEFARIOUS</a>
<h3>Hiding in Plain Sight: America’s Trafficking Epidemic </h3>
Your children&#8217;s phones could be their greatest danger. &#8220;Hiding in Plain Sight&#8221; takes you inside the shocking world of digital predators who use everyday apps to hunt, groom, and traffic children from their own bedrooms. Produced by Our Rescue, the renowned nonprofit organization dedicated to combating sex trafficking and child exploitation, “Hiding in Plain Sight” offers unprecedented access to undercover law enforcement stings and harrowing survivor accounts. This documentary exposes how traffickers have turned the internet, including social media and online gaming, into hunting grounds — and why no family is safe.
<iframe loading="lazy" title="YouTube video player" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/AOS9VUHpDpE?si=V5uuOP25kv0e29N2" width="560" height="315" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe>
Directed and executive produced by Nick Nanton and produced by Katie Tschopp, “Hiding in Plain Sight” is streaming free on DailyWire+ starting October 30.
<h3>Friendly Fire</h3>
Friendly Fire is the next decade of The Daily Wire — unleashed. Ben Shapiro, Matt Walsh, Michael Knowles, and Andrew Klavan go head-to-head in a biweekly clash of ideas, laughs, and cultural combat, joined by special guests like Isabel Brown, Jeremy Boreing, and more.
It’s unscripted, unfiltered, and the loudest way to launch the next chapter of the movement.
Another episode of <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/show/friendly-fire?contentProgram=Friendly%20Fire%20%7C%20Tonight%207pm%20ET&amp;contentType=Show&amp;elementPosition=2&amp;location=Home%20Tab&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Home%20Featured%20Carousel">Friendly Fire</a> drops on Wednesday at 7:00 p.m. ET.
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Don’t miss other recent DailyWire+ releases, including:
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">&#8220;<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/bss-b2-bomber">How to Win a War in 37 Hours</a>,&#8221; a behind-the-scenes look at the top-secret operation that dismantled the Iranian nuclear program.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">&#8220;<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/show/the-pope-and-the-fuhrer-the-secret-vatican-files-of-world-war-ii">The Pope and the Führer: The Secret Vatican Files of World War II</a>,&#8221; a 4-part series hosted by Michael Knowles exploring the Pope, Hitler, and the Holocaust from a perspective you’ve never seen before.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">&#8220;<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/videos/journey-to-the-ufc-joe-pyfer">Journey to the UFC: Joe Pyfer</a>,&#8221; a documentary that follows Joe Pyfer’s experiences with homelessness, a toxic family life, and numerous injuries as he made his way to UFC stardom.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">&#8220;<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/show/ben-after-dark">Ben After Dark</a>,&#8221; a late-night show hosted by Ben Shapiro, featuring unscreened guests, unsolicited opinions, and unchecked sarcasm.</li>
</ul>
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Here’s What Dropped On DailyWire+ In October

Here’s What’s Coming To DailyWire+ In October

Ben Shapiro

daily wire

DailyWire+

Isabel Brown

Matt Walsh

Michael Knowles

planned parenthood

A single moment in time can define the future and impact lives in ways beyond the comprehension of many Americans. For the crew and families who suffered the unimaginable loss of their Sailor, that moment in time came at 11:18 a.m. on October 12, 2000. Those of us who directly experienced that brutal Al-Qaeda terrorist attack on our ship, that moment in time loops back to play over and over in our minds. Now, each of us who was there, along with many in the Navy and the nation, will pause to reflect on the past 25 years of how that moment affected our lives. We live with the crystal-clear memory of those who chose to serve our nation and died for our freedom. Their sacrifice remains paramount in our thoughts and prayers.
USS Cole spent a year training for deployment to the Mediterranean and the Middle East with a clearly defined mission — safeguard U.S. national security through presence operations and maritime interdiction of illicit vessels smuggling oil out of Iraq. The crew was really good, but I knew I could demand better of them and was relentless in achieving more. Ultimately, our standards of performance and training were higher than any ship on the Norfolk waterfront.
Sure, there was the typical Sailor grumbling and complaining that we were spending too much time doing drills and learning watch and combat positions beyond their normal duty requirements. Little did we know that the investment in ourselves would save a $1 billion warship and most of the wounded crew.
On August 8, 2000, with families and friends tearfully waving goodbye, the ship slowly maneuvered off the pier and began a voyage into the annals of history. That day, a new benchmark of performance was set in the U.S. Navy — USS Cole got underway with a 100% qualified all-enlisted crew manning every sea and anchor detail watch position. It was an incredible achievement, never done before and never repeated since. More importantly, that accomplishment left an indelible mark on a crew, now absolutely confident they were well prepared for anything that might come their way, including combat.
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Following port visits in Spain, France, Malta, and Slovenia, we transited the Suez Canal and the Red Sea to enter the Port of Aden, Yemen, for an expected 6-8-hour brief stop for fuel. Three garbage barges were contracted to remove trash. After the first two barges departed, a third boat that looked exactly like the previous two garbage barges approached and came alongside amidship. We had no intelligence, warnings, or indications that this boat was actually manned by two Al-Qaeda suicide bombers and packed with explosives built into the hull as a waterborne improvised explosive device.
Suddenly, that singular moment in time occurred. At 25,000 feet per second, the blast shock wave pierced the hull, rapidly expanding as a powerful ball of flame into the interior of the ship. In a split second, metal was rendered unrecognizable, bodies were crushed and mangled, burned by the explosion’s wall of flame. In that instant, heroes stepped in to save lives that were forever changed, and within hours, families would be notified of the worst news possible — their loved one had been killed in the service of our country.
<div id="attachment_987153" style="width: 778px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-987153" class="size-large wp-image-987153" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-1159689-768x576.jpg" alt="380160 02: (FILE PHOTO) A gaping hole mars the port sidee sustained by the Arleigh Burke class guided missile destroyer USS Cole after a terrorist bomb exploded and killed at least five people and injured 36 during a refueling operation October 12, 2000 in the port of Aden, Yemen. October 12, 2001, marks the one year anniversary of the attack on the USS Cole. (Photo Courtesy of U.S. Navy/Getty Images)" width="768" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-1159689-768x576.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-1159689-300x225.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-1159689.jpg 1024w" sizes=" (max-width: 768px) 100vw, 768px" />Courtesy of U.S. Navy/Getty Images</div>
Training paid off within an hour as the crew valiantly stabilized the ship, preventing it from sinking and becoming a war trophy for Al-Qaeda. That first day, the crew evacuated 33 wounded off the ship within 99 minutes after the explosion. Ultimately, 32 would survive. While on our own in the immediate aftermath, we were never alone. France deployed a lifesaving medical team, flying 11 wounded to advanced medical facilities in Djibouti. That evening, staff from the U.S. Fifth Fleet headquarters in Bahrain arrived to arrange for security and get food and water out to the ship. The next morning, the British arrived with a security and damage control team from the HMS Marlborough. Later that day, two U.S. Navy ships, USS Donald Cook and USS Hawes, arrived to provide help and logistics support.
For the next 17 days, the Sailors of USS Cole exhibited initiative and ingenuity as they continually braved equipment failures, system challenges, and, at one point, the loss of our only operating generator on Sunday morning after the attack. The ship began to sink. God love Sailor ingenuity. By late morning, we had cut a hole in the side of the ship near the waterline to pump out floodwater as we feverishly worked to refill our high-pressure air tanks to restart the generator. After a harrowing 22 hours, the generator was started, and USS Cole was saved, again.
<div id="attachment_987149" style="width: 854px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-987149" class="size-large wp-image-987149" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-1303030-844x576.jpg" alt="380441 07: U.S. President Bill Clinton speaks during a memorial service for the sailors of the USS Cole October 18, 2000 in Norfolk VA. Clinton attended the service to honored the wounded and dead from the U.S. navy destroyer that was bombed while on a refueling stop in the Yemeni port of Aden. (Photo by Mark Wilson/Newsmakers)" width="844" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-1303030-844x576.jpg 844w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-1303030-300x205.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-1303030-768x524.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/GettyImages-1303030.jpg 1024w" sizes=" (max-width: 844px) 100vw, 844px" />Mark Wilson/Newsmakers</div>
Finally, after proudly sailing out of Aden harbor blasting our national anthem and Kid Rock’s “American Bad Ass” over the loudspeakers, USS Cole was floated onto the heavy lift ship, M/V Blue Marlin, and brought back to the United States for repairs. As a testament to the bravery and tenacity of that crew, USS Cole still proudly serves our nation today. This past Christmas Eve, she returned from deployment after shooting down Houthi anti-ship missiles in the Red Sea and successfully engaging Iranian ballistic missiles being fired into Israel. USS Cole remains in the fight to defend freedom.
As with any single moment in time that can shatter or change lives, the attack on USS Cole should serve as a poignant reminder that our freedom is not free. Twenty-five years ago, the courage of a crew was tested in combat, and the results speak for themselves. As a nation, we remain blessed with those who choose to raise their right hand, swear an oath to defend our Constitution and protect our freedom at the cost of their lives. Today, I could not be prouder of my crew and their accomplishments — they are the true heroes who saved USS Cole and their shipmates. Well done!
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Commander Kirk Lippold, USN (Ret.), was the Commanding Officer of the USS Cole when it came under a suicide terrorist attack by al Qaeda in the Port of Aden, Yemen. During his command, he and his crew distinguished themselves by saving the American warship from sinking. This event is widely recognized as one of the most brazen acts of terrorism by al Qaeda prior to September 11, 2001.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.
<h3><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/episode-1-the-attack?contentProgram=USS%20COLE%3A%20Al%20Qaeda%E2%80%99s%20Strike%20Before%209%2F11&amp;contentType=ShowEpisode&amp;elementPosition=6&amp;location=Home%20Tab&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Home%20Featured%20Carousel">WATCH: USS Cole: Al-Qaeda’s Strike Before 9/11 on DailyWire+</a></h3>

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It has been 24 years since the deadly attacks on the U.S. that unleashed a decade-long war against Al-Qaeda and the hunt for its leader. Those who fought that war and participated in that hunt should be remembered and honored for it. 
I had the privilege to play a small role in the endgame of that search as we delivered justice to the killer of so many innocents. It is also good to commemorate the Americans who fell in battles with Al Qaeda before we acknowledged that we were, in fact, at war with that terrorist organization. Those pre-9/11 clashes included the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center and the 1998 bombings of the American Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. 
It was the Al Qaeda assault on the USS Cole in 2000, however, that is seen as a precursor to September 11, 2001.
In 1779, when a British officer demanded the surrender of the USS Bonhomme Richard, John Paul Jones — founder of the American Navy — famously retorted, “I have not yet begun to fight.” That retort has been the credo of American sailors ever since. And it epitomized the reaction of every crew member aboard the USS Cole to the attack on their ship.
Now, 25 years after the surprise attack, Big Media and DailyWire+ bring you &#8220;<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eTvFDubU86g">USS Cole: Al Qaeda&#8217;s Strike Before 9/11.</a>&#8221; The three-part documentary captures the crew&#8217;s courage, professionalism, and sacrifice during and after the assault on their ship.
<div id="attachment_981571" style="width: 1034px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/uss-cole-al-qaeda-s-strike-before-9-11-official-trailer"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-981571" class="size-large wp-image-981571" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/USS-Cole-16x9-keyart-1024x576.jpg" alt="" width="1024" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/USS-Cole-16x9-keyart-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/USS-Cole-16x9-keyart-300x169.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/USS-Cole-16x9-keyart-768x432.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/USS-Cole-16x9-keyart-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/10/USS-Cole-16x9-keyart.jpg 1920w" sizes=" (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></a>DailyWire+</div>
The documentary also provides insights into the efforts of the skipper of the USS Cole, Commander Kirk S. Lippold, and other military professionals, who navigate the limitations placed on their abilities to respond to terror threats in the pre-9/11 era, which are at once fascinating and deeply unsettling. Finally, the show documents the comprehensive investigation and relentless pursuit of the perpetrators in the wake of the attack.
The Al Qaeda attack on the Cole occurred on October 12, 2000. The U.S. Navy destroyer was making a routine refueling stop at the Port of Aden, Yemen, when a small boat carrying concealed explosives approached the port side of the ship. The two men on board made friendly gestures to sailors on the Cole, and then detonated their lethal cargo. The resulting blast tore a 40-foot-wide hole in the hull near the galley, at a time when many crew members were lining up for lunch. The explosion killed 17 personnel on the ship and injured 40 others. Al Qaeda claimed responsibility for the attack, which had been coordinated by operatives who had trained in Afghanistan.
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As shown in the Big Media production, the crew of the Cole responded to the attack with extraordinary bravery and professionalism, working to triage injured shipmates and to deal with the extensive damage to the vessel. Within minutes of the explosion, medical personnel were rescuing, treating, and evacuating the wounded, many of whom were trapped under collapsed bulkheads. Sailors, a number of whom were badly injured themselves, fought flooding and fires for more than 96 hours, working without adequate sleep or food, often in total darkness and with the threat of further explosions. They did this despite the loss of key leaders, demonstrating great technical skill and courage in extremely hazardous conditions. With the assistance of nearby British Royal Navy ships and medical aid from the French military, the crew members saved the lives of injured shipmates and kept their ship from sinking. Later transported back to the U.S. for repair, the Cole remains in service with the Navy today.
&#8220;USS Cole: Al Qaeda&#8217;s Strike Before 9/11&#8221; also recounts the FBI investigation into the attack on the Cole. The Bureau dispatched more than 100 agents, lab technicians, and counterterrorism personnel to Yemen. Working with local authorities, FBI officers conducted witness interviews and collected evidence that resulted in a determination that Al Qaeda was, indeed, responsible for the Cole attack. In fact, it was tied to an abortive attempt to bomb another Navy ship, the USS The Sullivans, in January 2000. By the end of 2000, two men suspected of masterminding the bombing were arrested. Both subsequently escaped from Yemeni jails but were later killed in separate American airstrikes.
Another planner of the attack, captured in 2002, was shipped to Guantanamo Bay, where he was charged with responsibility for the Cole bombing and other terror-related offenses. Additional investigations and prosecutions identified numerous unindicted Al Qaeda co-conspirators. U.S. authorities have continuously pursued the remaining suspects. 
The lessons learned from the ordeal of the USS Cole and the investigations resulted in significant changes to U.S. Navy force protection protocols and U.S. counterterrorism policy. The documentary raises a key question over whether one of the key factors that contributed to the successful terrorist bombing of the Cole — and to the 9/11 attack — was that we were paying attention to things that distracted us from the threat.
Before the first plane struck the World Trade Center, we, as a nation, had not yet begun to fight. But the men and women of the USS Cole already had. And it is right that we should honor and remember them for it. In its portrayal of their courage, heroism, and sacrifice, the Big Media telling of their story does just that.
* * *
Mark Kelton is the former CIA Chief of Counterintelligence.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.
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Before 9/11, There Was The USS Cole: New Documentary Recounts A Defining Attack

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