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Russia May Have Killed ISIS Leader, Scalise Remains In Critical Condition, Six Men Convicted For Role in Mumbai Bombings, And More
- Russia may have killed ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in
an airstrike last month, CNN reports. The airstrike—in Syria—was
carried out on May 28 and targeted Raqqa. "According to information that
is being verified through various channels, the leader of ISIS…Abu Bakr
al-Baghdadi was also present at the meeting and was killed as a result
of the strike," Russia's Defense Ministry said in a statement.
- U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise (R-LA) remains in critical condition
and is undergoing repeated surgery after being shot earlier this week
during a Congressional baseball practice. While Scalise is in the
hospital, authorities are tracking the path the gunman—James Hodgkinson,
who was killed in a shootout with police—took to purchase the firearms
he used for the shooting before traveling to Virginia. "Hodgkinson, a
Belleville, Illinois, home inspector who had been living out of his van
near the park, had a social media page filled with criticism of
Republicans and the Trump administration," The Chicago Tribune reports.
- An Indian court convicted six men for
their involvement in bombings in Mumbai in 1993 that killed 257 people
and wounded 800 more. Abu Salem, Mustafa Dossa, Feroz Abdul Rashid Khan,
Taher Merchant, Riyaz Siddiqui, and Karimullah Khan were convicted on
charges that they had transported weapons and planted bombs that
targeted buildings in Mumbai's financial hub.
- Some Muslim groups in Germany are conflicted about participating in a planned anti-terrorism
march this weekend in Cologne. The march, Nicht Mit Uns (Not With Us),
was organized by Muslim activists to take a stand against acts of
terrorism and violence carried out in the name of Islam. But Germany's
"biggest Islamic organization has said it would not take part in the
demonstration which it said amounted to an 'assignment of guilt' which
was in danger of splitting German society," according to The Guardian.
- After
recent criticism by government officials, Facebook announced that it's
developing AI and will hire a team of 150 experts to make Facebook a "hostile place for terrorists."
In a press release, Facebook said that it already is in the practice of
removing content and accounts associated with terrorism that it finds
itself, but knows that it can do better by using AI to stop terrorist
content from spreading. "We are currently focusing our most cutting edge
technologies to combat terrorist content about ISIS, al Qaeda, and
their affiliates, and we expect to expand to other terrorist
organizations in due course," Facebook said.
- U.S. President Donald Trump is expected to introduce stiffer rules for Americans traveling to Cuba
and prohibit transactions with companies controlled by the military,
reversing changes made under the Obama administration. The changes are
likely to make it more expensive for the United States to do business
with Cuba. They will also likely "place a distinct chill on the
relationship between the United States and Cuba that was just beginning
to thaw after a half-century of isolation and estrangement and thrust
the two countries back into an adversarial posture that is among the
last vestiges of the Cold War," according to The New York Times.
- In other news, a pair of escaped inmates were captured in Tennessee, Trump reversed his campaign pledge to deport undocumented immigrants who came to the United States as children, new data from WikiLeaks reveals how the CIA could hack wireless routers, British Prime Minister Theresa May visited London fire victims, and members of Trump's transition team were ordered to preserve documents and materials related to the investigation into Russian interference in the presidential election.
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