CEP Senior Advisor Ian Acheson writes: The last time I visited HMP Frankland, where three prison officers were reportedly attacked and seriously injured by a terrorist yesterday, was in 2015. Then, I had been tasked by the government to investigate Islamist extremism in the prison system. The best way of knowing what is happening on the front line, far from the HQ bureaucrats’ reach, is to go there. And so I visited every high-security prison holding extremists – including Frankland, just outside Durham – to ask staff how they kept safe and what more they needed. I can still remember the chilling ordinariness of men and women in uniform explaining how they worked to avoid being taken hostage and murdered by dangerous ideologues who viewed them as available targets for jihad. One officer said that the only thing that kept him safe each day was not his employer but “sheer blind luck”.

ARD Tagesschau podcast on Active Clubs with Alexander Ritzmann
Young men meet in trendy sports clubs for fitness training and boxing or practise jiu-jitsu martial arts. According to experts, the so-called "active clubs" are primarily about fun and camaraderie, while also introducing them to right-wing ideologies of violence. Apparently, well-known figures from the right-wing extremist scene are behind this. In this 11KM episode, SWR reporter Florian Barth talks about the new phenomenon of "Active Clubs", in which right-wing activists apparently train for street fighting and a "system overthrow", how right-wing networks are organized and recruited throughout Germany and how security authorities are looking at them.
 

Dr Hans-Jacob Schindler on Russian interference in terrorist attacks in Germany about the need to regulate social media platforms in a more strict way, requiring them to pro-actively cooperate with law enforcement in Europe (starts 19.39).

Imam Abdullah S. has not committed any crimes to date. In the YouTube video, he also denies ever having advocated violence. However, Hans-Jakob Schindler of the research organization "Counter Extremism Project" expresses understanding for the Free State's harsh approach: The free democratic basic order could also be endangered "by targeted actions without direct calls for violence against the free democratic basic order."

CEP Senior Advisor Ian Acheson writes: Riots are, thankfully, relatively rare in the UK. This is in large part thanks to the deterrent effect of the British justice system’s quick and harsh sentencing for rioters. Before last August, the last widespread social disorder we had in this country was in 2011. Then, disturbances took root across the UK, sparked by the killing of Mark Duggan, a young black man who was shot by police. The state response to this unrest through the courts was punitive. Over 2,000 people were convicted. No comparable insurrection happened for another 13 years.

"A wide-ranging investigation has been opened into a terror attack that took place on May 31, 2024, in Mannheim, Germany. Anecdotal evidence suggests the attacker may have had contact with operatives inside Russia.

In this week’s episode of “The Hunt with WTOP National Security Correspondent J.J. Green,” Dr. Hans-Jakob Schindler, senior director at the Counter Extremism Project, says other terror events may be looked into as well."

CEP Senior Director Dr. Hans-Jakob Schindler spoke with RTL Nachtjournal about the closure of schools in the western German city of Duisburg following right-wing extremist threats.

CEP Nonresident Fellow Ari Heistein writes: "Despite rumors of high-level assassinations and the destruction of secret facilities, it is too early to declare the American campaign in Yemen a success. Still, there is reason to believe the Houthis have suffered a significant setback."

More ominously, the UN team also said that al-Qaeda had “established new training camps” in multiple Afghan provinces and had established “safe houses” in major cities such as Kabul. Fitton-Brown, the former coordinator of U.N. sanctions on the Taliban, told Just the News that “the U.S. is still stuck on this idea that the Taliban can be a counterterrorism partner” but that “there is a moral and practical hazard of trying to do counterterrorism work with the Taliban.”

Fitton-Brown, who is now senior advisor to the Counter Extremism Project, added that “if you go to the point of embracing allies of al-Qaeda to fight ISIS-K… it’s like treating a cold with a shot of malaria.”

CEP Senior Advisor Ian Acheson quoted: Ian Acheson, a former director of community safety at the Home Office, who previously said such games had become one of the main recruitment tools used by the far right, said the new precautions did not go far enough.

Acheson accused David Baszucki, the CEO of Roblox, which is valued at about $35 billion, of being “complacent” and said “vulnerable kids remain at risk”.