Boko Haram + ISIS = Marriage from Hell

For sheer cruelty, they are well matched. They also share an apocalyptic "end-of-days" vision. Now there are signs that Boko Haram -- the most feared group in West Africa -- may be edging toward a formal pledge of allegiance to the self-declared Caliph of the Islamic State, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

Observers of Boko Haram, which has inflicted years of terror on northern Nigeria, note that its actions in the last six months have frequently mimicked those of ISIS -- from punishments such as stoning and beheading of its victims to taking territory and an increasingly sophisticated use of social media that's very much in the ISIS "style."

The latest sign that Boko Haram is wooing ISIS came on Sunday with a series of tweets released by jihadist site Afriqiyah Media, which declared its own allegiance to ISIS in December. One tweet quoted Boko Haram's own media arm as saying: "We give you glad tidings that the group's Shurah Council is at the stage of consulting and studying, and we will let you know soon the group's decision in respect to pledging allegiance to the Caliph of the Muslims Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, may Allah preserve him," according to a translation by SITE Intelligence.

The message was purportedly posted on February 9.

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It's an unusual if unverifiable commentary on Boko Haram's internal processes. Jacob Zenn, who follows Boko Haram's operations and propaganda closely, says, "It is possible that due to factions within Boko Haram the shura was unable to come to an agreement at this point."

"Despite this," Zenn told CNN, "It's clear Boko Haram is leaning toward ISIS in terms of doctrine, ideology and an emphasis on holding territory after operations."

In August last year, Boko Haram declared its own "caliphate" -- after seizing the area around Gwoza in Borno state.

At other times its media arm has spoken of the "Islamic State in Africa" and the "Islamic State in West Africa."

Polished media

In terms of ideology, Boko Haram's leader Abubakar Shekau has said that kidnappings and hostage-taking are approved in the Quran, a claim ISIS also makes. "Our hostages are Christians or corrupted Muslims who follow the Christian way," he said last year, referring to the schoolgirls kidnapped in Chibok, Nigeria, most of whom remain missing. ISIS later referred to the Chibok abductions in its kidnapping of hundreds of Yazidi women and girls.

Zenn and other analysts point out that recent Boko Haram videos have resembled the polished media productions of ISIS. Zenn notes they "have the same choreography and lens angles as ISIS, particularly its video of John Cantlie in Kobani."

The group's latest production -- released at the weekend and showing fighting around the town of Baga in Borno state -- was a high-definition offering with advanced graphics, audio effects and gratuitous brutality that could easily have been produced by ISIS. Boko Haram has also begun distributing photographs and videos through its Twitter accounts, (one of which was no longer accessible Tuesday, February 24.)

Boko Haram has begun using ISIS symbolism in its media productions and operations. The Nigerian press noted with alarm last July that Boko Haram militants had been seen raising ISIS' rayat al-uqab flag along the Nigerian-Cameroon border. Recent videos have featured the same flag.

Nor is Boko Haram shy about appealing for help from ISIS. The message posted on February 9 requested the "mujahideen of the Islamic State to deliver our message to all Muslims that your brothers in Nigeria are calling you to immigrate to us, to assist us in managing the areas in which we have control and fight the alliance of the disbelievers."

A formal pledge of allegiance may only occur once a positive response is assured. Boko Haram's leader, Abubakar Shekau, has spoken in glowing terms of al-Baghdadi and ISIS, as well as al Qaeda, saying last July: "My brethren... may Allah protect you." A recent video from the group featured an image of al-Baghdadi in Mosul, Iraq, last year.

So far, the response from ISIS has been muted, especially when compared to al-Baghdadi's very public proclamation of "provinces" in Libya and Egypt. One reason may be that ISIS doesn't altogether trust Shekau -- whose pronouncements are often incoherent and meandering -- and perceives Boko Haram to be disunited.

ISIS may also be wary of Boko Haram's existing links with al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM); al Qaeda and ISIS are competing for leadership of the global jihadist movement.

However, some factions within AQIM have themselves pledged to ISIS, and analysts note that some prominent supporters of ISIS -- such as Shaybah al-Hamad -- have begun promoting statements and videos produced by Boko Haram.

Earlier this month, U.S. National Counterterrorism Center Director Nicholas Rasmussen told a congressional hearing that there was "increased intercommunication between Boko Haram and other terrorist groups in the northwestern part of Africa and even with ISIL," using another acronym for ISIS.

In an interview with the al Hayat newspaper last weekend, Libyan Foreign Minister Mohammed al-Dairi said that "groups associated with Boko Haram have been detained" in Libya and spoke of a "dreadful terrorist network between IS in Syria and Iraq, [partners] in Libya and Mali, and Boko Haram."

That may suggest the emergence of a broader front stretching from northern Nigeria through the Sahel to the Mediterranean. Boko Haram fighters already have experience in that region: a number joined the Islamist insurgency which seized the northern half of Mali in 2012 before being driven out by a French-led intervention force.

Pledging loyalty

Boko Haram already has a sophisticated smuggling network that reaches far beyond Nigeria -- into Cameroon, Niger and Chad -- and taking advantage of poorly policed borders.

Zenn, who is an analyst at the Jamestown Foundation, says the fact that Afriqiyah Media released recent messages may itself be ominous. He says it "is closely affiliated to Tunisian jihadist brigades that already pledged loyalty to Islamic State in 2014."

"Given ISIS penetration in Tunisia and Libya, and Boko Haram's logistical connections to North Africa," says Zenn, "it would not be surprising if North African jihadists helped make the segue between ISIS in Iraq and Syria and Boko Haram in northeastern Nigeria."

Further evidence of ISIS sympathizers in Tunisia emerged Monday, when the Tunisian Interior Ministry announced the arrests of about 100 alleged extremists, and published a video allegedly showing the group possessed a formula for making explosives and a photograph of al-Baghdadi.

It's estimated that between 2,500 and 3,000 Tunisians have traveled to Iraq and Syria, most to join ISIS.

Another part of Boko Haram's strategy that may borrow from ISIS is its concentration on creating its own space either side of international borders. Just as ISIS has carved out its "Caliphate" on both sides of the Syrian-Iraq border, so Boko Haram has focused on Borno state, which borders both Cameroon and Chad.

Shekau has castigated (as has ISIS) the colonial-era borders separating Muslims, saying once: "We don't know Cameroon or Chad... I don't have a country." And earlier this month he declared in another video: "O people of Cameroon! O people of Chad! Repent to Allah the Almighty. Know that one cannot be a Muslim but by disavowing democracy."

Once seen as an exclusively Nigerian movement, Boko Haram's horizons are broadening to the north and east, prompting closer military co-operation by the governments of Nigeria, Chad and Cameroon, whose latest offensive appears to be putting Boko Haram on the defensive in some parts of the border region.

When and whether there will be a formal alliance between Boko Haram and ISIS is still very much open to debate -- but at the very least the Nigerian group's shifting priorities, behavior and presentation is another sign of ISIS' far-reaching influence among jihadist groups.

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Actually, that's not in the Bible

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(SWB)NFL legend Mike Ditka was giving a news conference one day after being fired as the coach of the Chicago Bears when he decided to quote the Bible.

"Scripture tells you that all things shall pass," a choked-up Ditka said after leading his team to only five wins during the previous season. "This, too, shall pass."

Ditka fumbled his biblical citation, though. The phrase "This, too, shall pass" doesn't appear in the Bible. Ditka was quoting a phantom scripture that sounds like it belongs in the Bible, but look closer and it's not there.

Ditka's biblical blunder is as common as preachers delivering long-winded public prayers. The Bible may be the most revered book in America, but it's also one of the most misquoted. Politicians, motivational speakers, coaches - all types of people - quote passages that actually have no place in the Bible, religious scholars say.

These phantom passages include:

"God helps those who help themselves."

"Spare the rod, spoil the child."

And there is this often-cited paraphrase: Satan tempted Eve to eat the forbidden apple in the Garden of Eden.

None of those passages appear in the Bible, and one is actually anti-biblical, scholars say.

But people rarely challenge them because biblical ignorance is so pervasive that it even reaches groups of people who should know better, says Steve Bouma-Prediger, a religion professor at Hope College in Holland, Michigan.

"In my college religion classes, I sometimes quote 2 Hesitations 4:3 ('There are no internal combustion engines in heaven')," Bouma-Prediger says. "I wait to see if anyone realizes that there is no such book in the Bible and therefore no such verse.

"Only a few catch on."

Few catch on because they don't want to - people prefer knowing biblical passages that reinforce their pre-existing beliefs, a Bible professor says.

"Most people who profess a deep love of the Bible have never actually read the book," says Rabbi Rami Shapiro, who once had to persuade a student in his Bible class at Middle Tennessee State University that the saying "this dog won't hunt" doesn't appear in the Book of Proverbs.

"They have memorized parts of texts that they can string together to prove the biblical basis for whatever it is they believe in," he says, "but they ignore the vast majority of the text."

Phantom biblical passages work in mysterious ways

Ignorance isn't the only cause for phantom Bible verses. Confusion is another.

Some of the most popular faux verses are pithy paraphrases of biblical concepts or bits of folk wisdom.

Consider these two:

"God works in mysterious ways."

"Cleanliness is next to Godliness."

Both sound as if they are taken from the Bible, but they're not. The first is a paraphrase of a 19th century hymn by the English poet William Cowper ("God moves in a mysterious way, His wonders to perform).

The "cleanliness" passage was coined by John Wesley, the 18th century evangelist who founded Methodism, says Thomas Kidd, a history professor at Baylor University in Texas.

"No matter if John Wesley or someone else came up with a wise saying - if it sounds proverbish, people figure it must come from the Bible," Kidd says.

Our fondness for the short and tweet-worthy may also explain our fondness for phantom biblical phrases. The pseudo-verses function like theological tweets: They're pithy summarizations of biblical concepts.

"Spare the rod, spoil the child" falls into that category. It's a popular verse - and painful for many kids. Could some enterprising kid avoid the rod by pointing out to his mother that it's not in the Bible?

It's doubtful. Her possible retort: The popular saying is a distillation of Proverbs 13:24: "The one who withholds [or spares] the rod is one who hates his son."

Another saying that sounds Bible-worthy: "Pride goes before a fall." But its approximation, Proverbs 16:18, is actually written: "Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall."

There are some phantom biblical verses for which no excuse can be offered. The speaker goofed.

That's what Bruce Wells, a theology professor, thinks happened to Ditka, the former NFL coach, when he strayed from the gridiron to biblical commentary during his 1993 press conference in Chicago.

Wells watched Ditka's biblical blunder on local television when he lived in Chicago. After Ditka cited the mysterious passage, reporters scrambled unsuccessfully the next day to find the biblical source.

They should have consulted Wells, who is now director of the ancient studies program at Saint Joseph's University in Pennsylvania. Wells says Ditka's error probably came from a peculiar feature of the King James Bible.

"My hunch on the Ditka quote is that it comes from a quirk of the King James translation," Wells says. "Ancient Hebrew had a particular way of saying things like, 'and the next thing that happened was...' The King James translators of the Old Testament consistently rendered this as 'and it came to pass.' ''

When phantom Bible passages turn dangerous

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The dilemma over when to strike Mosul

While U.S. Central Command officials sketched a likely April or May time frame for a looming battle against ISIS in Mosul last week, other military officials tell CNN there are alternative strategies that involve a series of strikes in other locations before an all out attack on Mosul.

At the same time, new Secretary of Defense Ash Carter is making it clear he will not commit quickly to a time table, and wants assurances the Iraqi military is up to the task, a senior U.S. military official said.

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Carter wants to ensure military action is not ordered without strong indications Iraqi forces will be successful.

"If we begin this, and it doesn't work, it will be very bad," the official said of an effort to retake Mosul. "The secretary doesn't want it to go faster than the Iraqis are ready to go."

The official also underscored there is "not a broad consensus" among U.S. and Iraqi military and government officials about the tentative April-May launch or the first target city. In fact, some U.S. officials are quietly suggesting that instead of Mosul, which is a densely populated urban area, the first major target for Iraqi forces should be Anbar province and areas west of Baghdad that may not be as militarily challenging.

If Mosul were to be first target, the Pentagon would very quickly have to begin stepped up planning. Topping the to-do list is whether to recommend to President Barack Obama that a small number of U.S. troops be sent in to assist with targeting, which would bring the American troops closer to the front lines. A Mosul attack would also require additional intelligence, supply support and overhead reconnaissance flights increased so a daily list of bombing targets could be established.

The Pentagon and the Central Command, which is running the war, insist that even during a recent briefing for reporters that garnered global attention for mentioning the April-May time frame, it was never an absolute.

"In terms of the Mosul operation, we are still projecting that the shaping for Mosul and the isolation of Mosul is going on now," a Central Command official said during that briefing. "The preparation for the forces that will participate in Mosul is ongoing right now. And the mark on the wall that we are still shooting for is the April-May time frame."

But the official also offered a caveat.

"There are still a lot of things that need to come together. And as we dialogue with our Iraqi counterparts, we want them to go in that time frame, because as you get into Ramadan and the summer and the heat, it becomes problematic if it goes much later than that," the official said. "But by the same token, if they're not ready, if the conditions are not set, if all the equipment that they need is not physically there and they are trained to a degree in which they will be successful, we have not closed the door on continuing to slide that to the right."

A key will be having multi-sectarian units that are sufficiently trained to go to Mosul, rather than all-Shia brigades. The U.S. has already trained 2,500 of the Iraqi troops earmarked for Mosul or other operations, and has another 2,500 undergoing training. Mosul is estimated to require ultimately 20,000 to 25,000 troops but it's not likely they would all deploy at once.

Since the beginning of January, the Defense Department has shipped weapons to the Iraqi armed forces that will be available for use in the upcoming battle for Mosul, a Defense Department official told CNN.

This month the shipments include: 10,000 M-16s rifles, 10,000 M-68 close combat optical scopes to improve on the ground targeting, and 23,000 ammunition magazines, at a cost of about $17 million, according to the official.

"Thousands" of additional helmets and Kevlar vests are being shipped as well, in addition to 250 MRAP mine-resistant vehicles shipped in January and the 232 Hellfire missiles to Iraq sent this year. About 1,500 Hellfire missiles were shipped in 2014.

The official said the shipments were all planned, but the equipment will be in place for Iraqi forces whenever the battle for Mosul begins.

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Drug-resistant bacteria linked to 2 deaths

The deaths of two patients at a Los Angeles hospital are linked to the deadly bacteria CRE and more than 100 other patients may have been exposed to the drug-resistant superbug, a spokeswoman for the UCLA Health System said Wednesday.

Roxanne Yamaguchi Moster said in a written statement that seven patients at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center are known to have been infected by carbapenem-resistant enterobacteriaceae, and CRE was a contributing factor in the death of two of them.

The hospital is contacting 179 other patients who had endoscopic procedures between October and January. The patients have been offered tests for the aggressive bacteria they can take at home.

Moster said two scopes were sterilized to the manufacturer's instructions.

"However, an internal investigation determined that CRE bacteria may have been transmitted during a procedure that uses this specialized scope to diagnose and treat pancreaticobiliary (disorders of the bile ducts, gall bladder or pancreas)," Moster said.

The hospital notified the Los Angeles County and the state of California health departments when it discovered the bacteria.

The L.A. County Public Health Department visited the hospital to review procedures. "No infection control breaches were observed," the department said in a statement.

Some CRE bacteria can resist most antibiotics, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says on its website. The bacteria can kill up to half of patients who are infected.

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Bayelsa clash: Dep govn work out of memorial modalities with family

Yenagoa— Governor Seriake Dickson of Bayelsa State, has said that a state memorial service will be held in honour of Bayelsa women, who lost their lives in the Saturday tragic road accident along the Ahaoda axis of the East-West Road in Rivers State.

The governor, who described the accident victims as eminent women who played significant roles in the politics of the state, said the government was working out modalities for their interment.

He spoke as the Ijaw National Congress, INC, announced the postponement of the Ijaw Day celebration indefinitely in honour of the victims of the auto crash.

Dickson spoke when INC, its youth wing, the Ijaw Youth Council, IYC and the Bayelsa State Traditional Rulers Council paid him a condolence visit at Government House, Yenagoa.

Dickson, delegated his Deputy, Rear Admiral Gboribiogha Jonah to liaise with the bereaved families concerning the funeral rites of the departed.

He said: “The deputy governor, representing the state government will interact with the various families to discuss the modalities for the interment and what needs to be done from our end.

“We are thinking of organising some kind of state memorial service and I want to plead with all people of goodwill and our leaders to attend the service that we intend to hold in their honour before interment.

“The way and manner the interment will go will be essentially determined by the families.”

Expressing gratitude to sympathizers within and outside the state for their show of concern over the tragedy, the governor urged all people of goodwill to support the families affected by the incident.

He said on the part of the state government, “we are trying to console the families of our departed sisters, mothers and wives, all of them very eminent women in their own rights who were playing very important roles in the politics of our state and particularly in their communities and families.

“It is a very tragic and painful loss to our people, but in the end, it is also a huge personal loss to the families; spouses, children and to all their loved ones that have been left behind.”

- See more at: http://www.vanguardngr.com/2015/02/bayelsa-crash-dep-gov-to-work-out-memorial-modalities-with-families-of-victims/#sthash.XSxyibjD.dpuf

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