British Jihadi Believed to Have Carried Out Suicide Attack in Syria
British officials believe that a British man linked to the rebel jihadi group Jabhat al-Nusra may have carried out a suicide bombing in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo. If the identity of the suicide bomber is confirmed it will be the first known suicide bombing carried out by a Briton in the Syrian Civil War.
The man, identified by Jabhat al-Nusra as Abu Suleiman al-Britani, reportedly drove a truck full of explosives into a prison wall.
From the BBC:
The al-Nusra Front said Abu Suleiman al-Britani had driven a truck full of explosives at the walls of Aleppo prison on Thursday and detonated it.
The bombing was reportedly part of an attempted jailbreak by fighters from the hardline Islamist groups, Ahrar-al-Sham and the al-Nusra Front.
Heavy fighting broke out between the rebels and Syrian forces, causing dozens of casualties on both sides.
Activists said as many as 300 inmates managed to escape, but the Syrian government denied the report.
According to reporting from The Telegraph, after a senior research fellow at the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation at Kings College in London reached out to Britons in Syria to confirm the reports he received the following text:
Lol, yes, news travels fast. The first British brother!
The Telegraph goes on to note that Charles Lister, a terrorism adviser at the Brookings Center in Doha, Qatar is "99 per cent" certain that al-Britani was killed in the suicide attack on the Aleppo prison.
Last December, I wrote about a Sky News report on a British jihadi group fighting in Syria. Members of the group claim that hundreds of British jihadis are fighting in Syria. Recently, a video emerged of a British extremist torturing a moderate rebel in Syria.
This week, the latest round of peace talks between representatives from the Syrian government and some of Assad's opposition began. According to Lakhdar Brahimi, the United Nations envoy, little progress is being made at the talks.
More from Reason.com on Syria here.
