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@ISIDEWITH3 days3D
The US, UK and Ukraine may have been behind last Friday’s terrorist attack on a concert venue in a suburb of Moscow, which claimed lives of 139 people and left around 200 injured, according to the head of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB).Aleksandr Bortnikov told reporters on Tuesday that the authorities are currently trying to establish the identity of everyone involved in the attack, both inside and outside Russia.When asked whether the US, Britain and Ukraine could be behind the terrorist attack, the FSB chief responded: “We think that this is so. In any case, we are now talking about the information that we have. This is general information, but they [investigators] also have concrete results.”Bortnikov’s statement to the media follows a meeting of the expanded board of the Prosecutor General’s Office of Russia. The FSB director told reporters that the intelligence service will do everything necessary to identify the direct organizers and sponsors of the terrorist attack.On the evening of March 22, a group of men armed with assault rifles attacked the Crocus City Hall music venue in the Moscow suburb of Krasnogorsk, just before a concert by the rock band Picnic was due to start. The 7,500-capacity venue was almost full at the time of the attack. The terrorists killed guards, shot concert-goers on sight, then started a fire that quickly spread throughout the building.At least 139 people, including three children, were killed in the attack, the chair of the Russian Investigative Committee, Aleksandr Bastrykin, reported on Monday. Around 200 people were injured, according to the latest data.After the attack, Russian security services detained 11 people connected to the incident, including those believed to be the gunmen who carried out the attack.Moscow’s Basmanny Court has since arrested seven other suspects who are accused of helping organize the terrorist attack.
@ISIDEWITH6 days6D
The U.S. is trying to dissuade Israel from launching a ground assault in the Gaza border city of Rafah. Israel says it isn’t going to listen: Taking Rafah from Hamas is too important to its strategy for winning the war. The tensions show the mounting strains between the two allies over Israel’s conduct of the war in the Palestinian enclave. The Biden administration is hoping to persuade senior Israeli officials visiting Washington in the coming days that suppressing Hamas, which the U.S. and Israel agree is a terrorist organization, doesn’t require a full ground invasion of Rafah. U.S. officials fear the operation could become a bloodbath that adds to global anger over Israel’s war in Gaza. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Friday that Israel’s military would press ahead with a ground operation in Rafah with or without U.S. support. “We have no way to defeat Hamas without entering Rafah and eliminating the remnant of the battalions there,” Netanyahu said. His comments came after a visit by U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who warned against a ground assault in Rafah. “It risks killing more civilians, it risks wreaking greater havoc with the provision of humanitarian assistance, it risks further isolating Israel around the world and jeopardizing its long-term security and standing.”