Nigerian Taliban base overrun

AFP:

Fresh fighting broke out here Tuesday after Nigerian forces shelled a mosque and the home of the leader of an Islamic fundamentalist sect on the third day of fierce clashes that have killed more than 250 people, witnesses said.

Sporadic mortar fire and gunshots rang out as soldiers shelled the mosque and home of Mohammed Yusuf in Maiduguri, sending plumes of smoke rising over the capital of northern Borno State.

An AFP correspondent, meanwhile, witnessed soldiers shooting three young men dead at point blank range close to the city's police headquarters.

The men who had just been arrested were seen kneeling and pleading for their lives before being shot.

"The deafening sounds are from mortar shelling of the house of the leader of the Taliban by the military," a source at the police headquarters told AFP.

"The military is also shelling the mosque run by the group, which hundreds of its followers have been guarding," he said.

The shelling came as Nigerian security forces sought to end an uprising by the self-styled Nigerian "Taliban" which has said it wants to lead an armed insurrection and rid society of "immorality" and "infidelity."

...

During the assault security forces overran the home of the elusive sect leader Yusuf and a nearby mosque used by his followers.

"We are not sure whether he has been killed in the shelling or has managed to escape," a police officer said of Yusuf.

The fighting began Sunday in nearby Bauchi State before spilling over into Yobe, and authorities said 55 were killed in both states.

However, most of the casualties appear to have been in Maiduguri, the northeastern city known as the birthplace and stronghold of the Islamic fundamentalist group.

Clashes between security forces and radical Islamists there on Monday alone killed at least 206 people, a police source told AFP.

...

There is more.

You have to wonder if as they face death, they think about whether God decided it was not a good idea to start this mass murder thing. Or is their something about radical Islam that makes some people completely lose their judgment?

It does look like a relatively short lived jihad.

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