SPAIN ARRESTS SIX FOR AIDING JIHADOTERROR

XINHUA:

Six people have been arrested in Spain for allegedly providing support and helping to train fighters for terrorist groups in Iraq and elsewhere, the Interior Ministry said Wednesday in a statement.

The Civil Guard searched six houses in the northern Burgos province and found documents and computers used by the suspect, it said, adding that this is the first time Spain has shut down an internet-based terrorist operation.

The group collected funds for alleged terrorist groups, engaged in extremist preaching that justified terror attacks, recruited and trained people to conduct terrorist operations, and produced audiovisual material and leaflets for them, said the statement.

The group was led by two men from Algeria and Morocco, the Ministry said.

WASH POST/AP:

The five men and a woman, all from Algeria or Morocco, were arrested in or near the city of Burgos, the Interior Ministry said. The cell is unrelated to 22 people indicted Tuesday on charges of recruiting potential suicide bombers for Iraq. The new cell allegedly was led by an Algerian, Abdelkader Ayachine, who ran a Muslim butcher shop in Burgos.

In addition to recruiting potential fighters for Iraq, authorities said the group sought donations through the shop for people jailed in Morocco in connection to a May 2003 suicide bombing in Casablanca that killed 45 people, the ministry said.

Members of the group called themselves "Los Ansar," an apparent reference to Ansar el Islam, an al-Qaida-linked group that operates in Iraq, the ministry said. The Burgos group also allegedly distributed audiovisual material that praised jihad, or holy war, and used online chat rooms to recruit fighters for the Iraq insurgency. "The group basically worked via the Internet," Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba told reporters.

Spain said it is the first time its police had cracked a cell that relied so heavily on the Internet. Police searched six homes and seized documents, computers and other material.

The investigation began a year and a half ago, with Spanish security agents receiving help from colleagues in Sweden, the United States and Denmark.

NYTIMES:

The group was using private chat rooms and Internet forums to disseminate radical propaganda, the authorities said, and was recruiting people to fight in various locations, particularly Iraq.

It was also collecting money for Islamist prisoners, including some of those jailed in Morocco in connection with the May 2003 bombings in Casablanca that killed dozens of people and wounded more than 100.

THIS IS SIMPLY MORE PROOF THE ENEMY IN INTERNATIONAL IS SCOPE, UNITED BY THEIR IDEOLOGY: GLOBAL JIHAD.

WE ARE TRULY IN A GLOBAL WAR - REGARDLESS OF WHETHER OR NOT THE LEFT ACCEPTS IT.