Assailants burst into a large concert hall in Moscow on Friday and sprayed the crowd with gunfire, killing over 60 people, injuring more than 100 and setting fire to the venue in a brazen attack just days after President Vladimir Putin cemented his grip on power in a highly orchestrated electoral landslide.

The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the attack in a statement posted on affiliated channels on social media. A U.S. intelligence official told The Associated Press that U.S. intelligence agencies had learned the group’s branch in Afghanistan was planning an attack in Moscow and shared the information with Russian officials.

It wasn’t immediately clear what happened to the attackers after the raid, which state investigators were investigating as terrorism.

The attack, which left the concert hall in flames with a collapsing roof, was the deadliest in Russia in years and came as the country’s war in Ukraine dragged into a third year. Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin called the raid a “huge tragedy.”

    • tal@lemmy.today
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      8 months ago

      https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/22/world/europe/isis-moscow-attack-concert-hall.html

      After a period of relative quiet, the Islamic State has been trying to increase its external attacks, according to U.S. counterterrorism officials. Most of those plots in Europe have been thwarted, prompting assessments that the group had diminished capabilities.

      “ISIS-K has been fixated on Russia for the past two years,” frequently criticizing President Vladimir V. Putin in its propaganda, said Colin P. Clarke, a counterterrorism analyst at the Soufan Group, a security consulting firm based in New York. “ISIS-K accuses the Kremlin of having Muslim blood in its hands, referencing Moscow’s interventions in Afghanistan, Chechnya and Syria.”

      rolls eyes

        • Ð Greıt Þu̇mpkin@lemm.ee
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          8 months ago

          Kinda funny how everyone hates the islamists so damn much that even the US and Russia will still pass each other heads ups about possible attacks even while actively fighting a halfway proxy war.

          These fuckers just declared war on everyone and everyone responded with, "Ok, you’re now at war with all of us.’

          • locke@sopuli.xyz
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            8 months ago

            It would be a beautiful world if the all nations joined together in peaceful harmony and started beating the fuck out of islamistic terrorists.

            ♫ Imagine all the people ♫

            • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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              8 months ago

              Take out the word “islamistic” and I’m on board. That implies that the homegrown Nationalist Christian Terrorists that are attempting a coup in the US can be ignored, and as one of its citizens, I assure you those fuckers need the same treatment.

          • kautau@lemmy.world
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            8 months ago

            Part of the reason it was an embassy announcement. The US gov has a responsibility to protect its citizens. And if they had just passed this quietly to the FSB or something, nothing would have happened, but this both tells US citizens in Russia “yeah probably get out of there” but also puts the ball in Putin’s court in how he responds to the info, it’s a double play

        • tal@lemmy.today
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          8 months ago

          Nah, I mentioned it in another comment in this thread. We had a press conference and cleared it up. We did warn Russia about an attack earlier in the month, but that was a different one from this one.

          https://lemmy.today/comment/6912150

      • errer@lemmy.world
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        8 months ago

        I’m not sure why you made a turtles in time reference but now I have the character select music stuck in my head…

        • tal@lemmy.today
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          8 months ago

          Unlike most arcade machines, which typically only had positions for two players to play at once, it had four, and would permit for a third concurrent player.

        • Jesus@lemmy.world
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          8 months ago

          I recall that’s what happened when someone joined in during the TMNT arcade game

      • Bananigans@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        8 months ago

        Rampage really feels like it should be the go-to of 3-player arcade references. Too bad it doesn’t have any iconic lines.

    • current@lemmy.ml
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      8 months ago

      Russia has always been… not very tolerant… of Muslims in their borders. Cough cough Chechen genocide ca. late 1700s to 2010s