2006 and 2007 Tunisia clashes

On 23 December 2006 and 3 January 2007, Tunisian security forces engaged in clashes with members of a group with connections to the Islamist terror group Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC) in the towns of Soliman and Hammam-Lif south of the capital Tunis, killing more than a dozen people.[1][2]

Clashes

On 23 December, two Islamists were killed and two arrested in a shootout with police in the town of Hammam-Lif south of Tunis.[3]

On 3 January, at least two members of Tunisian security forces and twelve Islamists were killed, and fifteen arrested in a clash in a forested area near Soliman.[3][4]

Among those killed was the leader of the group, Lassaad Sassi, a former Tunisian policeman who had spent time in Afghanistan and headed a terror network based in Milan, Italy. Sassi's group had reportedly established training camps in the mountains in Djebel Ressas and Boukornine south of the Tunisian capital.[5]

According to French daily Le Parisien at least 60 people were killed in the clashes.[1] It was later revealed that the Islamists had been in possession of blueprints of foreign embassies as possible targets.[3][4] The attacks were the most serious by Islamists in Tunisia since the Ghriba synagogue bombing in 2002.[1]

References
  1. http://www.weeklystandard.com/terror-in-the-maghreb/article/14408
  2. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-17308138
  3. https://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/14/world/africa/14tunisia.html
  4. http://articles.latimes.com/2007/jan/13/world/fg-briefs13.3
  5. Botha, Anneli (June 2008). "Chapter 4: Terrorism in Tunisia". Institute for Security Studies. Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
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