“If 650 hostages were freed, than this was a lot bigger than they would have us believe.  First we were told that Alqueda was dead.  Then Bengahzi, now this.  This would have taken a large amount of terrorists to pull off.  And why is Algeria going it alone?  I’ve heard the news say that Algeria is refusing help.  But that doesn’t make sense.  So what is really going on?  They are demanding the Blind Sheikh be released.  It was just days ago that Morsi was demanding obama to release this terrorist.  So what is really going on?”

By Elad Benari, Canada   Algeria has begun a second militaryoperation to rescue some 30 foreign hostages still captive by Al-Qaeda-affiliated group at a gas facility in the country’s southeast, Al Jazeerareports.

The second round of rescue efforts on Friday come as Algerian state media reported that more than 650 hostages had been freed as part of the army operation.

The state-run APS news agency said 573 of those freed were Algerians. Another 100 were among the 132 foreign workers captured at the In Amenas facility.

The Masked Brigade, an armed group who took hundreds hostage at the In Amenas facility, said on Friday that they would trade captives from the United States for the release of two terrorists jailed in the United States.

A spokesman for the group named the two as Aafia Siddiqui, from Pakistan, and Omar Abdel-Rahman, an Egyptian referred to as the “blind sheikh.”

The Mauritanian ANI news agency reported that sources close to Mokhtar Belmokhtar, believed to be behind Wednesday’s raid, had proposed that France and Algeria negotiate “an end to the war being waged by France in Azawad”, northern Mali.

Al Jazeera reported that the United States has sent a plane to the Algerian desert where it hopes to transport some of those freed to Europe for medical treatment.

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