Good morning. I'm James Helmin from the Washington Post and this is the Daily

2002 for Monday, October 19. In today's news, Joe Biden leads President Trump in the polls, but so did Hillary Clinton.

Democrats fear deja vu.

Red state governors resist measures to slow the spread of the coronavirus, even his cases

surge.

And a federal judge strikes down Trump's plan

to slash food stamps for 700,000 unemployed Americans.

But first, the big idea. On August 5th, militants carrying the black flag of the Islamic State launched a daring land and sea assault on the strategic port city of

Mozamboa de Priya in northern Mozambique. In less than a week they routed

government forces and captured the entire town,

declaring it the capital of a new Islamic province. Days later, a different band of Islamist

gunman rampaged through a famous wildlife park for

giraffes in Kure and Niger just 35 miles from the country's capital.

Firing for motorbikes they killed people, including six French humanitarian workers.

The two attacks on opposite sides of Africa are among scores of violent episodes that have shaken

the continent and what experts are calling a breakout year for extremist groups affiliated

with Al Qaeda or the Islamic State. Less than two years after the fall of the Islamic State's self-declared

caliphate in Syria and Iraq, the terrorist group is attempting a comeback in

Africa with far-reaching implications for a region already beset by poverty, corruption, and the coronavirus.

At least three Islamist insurgencies are surging across broad swaths of territory,

from the deserts of the Sinai to the scrublands of the Western

Lake Chad Basin, to picturesque Indian Ocean villages and resort islands in the southeast.

...