PARIS.– A few months before being eliminated by United States special forces, the leader of the Islamic State (IS), Abubakar al-Baghdadipublished a final video in which symbolically passed the baton to his followers residing in distant countries. His self-proclaimed caliphate had been defeated, he acknowledged, but now it was up to regional terrorist groups to launch “revenge operations” around the world.
“Our enemies must know that jihad (holy war) will continue until the day of Judgment”he ordered.
Last week, the bloodbath caused by IS in a shopping center on the outskirts of Moscow It was the latest example of how Al-Baghdadi’s brutal prediction is coming true. While his Middle Eastern apologetic project lay in ruins, a constellation of affiliated Islamic states gains ground in many parts of the globefueled by a mix of old grievances and new ones, including the war in Gaza, according to the analysis of Western counterterrorism experts.
Until now, each of those groups has focused their terrorist efforts on their own regions. However, the most violent of all, the self-proclaimed Islamic State-Khorasan (commonly known as ISIS-K) seems to be specializing in external attacks. The group has sent operatives to Russia, Iran and Turkey while simultaneously planning attacks against European countries, and even the United States, according to reports from Western intelligence services. In the two largest attacks carried out this year, in Iran and Russia, ISIS-K jihadists targeted important groups of civilians, killing around 250 people. Both attacks were celebrated by the propaganda organs of the Islamic State as proof that the movement is gaining more and more importance.
These operations are the best way for IS to send the message to the world that it remains a relevant and deadly threat, several security experts acknowledged.
And Europeans take that threat very seriously. Contrary to the efforts of Vladimir Putin of ignoring the demands of the jihadist group with the aim of involving Ukraine in the brutal attack in Moscow, European capitals have begun to reinforce your security measures.
On the eve of the long Easter weekend, France decided to raise its alert level, being imitated by numerous of its neighbors. Four months before the Paris Olympic Games, the ISIS-K attack in Moscow brutally revived in the country the memory of the attacks launched in November 2015 by IS commandos against the Bataclan concert hall, as well as on the terraces of several Parisian cafes and at the Stade de France, causing 130 deaths.
“The police, the gendarmerie and the intelligence services will be ready to guarantee the security of the Games,” Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said on Monday.
Italy, Spain and Norway also announced additional measures on the eve of Easter.
In Germany, security measures “are already high”said this week the spokesman for the Ministry of the Interior, Cornelius Funke.
“The risk assessment of the intelligence services after the Moscow attack did not change. They were already very high before,” she declared, underlining that, after the October 7 attacks in Israel, “the Islamist scenario is even more in the sights of the German security services.”
According to German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser, at the moment, “The biggest Islamist threat in Germany emanates from ISIS-K”.
“Our intelligence services have controlled this terrorist group for a long time,” he told the newspaper. Southgerman newspaper. Last Tuesday, German authorities detained two Afghans in Thuringia (in the east) suspected of having prepared an attack near the Swedish parliamentin a context of high jihadist threat in that country due to what Muslims denounce as acts of offense against the Koran.
The two suspects are accused of being sympathizers of the IS ideology “since 2023,” according to the court. Asked about the security measures that will be taken during the European Football Championship in Germany (June 14 to July 14), Cornelius Funke stated that “security (during the Euro) is the main priority.”
In Italy, without giving precise details, the government decided “an intensification of surveillance and control activities” from the police forces, with special attention to important gathering places and sensitive targets” during the Easter holidays.
“We made a careful analysis of the terrorist attack in Moscow, in order to update the anti-terrorist prevention measures already in force,” the official statement stated. Participants at a meeting of the National Committee for Public Security emphasized “the importance of continuing surveillance activity, also on the Internet, to identify possible dangerous situations” in Italy. The text adds that “This prevention activity allowed 47 people to be expelled since October 7”.
For its part, Spain maintained its attack alert level at 4, on a 5-level scale. However, on March 20, the Ministry of the Interior announced a reinforcement of security measures throughout the country during Easter, a period in which numerous processions take place and the displacement of millions of people.
According to a report published on March 19 by the National Security Council (CSN), the official body of the Spanish State, The war in Israel and Ukraine pose “a real and direct risk” of “terrorist threat, violent (Islamic) extremism and the emergence of new movements of radical and violent ideology” in Spain and the rest of Europe. CSN experts indicate that the main threat to European security comes from terrorist groups of IS and Al-Qaeda.
The Norwegian police in turn announced that Your police would be exceptionally armed during Holy Weekafter a new report from its intelligence services evoking the possibility of jihadist attacks against churches and Christian meetings.
For specialists, the Islamist threat is protean and evolutionary.
“With the attack in Moscow we are witnessing the return of an intermediary threat, called ‘remote guided’with precise instructions given from an area controlled by jihadist fighters,” analyzes Vincent Nouzille, a terrorism specialist.
“ISIS organized distance, online military training courses. This allows people to train before taking action.”, he adds.
For historian Jenny Raflik, the alternation between large-scale attacks and ‘low cost attacks’ started by Al-Qaeda in the 2000s are still in force: “A planned, inspired, remote-guided attack… It is not new. It is the 1000-point strategy, an expression of the strategy proclaimed by Al-Qaida and later by IS,” he explains. And he concludes: “Depending on the opportunity and the situation, terrorist organizations will accentuate one or the other. “They will always try to develop both tracks.”
This diffuse threat, which is supported both by IS propaganda networks and a more structured logistical organization, has been reinforced thanks to international news.
“Jihadism in Western Europe has seen an increase in activity since the beginning of March, for no clear or obvious reason. But the signs are disturbing.”, observes Alexandre Rodde, specialist in security and terrorism. The expert points out that, in March, There were many more arrests in Europe. Especially in France, Belgium and Italy.