Violence and Security

Jihadists in Africa Capitalize on Poor Governance, Corruption & Poverty

March 04, 2022

Expanding jihadist activity and resilience on the African Continent led to the recent decision by France to withdraw its troops from a nine-year counter-terrorism and peacekeeping mission in Mali, with the failure of the military mission in Mali reflecting many of the root causes--endemic poverty and contested access to natural resources, poor governance, and corrupt political elites.
Turkey-Pakistan Defense Cooperation Signals Convergence on Islamist Ideology & Power Projection

March 02, 2022

Turkey and Pakistan are expanding their defense collaboration in a joint public-private partnership to produce a new generation of jet fighters, enabling Ankara and Islamabad to circumvent their defense reliance on the United States, and, instead, use a combination of American, Russian, and Chinese technologies to facilitate the Islamist regimes in their goal of becoming the religious and military leaders of global Islamism.
German FIS Intel Chief Warns of Renewed Islamist Terror Threats to Europe

March 02, 2022

The head of Germany's Foreign Intelligence Service has warned that the symbolic value of the Taliban's establishment of an Islamic Emirate in Afghanistan, along with the country's permissive environment for operations by Islamist extremist groups, is raising the threat level of renewed Islamist terrorist attacks in Europe, with secondary threats emerging from mass distress migration into Europe from Asia and Africa.
Palestinian West Bank Islamist Groups Move Against Israeli Security Operations

February 25, 2022

Islamist groups in the Palestinian West Bank are moving towards greater collaboration aimed at improved organization and increased impact of militant activities against Israeli security operations in the West Bank, with the formation of a new Joint Operations Room (Hizam al-Nar), which includes both the Jenin Branch of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades.
Report: Jihadist Militants Fighting Indian Control Over Kashmir Commit Violence Against Muslim Women & Girls

February 25, 2022

According to a new report from India’s National Crime Records, Islamist militant groups waging jihad aimed at liberating Indian-administered Jammu-Kashmir, the long-disputed territory claimed by both India and Pakistan, have been perpetrating systematic rape and other forms of physical abuse against Muslim women and girls.
UK Intelligence Head Warns of Increased Islamist Terror Threat at Home from the Taliban

February 22, 2022

The global geopolitics of extremist Islamist threat was driven home in the recent warnings by the head of the Britain’s domestic intelligence agency MI5, who flagged the increased threat level in the United Kingdom (UK) for high-casualty Islamist terror attacks consequent to the Taliban victory in Afghanistan, which have made the South Asian country a magnet for travel and training of international jihadis and an inspiration for “al-Qaeda style” Islamist attacks that aim for maximum lethality and that may include efforts to use biological weapons.
Al-Shabaab Attacks Destabilize Somalia and Remind of Al-Qaeda’s Resilience

February 18, 2022

The Islamist militant group al-Shabaab recently perpetrated a series of multi-casualty attacks in Somalia’s capital city of Mogadishu, in a strategy designed to disrupt and destabilize parliamentary and presidential elections in the geopolitically important Horn of Africa country underscoring the continuing resilience and global security threat presented by al- Qaeda, the parent jihadi group to which al-Shabaab professes loyalty.
IS Resilience Threat Complicated by Indefinite Detention in Camps

February 18, 2022

International security and human rights experts are warning that the threat of a resilient IS in the extremist groups core caliphate territories is being exacerbated by the indefinite detention in northeast Syria camps of thousands of fighters, women, and minors whose affiliation with the jihadist entity remains to be determined, via repatriation, prosecution, or reintegration, processes that have been indefinitely delayed by the international community.
Iran's Islamist Revolutionary Activities Penetrate the Iraqi Military

February 18, 2022

Iran's Islamist revolutionary activities continue to disrupt governance and destabilize the security environment at the Iraq-Syria border regions, as Kataib Hezbollah (KH) brigades that are formally part of Iraq's military but are linked to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), have stepped up fundraising and recruiting for violence against key Sunni-majority theocracies such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
Trial of Jihadist Killers of French Priest Highlights Challenges of Radical Islamism

February 16, 2022

This week’s trial of four IS jihadists accused of slitting the throat of a Roman Catholic priest praying at his church altar in northwestern France comes five years after the atrocity, but the details of the event are a reminder of the challenges for Western intelligence agencies in dealing with the transnational Islamist extremist networks that connected the perpetrators to IS networks in Turkey and Syria caliphate.