CNN wonders just what has changed with Islamic terrorism since 9.11 fourteen years ago
(CNN) In the 14 years since the 9/11 attacks, the face of terrorism has changed out of recognition. To many experts, the threat of Islamist terror is in some ways greater and in some ways diminished. It is geographically more diverse and organizationally more divided, and leverages social media and the internet in a way impossible in 2001.
In the West, Islamist terrorism is often more inspired than organized and directed. Its menace is also more fluid and unpredictable than it was on that bright autumn morning in 2001, but the tools to combat it are also more plentiful, from ever more sophisticated and accurate drones to financial intelligence and algorithms for chewing terabytes of data in the pursuit of suspicious communications.
The likelihood of an attack on the scale of 9/11 has receded. but the probability of more frequent though less devastating attacks has increased.
It’s interesting that CNN even acknowledges that these attacks are being propagated by Islamic radicals.
Anyhow, there’s a bit of a scuffle between ISIS and al Qaeda, but, at the end of the day, they would cooperate to kill the infidel, and
Similarly unimaginable 14 years ago is that a jihadist group — a “nonstate actor” as the academics say — could control a huge amount of territory. Al Qaeda was the guest of the Taliban in Afghanistan, and after 9/11 was dispersed to mountain camps in Pakistan. Al-Shabaab, for a while, controlled parts of central and southern Somalia; al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb briefly held some towns in Mali.
But these groups never had the trappings of a “state” in the way ISIS has Sharia courts, basic social services and now even a currency. And any form of safe haven allows for greater and more ambitious planning.
Remember, it wasn’t that long ago when many politicians, pundits, and leftist news outlets, including Hillary Clinton, were saying that ISIS was not a state. They were also saying, including John Kerry and Barack Obama, that ISIS wasn’t Islamic.
Writing in the latest edition of the Combating Terrorism Center’s Sentinel, Morell says that “all told, some 20 countries now have terrorist groups within their borders espousing the jihadist ideology.”
And ISIS has created “provinces” beyond Syria and Iraq at warp speed.
There are countless more “no-go zones” in the world than there were on 9/11:
— Britain tells its holidaymakers to avoid Tunisia.
— Parts of Kenya and Egypt are off-limits, as is almost all of Libya.
— Boko Haram has turned much of northern Nigeria into a battlefield (as well as some areas of neighboring states.)
— Yemen was never the easiest place to navigate but has imploded in the past four years, becoming yet another theater in which al Qaeda and ISIS compete to kill the most Shiites.
And let’s not forget the cesspool of Syria, nor that these Islamists are operating in many, many Western nation, much less attempting to infiltrate and expand in many African countries. Nor that some countries, such as Turkey, are moving towards a more hardcore Islamist viewpoint.
For the most part, the jihadi attacks on the West (Europe, America, Australia primarily) are not really organized, just “inspired”, as mentioned initially. However, the Islamists are pushing harder and harder to change Western culture without firing a shot. They use out laws, constitutions, societies, and even our compassion against us, pushing Sharia law and hardcore religious beliefs. They create an environment where any complaint, no matter how minor, is considered full blown Islamophobia, hence, many, especially in government, turn a blind eye. How else to explain incidents like the Rotherham sex scandal? Anyhow, people forget that the “peaceful” ones can be just as dangerous, if not more in the long term, to our societies as the periodic jihadi attacks.
By the way, it’s fantastic the way Islamic terrorism has exploded in the era of Obama, eh?
Crossed at Right Wing News.
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