
Latest Terrorism Monitor Articles

Insurgent Groups React to the Withdrawal of American Combat Forces in Iraq
The withdrawal of the last combat units of the U.S. army from Iraq at the end of August attracted reactions from various Iraqi insurgent groups. On September 1 the number of U.S. troops in Iraq dropped to less than 50,000 personnel. The U.S. army announced... MORE

Islamist Terrorism in Europe: Could Greece Be Next?
Radical Islamist groups, including al-Qaeda, have the means and resources to target European citizens both in Europe and abroad. However, Islamist terrorist groups have not yet directly hit Greece. Why is that the case?From a strategic standpoint, Greece is not a major player in the... MORE

French Counterterrorism Operations in the Sahara
On the morning of July 22 at approximately 5 A.M., Special Forces of the Mauritanian and French armies commenced operations against an alleged al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) base in northern Mali designed to free French hostage Michel Germaneau, 78-year old dependent on medicinal... MORE

Iraqi Oil Facilities Threatened as Islamic State of Iraq Intensifies its Campaign Against the State
As the United States ends the combat phase of its occupation of Iraq and begins an “advisory phase” known as Operation New Dawn, there are fears that a resurgent Islamic State of Iraq (ISI – closely tied to al-Qaeda in Iraq) may target Iraq’s oil... MORE

Suicide-Bomb Assassination of Prominent Cleric in South Waziristan May Incite Tribal Conflict
While the Pakistani government and army were busy helping millions of Pakistanis reeling under the worst floods in the nation’s history, newspaper headlines flashed on August 24 with news of a suicide attack on a South Waziristan mosque that killed 30 worshippers. Among the dead... MORE

Salafists Challenge al-Azhar for Ideological Supremacy in Egypt
Having emerged from a period of religiously inspired terrorist violence in the 1990s, Egypt has since been regarded as a regional bulwark against Islamist militancy in the Arab Middle East. However, a new ideological struggle is emerging between the religious scholars of Cairo’s al-Azhar University... MORE

Strange Case of Suspected Lithuanian Suicide Bomber Complicated by Alleged Role of Security Services
Buried in this year’s Europol report on terrorism trends was a reference to “a 20 year-old Lithuanian woman” who was “arrested before she traveled to Russia to commit a suicide attack there. She had converted to Islam and was self-radicalized via the internet” (for the... MORE

Is Syria Cooperating Militarily with Turkey Against the PKK?
Recent media reports suggest that a new phase of Syrian-Turkish military cooperation has begun against Kurdish militants of the Parti Karkerani Kurdistan (PKK - Kurdistan Workers Party) in Syria. However, a closer examination of the rapprochement between Damascus and Ankara and their respective policies on... MORE

Al-Tatarrus: al-Qaeda’s Justification for Killing Muslim Civilians
One of the global Salafi-Jihadist movement’s most persistent strategic vulnerabilities is its association with terrorist attacks that result in large numbers of Muslim civilian casualties. In jihadist conflict zones from Chechnya to Iraq, Somalia and Afghanistan, armed assaults and suicide bombings have been responsible for... MORE

Floods Wash Out Counterterrorist Operations in North Waziristan
Recent political developments in Pakistan seem to have put a military operation in North Waziristan on the backburner once more. If current political trends continue, the much awaited military operation in the region may not start for a long time, if ever. The recent floods,... MORE