The Islamic State is once again urging followers to target Christians and Jews in the West —a reminder that, even after losing most of its territorial “caliphate,” the group’s propaganda continues to push lethal lone-wolf attacks and to radicalize small cells worldwide.
In a piece titled 'O Zealous Monotheists,' spokesman Abu Hudhaifa al-Ansari states the following in the most recent issue of the al-Naba newsletter.
"O lions, chase your prey, Jews, Christians, and their allies, in the streets and roads of precious America, Europe, and the world. Break into their homes, kill them, and punish them by any means you can. Keep in mind that you are the hand of the Islamic State today, striking at the heart of the infidels and avenging Muslims in Palestine, Iraq, Syria, and all Muslim lands."
"Perfect the plans and diversify the operations: Blow up with explosives, burn with incendiary bombs, shoot with fatal bullets, cut and slaughter with sharp knives, run over and crush with buses, and the sincere will not lack a trick to bleed the hearts of Jews, Christians, and their allies..."
The message goes on to praise recent mass-casualty attacks and urges supporters to attack churches, synagogues, and public gatherings in the US, Europe, and Israel, using methods such as shootings, stabbings, or vehicle rammings.
Messaging Patterns
ISIS’s messaging follows a familiar pattern: public praise for high-casualty incidents, encouragement in the use of simple but effective weapons such as knives, vehicles, and small arms, as well as appeals to “lone wolves” who are unwilling or unable to join the fight in the Middle East. Analysts say that this mix — ideological glamorization plus simple, low-cost attack techniques — is intended to produce copycat violence and to lower the barriers to action for isolated radicals. The group’s online forums frame the violence as both religious duty and asymmetric warfare against Western societies.
And this method certainly works. Intelligence services have numerous documented cases where propaganda directly inspired attackers or helped them select targets. Some may recall the name Anwar al-Awlaki. He was an American-Yemeni Islamic cleric and al-Qaeda commander whose online sermons and discussions were notorious for inspiring some of the most sinister terror plots of our time, both before and after his death in a US airstrike in 2011. These include the 2009 Fort Hood shooting, the 2009 Northwest Airlines Flight 253 underwear bomb plot, the 2010 Times Square car bombing attempt, the 2016 Orlando nightclub shooting, and others.
Counter-extremism monitors have therefore flagged recent rhetoric as raising the risk to religious communities and to soft public targets ahead of major Jewish and Christian holidays and observances. In October alone, Jewish congregations will be observing Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur and the Feast of Tabernacles.
NCTC Warns of Al Qaeda Threat
Similarly, Al-Qaeda’s resurgence of calls for attacks in the homeland highlights its persistent and enduring threat to the country.
On Friday, the Director of the National Counterterrorism Center, Joe Kent, issued a press release highlighting the DNI's sharing of threat intelligence with first responders and urging authorities and the public to stay alert and vigilant against threats from al-Qaeda's global network.
According to DNI, Al-Qaeda and its Yemen-based affiliate, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, or AQAP, are likely seeking to leverage their media publications and global conflicts to inspire potential attackers.
As an example, AQAP messaging celebrates recent attacks in the US and calls on its supporters in the homeland to strike using simple methods, such as firearms, explosives, knives, vehicle-rammings, or Molotov cocktails. Recommended targets are individuals or organizations that support Israel, as well as law enforcement and government employees. Messaging also suggests that large protests or civil disturbances could be good opportunities to commit an act of terrorism.
Many of the suggested target themes in recent Al-Qaeda threats are consistent with the group’s post 9/11 attack plots in the homeland, which focused on aviation, symbolic or economic targets, US military or government employees and facilities, and the US public.
For Western security services, the greatest threats from the Islamic State and al-Qaeda today are not large, centralized plots but scattered, low-sophistication lone-wolf assaults that are inspired online. This makes detection difficult, and prevention dependent on a mix of community awareness and reporting, targeted policing, social media disruption, and international intelligence sharing.
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