This question resonates in particular with ISIS’s efforts to return to its former strongholds in Syria and Iraq, by intensifying its attacks in the two countries during the past two months, and its public reappearance.
The International Coalition to Defeat ISIS held its meeting in Morocco on Wednesday, stressing in its final statement the continuation of the war against the organization as it represents a constant threat, and that ensuring the permanent defeat of ISIS in Iraq and Syria remains a priority by combating its sources of funding and prosecuting and rehabilitating foreign fighters.
The coalition posted on its Twitter account that, on the occasion of the first ministerial meeting of the International Alliance in Africa, “we are relaunching the campaign #One Mission #Multiple Countries”, and that “in the coming weeks, we will go into more details about the contribution of our partners to our common mission to defeat ISIS.” .
Two days before the meeting, Washington imposed sanctions on 5 people accused of collecting funds for ISIS and using them to recruit children.
The international coalition was formed in 2014, comprising 84 countries, to prevent the flow of fighters to Syria and to eliminate the economic structure of ISIS.
meeting time
The coalition meeting comes about a month after ISIS sent a message to its members and lone wolves, asking them to intensify attacks in Europe, taking advantage of its preoccupation with the Ukrainian war.
ISIS recently escalated its movements in Iraq and Syria, in which the coalition announced its defeat in 2017 and 2019, respectively. In March, for example, it carried out 17 attacks in Deir ez-Zor, Homs, Raqqa, Aleppo and Hama in Syria.
According to the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, ISIS movements were monitored in the city of Palmyra in central Syria, which is its first public appearance in 5 years, which is a dangerous development.
In Iraq, ISIS intensified its presence in Mosul with two attacks, and the governorates of Diyala, Nineveh, Salah al-Din and Anbar witnessed attacks that were confronted by Iraqi forces with the “solid will” operation.
organization destination
During the past year, Africa became the target of terrorism, and 15 countries witnessed more than 70 terrorist attacks, resulting in thousands of deaths and injuries.
The closing statement of the coalition conference referred to addressing the underlying causes of insecurity in Africa, while emphasizing that curbing ISIS is the responsibility of the national authorities.
While the coalition held its meeting for the first time in Africa, Jassim Mohamed, Director of the European Center for Counter-Terrorism Studies and Intelligence, believes that this is related to the organization’s activities there, especially since the UN Security Council indicated that there are 27 terrorist organizations on the continent, and that 41% of ISIS operations are targeting African countries.
In his interview with Sky News Arabia, he pointed out that Africa has become the new destination for ISIS after losing lands in Iraq and Syria between 2017 and 2019.
The experience of Syria and Iraq
Jassim Muhammad finds that drying up the sources of terrorist financing and achieving justice by prosecuting and reintegrating fighters is a major challenge for the international coalition, and the problem of foreign fighters increases, especially with countries not refusing to take back their citizens who joined the organization in Syria and Iraq.
In his estimation, the coalition’s experience in fighting ISIS in the two countries “was not successful in creating societal security, promoting development, and finding radical solutions to the real causes behind the emergence of terrorism, and the coalition will face the same experience in Africa as long as it does not work on development and community security.”
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