How did ISIS inspire the deadly truck attack in New Orleans?

A deadly vehicle attack in New Orleans by a man who the FBI claims was “100 percent inspired by ISIS” has raised questions about his affiliation with the militant group and his adherence to its ideology.

The FBI said it recovered a flag representing the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) from the rental car the man used to plow into a crowd on New Year’s Day, killing 14 people. They said he also posted videos on his Facebook account declaring his loyalty to the militant group.

Colin B said: “To go that far, to get the ISIS flag, to put out (ISIS-related) videos, I feel like he was really drinking in ISIS propaganda,” said Clark, a new counterterrorism research analyst at the Sovan Group. York based security consultancy.

Clark says the attacker may also have been experiencing financial or marital difficulties that could have created cognitive opportunities for him to become vulnerable to ISIS ideology.

“And then, at what point does it become more about ideology than personal grievances?“

Investigators are looking into any support or inspiration he may have drawn from ISIS. But the incident bears similarities to previous ISIS-inspired attacks, in which individuals used vehicles to ram crowds.

“When this first happened, without knowing anything about the person responsible…the first thing I thought was that there had been a wave of similar attacks in 2016 and 2017 that had varying degrees of inspiration or connection to ISIS,” Tom Josselin said.a senior fellow at Just Security, an online security analysis forum that is part of Reese center in Law and Security at New York University School of Law.

Although the FBI initially said it was looking for any accomplices of the attacker, they said Thursday they believe Shams al-Din Jabbar, a 42-year-old US-born Texas citizen, is the only person responsible.

The FBI said Jabbar posted five videos to his Facebook account in the hours before the attack, including one in which he said he had joined ISIS before this summer.

The agency also said that Jabbar was originally planning to harm his family and friends, but was concerned that the headlines would not focus on “the war between believers and unbelievers.”

The attacker fits the definition of “domestic violent extremist.”

Austin Doctor, director of counterterrorism research initiatives at the National Center for Counterterrorism Innovation, Technology, and Education (NCITE), says Jabbar fits law enforcement’s definition of a “domestic violent extremist.”

He says this definition includes people who may not be members of a terrorist organization, but who may provide support or be inspired by their ideology.

In the case of the New Orleans attack, Doctor says law enforcement appears confident that the attacker was specifically inspired by ISIS and carried out the attack believing he supported the group, its mission and its cause.

“What I think is not yet clear from the information currently available is exactly when Jabbar turned to extremism and embraced the ideology of the Islamic State,” he said.

The vehicle attack follows an ISIS pattern

The New Orleans attacker’s method of using a vehicle fits a similar pattern of previous ISIS-related incidents where individuals used cars or trucks to kill as many people as possible.

Analysts point out that ISIS called on its followers to use vehicles as weapons, which inspired a series of attacks in a number of cities, including Berlin, London, New York and Barcelona, ​​between 2016 and 2017.

One of the deadliest attacks occurred on July 14, 2016, when 86 people were killed by a man who drove a cargo truck at high speed and plowed into a crowd gathered to watch Bastille Day fireworks in the French Riviera city of Nice.

Two days later, As claimed by ISIS The attacker, a 31-year-old Tunisian named Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel, was one of its “soldiers.”

Analysts like Nathan Sales, the former counterterrorism coordinator at the US State Department, say such attacks are an indication that joining ISIS does not always mean traveling abroad to fight, something the militant group uses to its advantage when recruiting.

He added: “They said: We understand that you want to come to Syria and Iraq to fight in the desert and establish the caliphate. But you are valuable at home as well. Continue the jihad, and carry out acts of violence at home.” CBC News Network.

It is unclear whether the attacker had direct contact with ISIS

According to NCITE, the number of ISIS supporters in the United States is statistically small. But over the past decade, the FBI has consistently said in public statements that it has more than 1,000 active ISIS investigations in all 50 states.

Typically, in America, there would be about a dozen ISIS-related federal arrests per year, writes Seamus Hughes, a senior research faculty and policy associate at NCITE. But from 2014 to 2016, at the height of ISIS, he noted there were more than 60 arrests a year.

As of now, it is not clear what, if any, direct connection the New Orleans attacker may have had to ISIS. But Just Security’s Jocelyn pointed out that there doesn’t have to be physical contact for a person to be inspired by ISIS ideas.

“He may not have been in contact with anyone,” Jocelyn said, noting that the New Orleans attack may have been “inspired by ISIS calls to do this kind of thing.”

Online recruiters encourage attacks

However, Josselin said that in some past cases, the person responsible was in contact with a so-called ISIS virtual planner.

“ISIS had these people who were basically recruiting online and were in contact with aspiring recruits and potential jihadists, encouraging them to carry out terrorist acts in their home country,” he added.

Sells says the attack is a wake-up call about the threat ISIS still poses domestically.

He says that during the rise of ISIS a decade ago, thousands of Westerners from North America, South America, and Europe traveled to Syria to fight for ISIS.

“We should not make the mistake of thinking that this is all ancient history. It is not,” he said. “ISIS is still targeting our young people online. They are still being radicalized, they are still recruiting. We need to stay on top of this.”