The Role of Intelligence in the Confrontation of ISIS 3.0 and Recommendations for UAE

Abstract

After September 11, 2001, the entire world was threatened by the Islamic terrorist organization Al-Qaeda. Led by Osama Bin Laden, they attacked the World Trade Center and the Pentagon and showed everyone that the USA was vulnerable to attacks, killing thousands of innocent people in the process since most of the people inside the World Trade Center were civilians. After that, Al-Qaeda was considered the main public enemy in the War on Terror, which the USA and its allies in NATO started shortly after. With the changes to national security policies, aviation security, airport security and counter-terrorism measurements undertaken by states and international organizations (United Nations, European Union, Commonwealth etc.), there was less belief that another organization could rise again and become as powerful as Al-Qaeda, which was believed to have stopped their attacks in 2011, after the killings of Osama Bin Laden. After Bin Laden was killed, many believed the organization Al-Qaeda to have dispersed and become less active. Nevertheless, there are many reports and researches showing that Al-Qaeda was still active in Southeast Asia, where they are still recruiting fighters for the Jihad, under new leadership. However, in 2011, the world witnessed public uprisings and revolt in several states in the Middle East (Libya, Syria, Bahrain, Egypt, Tunisia, Algeria, etc.), where rebels started fighting against the current regime. This event was later known as the Arab Spring. After the Arab Spring, another terrorist organization became famous for the proclamation of their Khalifate—the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, commonly known as ISIS. ISIS started operating a large-scale network spreading across the borders of Iraq and Syria, where their Khalifate was located, and led attacks in Europe and the USA and was affiliated with other attacks being conducted by affiliated organizations. In 2017, the USA and its allies led an attack on ISIS and officially declared the organization “defeated,” killing the majority of their fighters and attacking their headquarters in the largest ISIS Khalifate. But, much to the surprise of everyone else, ISIS continued to exist and led attacks after 2017, with the most recent attack being the Sri Lanka Easter Bombings on Christian churches in the capital in 2019. Despite being “defeated” in the military sense, ISIS continues to exist in the virtual world, and reports show that they are still recruiting fighters and spreading propaganda through the internet, thus this formation has been given the name ISIS 3.0.