ISIL militants struck at the heart of the world’s most populous Muslim country last week. Five ISIL-linked attackers carried out gun and suicide attacks in Indonesia’s capital city, Jakarta. A few days before that, an ISIL-linked suicide bomber detonated a device in the centre of Istanbul’s tourist district, killing 10 German tourists. This weekend, Al Qaeda-linked extremists stormed a luxury hotel popular with westerners in Burkina Faso, extending the group’s reach in West Africa.
It is easy to understand why ISIL would target Indonesia for its latest act of carnage. Not only is Indonesia the world’s largest Muslim nation by population but it has an admirable history of religious tolerance that runs contrary to ISIL’s twisted understanding of religion. Moreover, Southeast Asia is fertile ground for extremist movements, a fact not lost on ISIL’s strategists in Syria and Iraq.
It is less clear, however, why the group targeted Turkey’s most important city. Despite recent crackdowns by the Turkish government, the Turkish-Syrian borderlands remain a vital supply line for the militants, both in terms of fighters and weapons. It makes little sense to give Ankara additional reasons to go after ISIL positions in Syria and Iraq or clamp down further on the border traffic.
With these latest attacks, ISIL is thinking about its continuing recruitment and branding efforts. The group has been on the run in Syria and Iraq thanks to intensifying US-led coalition air strikes and by some accounts, recruitment is suffering. Therefore they need grand targets to rally misguided souls to join their efforts of destruction.
Indeed, the method of these attacks is unremarkable. Given the predictability of ISIL’s methods, security forces around the world will have gained at least some insight into the way the extremists strike and the type of targets they seek out. The same is true of Al Qaeda and other militant groups, which are exploiting known security vacuums in Africa to grab media attention and remind the world of their existence.
With ISIL in need of fresh recruits, we can only expect further attacks in the vein of Jakarta and Istanbul.
We also know the complexion of their menace and methods. Therefore we have the upper hand in this fight and we must take the necessary precautions.
