Terrorist and Security Report - Americas

United States/World – A “sternly worded warning” from a supporter of the Islamic State may just be an attempt to “strike terror into the hearts of the enemies of Allah,” but with its photos in front of the White House and elsewhere in the U.S., the Islamic State seems intent on communicating that it can strike in the U.S. If it can, it certainly will.  “Islamic State supporter warns of attacks against U.S.: SITE,” 16 Sep 14.  A supporter of Islamic State militants has warned of attacks on the United States and its allies if they continue to carry out military action against the group that has seized large parts of Iraq and Syria, the SITE monitoring service said.  The message on a well-known militant Islamist online forum is one of the few responses from supporters of Islamic State to Washington’s announcement that it was prepared to extend airstrikes against the group into Syria.  The posting on the Minbar Jihadi Media website condemned “intervention in the affairs of other peoples” and said it would trigger an equal response, SITE said.  “It will lead to an equal reaction of the same strength in targeting the American depth and also the nations allied to it and in all aspects,” the message said in a translation from Arabic, according to SITE, which tracks militant forums.  361 COMMENT:  The Islamic State must be near to a state of panic to send out messages such as this one.  It is all very well targeting innocent people, murdering Iraqi soldiers and other faiths that cannot fight back but when it comes to superior firepower they are not in the same league.  This threat, along with others to various countries, have the hallmarks of a frightened child attempting to bully a bigger child with threats that they know they cannot win.  The Americans and its allies will start their campaign shortly and with that the security in their allies’ home countries must be raised to stop the threat from the lone wolf brigades attempting to take the fight in their home countries.  Recently Australia arrested people on the grounds of terrorism and one in particular who was arrested was found to be attempting to carry out an attack where an innocent person was to be abducted and beheaded in the name of the IS.  This unfortunately will become a familiar pattern for some time to come.  COMMENT ENDS

NYPD Police Commissioner Bill Bratton says that ISIS may be targeting Times Square, as the terrorist group has made threats on an online message board.  ISIS put out messages to recruit “individual wolves in America” to initiate attacks on the famous spot, writing, “Times Square is considered one of the most important and famous tourist attractions in the city.”  
Accompanying the message were instructions for the manufacture of nail and pipe bombs and how they can be run with batteries or timers. Those instructions are reminiscent of similar instructions in al Qaeda’s Inspire magazine. That magazine also called for attacks on Times Square in May.  Unlike others who have dismissed ISIS as a “JV team,” Bill Bratton takes them quite seriously, saying of their efforts at recruitment, “We are quite concerned with the capabilities of ISIS, much more so than Al Qaeda was ever able to project.”  Bratton noted that over 100 U.S. citizens have joined with ISIS in Syria and Iraq, adding, “The potential for them to come back and do terrorist acts here is very real. This is the evolving world of terrorism. We are staying ahead of it. We are focusing on it, and I believe that we are prepared as any entity could be to deal with the threats.” Bratton did conclude that as of yet, there are no credible or specific terror threats marked for New York City.