Europol Chief Warns Terrorism Is 'Highest Threat in Europe for a Generation'

Patrick Poole | 9:26 AM on August 19, 2017
Tight security after terror attack Terror attack in Barcelona, Spain. (Rex Features via AP Images)

Terror attacks this week in Barcelona, Finland, and Russia have European security agencies openly expressing their concerns. And it’s not about “right-wing” terrorism.

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Europol chief Robert Wainwright warned on Twitter yesterday that terrorism is the “highest threat in Europe for a generation.”

That warning was in response to Thursday’s car-ramming attack in the popular Las Ramblas tourist area in Barcelona.

So far, 14 people are reported dead from that attack, including American Jared Tucker from California, who was on on his honeymoon.

The Barcelona attack could have been even worse. The terror cell had apparently intended to commit a dual vehicle-borne IED (VBIED) attack, but an explosion Wednesday at the safe house where they were building the bombs forced them to scale back their plans.

Following the Europol chief’s warning yesterday, there was a stabbing terror attack in Turku, Finland, that killed two.

And today, there was an attack in Surgut, Russia, that killed eight.

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From 2014 to 2016, jihadist terror attacks in Europe increased from 2 to 30, and the pace of attacks this year is becoming unrelenting.

Now European security officials are describing the escalating terror threat as “the new normal”:

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The fact is that the scope of the jihadist terror threat in Europe is now entirely unmanageable.

The preferred method of attack in Europe over the past year has been car-ramming, encouraged by ISIS and al-Qaeda:

In an attempt to address the problem, a whole new art form has been developed — “crisis architecture”:

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And the targeting of popular tourist landmarks is literally changing the face of Europe:

One of the prime targets for jihadist attacks so far this year has been France.

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As they saw in Paris in 2015 with the Charlie Hebdo and the Bataclan terror attacks, one of the contributing factors to Europe’s terrorism problem is foreign fighters who fought with ISIS and other terror groups in Syria and Iraq:

And it’s not just France confronting a problem of returning foreign fighters.

One approach that France has tried is to hunt them down in Syria and Iraq before they return:

Other countries are not so proactive in dealing with the returning foreign fighter threat.

As I’ve reported here at PJ Media, U.S. authorities are actively warning their counterparts about the scope of the foreign fighter threat.

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How are these terrorist transiting? In many cases, along established refugee routes into Europe.

In both the Barcelona and Turku attacks this week, the terrorists were Moroccan immigrants.

Earlier this month I chronicled the immigration-driven terror problem underway in Germany, which in the lead-up to parliamentary elections is being blamed on Frau Merkel’s open immigration policies.

Despite the fact that the U.S. is geographically separated from many of these problems by two vast oceans, we are hardly immune from the threat of jihadist terrorism.

As recent U.S. ISIS-related cases reveal.

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I warned back in April that we may be facing yet another “Summer of Terror,” and the attacks this wee indicate that it may be far from over.

Patrick Poole
For media inquiries, please contact [email protected]

Patrick Poole is a national security and terrorism correspondent for PJMedia. Follow him on Twitter.
Category: HOMELAND SECURITY
Tags: HOMELAND SECURITY

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