A memorial on Las Ramblas following the attack. EPA/Quique Garcia

The fact that there was a 13-year gap between these incidents and the Madrid train bombings of March 11 2004 – should not be interpreted as a loss of interest on their part in such a strategic target.

Indeed only the diligence and efficiency (admittedly, coupled with strokes of fortune) of the country’s security and intelligence services have prevented further attacks.

According to government sources, some 180 jihadists were arrested in the four years leading up to July 2016. Meanwhile, interventions by law enforcement agencies, with investigative skills honed by decades of experience in fighting terrorism by Basque separatists, are believed to have directly prevented at least 15 major attacks since 2011.

Police gather in Cambrils, the scene of the second attack. EPA/Jaume Sellart

Not all the plots were typical. One that was thwarted in 2011 aimed to poison water supplies in tourist campsites and resorts with chemicals. This was apparently in response to the death of Osama bin Laden.

Searches of the homes of suspects arrested during operations uncovered encrypted videos with detailed maps of major Spanish cities, photos and plans of key buildings and guides to handling explosives.

According to the El Mundo newspaper, the jihadist ranks fighting in Syria currently include more than 100 fighters of Spanish nationality or former residents of Spain. These are among the most fanatical members of the terrorist groups and their active calls to strike in Spain serve as inspiration for followers still in the country.
 

A key target

Such vast potential is not lost on organisations such as Islamic State, which has claimed responsibility for the Barcelona attack. The group is known to be keen to extend its theatre of operations beyond Syria and Iraq to demonstrate that it is not a spent force. And, equally important, it wants to prompt a public opinion-driven rethink of support by Western governments for anti-IS campaigns.

Spain was mentioned 24 times in jihadist videos, newsletters and other forms of online propaganda over a period of just five months in 2016. That’s a reliable indicator that the Iberian country is firmly fixed in the terrorists’ sights.

There are geopolitical reasons for this keen and permanent interest. Spain has long been an active ally of the United States – particularly while conservative governments are in office as at present. For jihadists, the country is a key member of the international military coalition that “occupies” Muslim lands.

The picture of the Spanish premier of the day, José María Aznar, standing shoulder to shoulder with George Bush and Tony Blair in the Azores in March 2003 – effectively sealing the pact which led to the invasion of Iraq – served to establish Spain further as an enemy of Islam in terrorist’ minds.

Blair, Bush and Aznar in 2003. Harry Page/EPA

Less than a year later, Aznar was ousted from office due to the political fallout from the Madrid train bombings. His successor, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, immediately announced he was pulling Spanish troops out of Iraq. Al-Qaeda was swift to highlight this cause-and-effect sequence in subsequent propaganda.

The Spanish government has adopted a less active stance in the Middle East recently. It has refused to join airstrikes in countries such as Syria, for example. However, the government does not criticise its allies in their endeavours, so jihadists continue to see Spain as a legitimate target.

Hundreds of thousands of people protest in Madrid following the 2004 bombing. Andrew Parsons/PA Archive

Various historical issues aggravate the threat posed by such groups. It is important to recall that a priority of jihadist ideology is the reinstatement of the original borders of the Caliphate. Spain is considered the illegitimate occupant of Al Andalus (Islamic Iberia), the medieval territory under Muslim control and cultural influence between 711 and 1492. The reconquest of Granada – the last Islamic stronghold in Spain – by the Catholic Monarchs led to forced conversions and mass expulsions of Muslims.

A number of references in jihadist propaganda to Spain emphasise that the country is part of the umma (the supranational community of Islamic peoples), despite it having been seized by “infidels”. The territorial claims are wholly unrealistic today, but nonetheless strike a useful chord among radicalised jihadists desperate for a cause in which to believe.

The government is also often criticised for its permissiveness towards the formation of immigrant ghettos. Many fear that these socially excluded areas provide fertile ground for the seeds of the discontent that feeds radicalism and extremism, making young people easy prey for the ideology of jihadist terrorism.

Spain’s history, both in its recent and more distant past, makes it particularly vulnerable to jihadist terrorism, which is why these terrible events are unlikely to have come as a surprise. While none of this legitimises the ideology espoused by Islamic State, it goes some way to explaining how the organisation operates and how it convinces followers that cities like Barcelona should be targets of their violence.

Karl McLaughlin, Senior Lecturer in Spanish, Manchester Metropolitan University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

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Spain plays a relatively inconsequential role in the fight against Islamic State. Reuters/Sergio Perez

The location and targeting of the attack deviates from IS’s previous efforts. These have typically focused on punishing countries directly involved in military operations against it in Syria and Iraq.

But how reliable are its claims of responsibility? And why was Spain chosen, given its relatively inconsequential role in the fight against IS?
 

The validity of IS’s claims

Verifying the culpability of terror attacks can traditionally be a tricky affair. Given that organisations that engage in terrorism are doing so from a position of weakness, there is always an incentive to lie in order to bolster mystique and inflate the image of threat.

But in this regard, IS seems to differ from previous groups. It has typically been reliably truthful in what it claims to have been its actions.

One Australian example of this can be found in the 2014 Lindt Cafe siege. The perpetrator, Man Haron Monis, proclaimed he was acting under IS auspices. But despite this declaration, and the potential propaganda victory it could bring, IS resisted such advances and distanced itself from the incident.

While IS would go on to posthumously praise Monis’ actions, it never made any explicit claims to having organised or directed them. No pre-existing relationship was found in the subsequent inquest.

This incident, along with many others, seems to indicate that while IS claims a butcher’s bill of heinous activities, it doesn’t tend to overtly lie about them.

Such a policy, while initially appearing counter-intuitive, maintains IS’s perception as a trustworthy source of information. This is particularly important in recruitment efforts, and makes it difficult for governments to challenge the IS’s claims in counter-propaganda.

For IS, maintaining a twisted sense of chivalrous virtue remains paramount.
 

Spain and the clash of civilisations

The Barcelona attack also reflects IS’s view of the world as a civilisational clash.

Described as a “reluctant partner” in the anti-IS coalition, Spain has resisted entreaties to join military efforts. Instead, it has opted for what it sees as a less risky role – providing logistical aid and training to local Iraqi forces, as well as preventing homegrown attempts to support IS abroad.

Spain’s limited role in the fight, particularly in contrast to other terror victims such as France and the US, might lead one to expect it to be relatively low on IS’s hit list.

But in terms of IS’s conflict narrative, Spain represents just another manifestation of a hostile Western civilisation in a state of war against the Islamic community. This leaves it more than open for reprisals.

At a spiritual level, Spain also holds a special place in IS’s mythology. Once a part of the Islamic empire, al-Ándalus, as it is known in Arabic, is seen by many IS ideologues as a natural territorial part of the end-state caliphate and currently under direct occupation by infidels.
 

Shock and bore

Terrorist reprisals like this attack are likely to intensify temporarily against Western targets throughout Europe and further abroad over the coming months and years, as the IS is systematically deconstructed on its home turf in Iraq and Syria.

IS remains heavily dependant on an image of defiant dynamism and a commitment to challenge the international status quo, which it claims subjugates the chosen community. As its ability to function as a “state” continues to decline, it will increasingly seek to maintain such a mystique through acts of spite against those that have prevented it from achieving its goal of a “caliphate”.

Despite a likely future increase in terrorist attacks, IS also risks a growing public disinterest and apathy toward its activities.

As one commentator has written, the banality and nontheatrical nature of IS’s approach to terrorism – particularly in contrast to al-Qaeda’s keen eye for spectacular symbology – has left many onlookers less than impressed and far from terrified.

Ben Rich, Lecturer in International Relations and Security Studies, Curtin University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

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