While details continue to emerge about Thursday’s terrorist attack in Nice, France, one thing remains clear: regardless of whether ISIS orchestrated the attack, inspired it, or had no connection to it whatsoever, the organization’s “prestige” among its supporters continues to rise after each terrorist incident.
“In the early hours after the attack, the debate was over, “Is this actually an ISIS attack?”—which is the exact same one we had in Orlando and San Bernardino,” says Patrick Skinner, Cipher Brief expert and Director of Special Projects at The Soufan Group. “In a way it doesn’t really matter, because they are going to say it is and people will believe it.”
And ISIS did indeed take credit over the weekend. The Amaq News Agency, which is linked to ISIS, referred to the Nice attacker, identified as French-Tunisian Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel, as a “soldier of the Islamic State” and that “he executed the operation in response to calls to target citizens of coalition nations that fight the Islamic State.” After interviews with some of Bouhel’s acquaintances, French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said Saturday, “It seems as though he radicalized his views very rapidly.” But Cazeneuve offered no details on how investigators came to that conclusion.
In addition to providing ISIS with a further boost of infamy, Thursday’s terrorist attack took on somewhat of a different form, as Bouhlel used a truck as his weapon of choice.
“There are a number of different types of modalities for terrorists to use that are frankly, almost unlimited,” explains Mitch Silber, Cipher Brief Expert and Former Director of Analysis at the NYPD. “Just like we saw the use of vehicles in Israel and other locations, it was only a matter of time before it was used in a Western environment.”
Perhaps most alarming is the amount of carnage caused by one individual with one truck – at least 84 dead and hundreds injured, some critically.
In response to the attack, French President Francois Hollande announced that the country’s State of Emergency, which has been in effect since the Paris attacks in November 2015 but were set to expire last week, will remain in place for an additional three months. Some point to this extension as a worrisome sign for France.
“States of emergency can become slippery slopes,” cautioned Skinner. “For example, in Egypt, there is now a permanent state of emergency.”
Despite Hollande’s announcement, France will likely have its hands full in preventing terrorist attacks for the foreseeable future. France has been the victim of deadly attacks three times in the past 18 months, twice in Paris and now Nice. More than 225 people have died and hundreds more injured in those attacks. And experts believe France, with its large Muslim population and as a member of the anti-ISIS coalition, remains a key target of the Islamic State.
Yet even in countries such as France, where thwarting terrorist attacks is a top security priority, questions remain about how it is possible to detect all of these individuals, especially lone actors, before an attack is carried out. “France does have a very effective counterterrorism service, and they have a very capable intelligence service,” says Skinner. “But in cases like this, there’s not much to go on.”
Bennett Seftel is deputy director of editorial at The Cipher Brief.
