Researcher: expansion of conflict represents opportunity for ISIS to revive

Hassan Abu Haniya, a researcher on terrorism issues, considered that the repercussions of the war between Israel and Hamas “made the United States and the international coalition bussy with geopolitical issues, for fear of expanding the war with Iran and its militias, which intensified their attacks on American bases in Iraq and Syria, and thus confronting ISIS is no longer a priority, and this path has witnessed a significant decline.”

He pointed out that ISIS "is always adept at exploiting crises. It does not create crises but exploits them. Therefore, we have seen since the beginning of the war on Gaza that ISIS has organaized itself and exploited this event by waging a long war of attrition."

ISIS mercenaries recently intensified their attacks on the Syrian desert. They also claimed suicide operations in Iran and an attack on a church in Istanbul, in addition to talking about plans to carry out external attacks on Al-Hol camp and repeating the Al-Sinaa prison scenario of Hasaka.

The researcher in terrorism issues criticized the international coalition’s strategy based on containing ISIS instead of eliminating it, and said: “The coalition’s strategy from the beginning is not to eliminate ISIS, but rather to contain it and remove it from its areas spatial control, but without eliminating it, and then relying on the “over the horizon” strategy, relying on drones and intelligence work, and this constitutes a dilemma, and thus the organization exploits these crises, restructures itself, launches a war of attrition, and intensifies its attacks, but they are limited.”

The researcher explained the international coalition countries’ efforts to contain ISIS and not eliminate it completely, by saying, “There are countries that do not want to eliminate ISIS completely, but want it to remain in a limited form and constitute a danger, in order for it to be a pretext for the presence of those countries in the region, and to implement an agenda related to national and geopolitical interests.”

The researcher on terrorism issues ruled out that ISIS has any intention of taking control now, but he said: “If this regional and international conflict intensifies with America preoccupied with the war in Ukraine, in the South China Sea, in Palestine, and with the Houthis in Yemen, this will push ISIS to revive..”

The researcher pointed out that one of ISIS's strategies is "to demolish the walls, as happened with the Ghwayran prison in Hasaka, and that this is a consistent strategy for ISIS, as it also did in 2014 in the Taj and Abu Ghraib prisons in Iraq and other places."

The researcher believed that the coalition’s strategy of expelling and containing ISIS, not eliminating it, will be exploited during this period, and this matter will create a problem, and that one of the clear issues in the case is dealing with the issue of displacement camps or ISIS detainees, He explained, “There are about 60,000 in the camps and 12,000 in prisons. Therefore, ISIS may repeat this process (attacking ISIS places of detention), in light of the lack of desire on the part of the countries to end this file and restore ISIS. All of this will make ISIS return again, but it is a matter of time, as it is waiting for more collapse in the region and more chaos, as happened in 2011, and it seems that the region is heading towards that.”

 Sh-S

ANHA