Galvanized By Anti-West Rhetoric, Standing Grievances: Jihadis Online Echo Threats To Paris Summer Olympics

The following report is now a complimentary offering from MEMRI's Jihad and Terrorism Threat Monitor (JTTM). For JTTM subscription information, click here. 

Introduction

As the world's attention turns to France for the much-anticipated Paris Olympic Games, slated to launch in a few hours, Salafi jihadis, in pursuit of religious and political goals, appear to be eyeing the event as an opportunity to further their ideology of violence.

Knowing that such a world event would generate significant global media coverage, jihadi groups, including Al-Qaeda, see the Olympics as an opening to resurrect themselves, after serious setbacks as a result of international counterterrorism campaigns. The jihadi groups have lost not only territory and popular support in areas they controlled, but also high-ranking leaders, funding, and social media presence.

As for the Islamic State (ISIS), the Paris Olympics represent a bonus opportunity to reinforce its status as the leading jihadi organization, capable in recent months of carrying out attacks outside the Middle East and Africa and penetrating the heart of Europe.

While the jihadi propaganda continues to amplify anti-West sentiment, the operational focus and tactics appear to have shifted from group-sponsored operation, to loosely affiliated lone wolf attacks. This shift has proved to be deadlier, and often difficult to predict.

The decision making is now in the hands of would-be terrorists who have been radicalized by a propaganda effort that feeds on the situation in Gaza, as it did before regarding Syria, Iraq, Yemen, and Libya.

Jihadis Emboldened By Large-Scale Moscow And Kerman Attacks

The war in Gaza, following the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack on Israel, has reinvigorated jihadi groups, leading them to reprioritize the cause of "Palestine" to incite attacks in the West in support of Gazans.

Media outlets linked to ISIS have stepped up their propaganda effort, inciting attacks worldwide against everything Western. Their rhetoric was inspired by an address by ISIS leadership on March 28, 2024, which called on Muslims to avenge Gazans by launching lone-wolf attacks around the world. Similarly, content produced by supporting entities were further emboldened by the ISIS-claimed attack that targeted the Crocus City Hall music venue in Moscow, Russia killing more than 140 people.[1]

Over the last few weeks, numerous videos and posters posted recently by pro-ISIS media outlets, such as the prolific Al-Azaim Foundation and Nashir Pakistan, two media outlets linked to the Islamic State in Khorasan Province (ISKP) and the Pakistan province, respectively, encouraged attacks against international sporting events and venues as soft targets. Attacks on these venues would guarantee scores of casualties and significant media attention much needed by jihadis to return to the global scene. Jihadis were encouraged to use all means available, from simple stabbing attacks to operations using weaponized drones.[2]

It is notable that Al-Azaim Foundation, which produces content in a dozen regional languages, including Russian, Turkish, Dari, Pashto, Urdu, Uzbek, Tajik, Farsi, in addition to Arabic and English, gained ample attention among English-language supporters, mainly due to its high-quality flagship magazine, the Voice of Khorasan.

Al-Azaim has been spearheading ISIS’s narrative lately, calling for attacks in the West and inciting populations across the Middle East to rebel against established regimes in the area.

On May 30, 2024, Nashir Pakistan released a poster threatening lone wolf attacks on Americans during the T20 Cricket World Cup in Long Island, New York, which was held from June 3 – 12, 2024. Another poster threatened: "Nassau Stadium 9/06/2024 [June 9, 2024] You wait for the matches... And we wait for you..."[3]

On June 6, 2024, the pro-Islamic State (ISIS) Al-'Adiyat Media Foundation released an English-language poster on Telegram threatening an attack on the 2024 Summer Olympics, scheduled to be held in Paris between July 26 and August 11.

Displaying an aerial view of the city of Paris, with the Eiffel Tower featuring prominently, the poster depicts a drone being operated by remote-control, carrying a package marked "gift." The interior of a stadium is shown on the operator's screen, suggesting the load carried by the drone is meant to be dropped there. The text on the poster reads: "Lone wolves' Olympics have begun with the Will of Allah."[4]

The Al-Azaim also incited lone-wolf operatives to target the citizens of the member states of the global coalition against ISIS as soon as possible, with a stark threat that reads: "If not now, then when?" as it celebrated the outcome of the 2024 large-scale Moscow attack with a poster showing Vladimir Putin humiliated and tiled "The Bear Bewildered."[5] 

2015 Paris Stadium Blasts: "We Will Do It Again"

Although terrorist attacks against sports venues are rare, recent history records the 2013 Boston Marathon bombings, the 2015 coordinated attacks in France, including blasts at iconic Stade de France Stadium and an attack on the Bataclan concert hall.[6]

Responding to the multiple calls for attacks in France, among other Western countries, the pro-ISIS Al-Adiyat media outlet published a poster showing an ISIS militant in a shooting pose before the burning Eiffel Tower.

The poster's caption reads in English: "We will retaliate, by the will of Allah." The Arabic caption is translated differently: "We will do it again," suggesting that ISIS adherents remain determined to carry out new attacks in France, particularly targeting the Olympic Games' host city, Paris. The group had previously celebrated the October 16, 2023, ISIS attack in Brussels, which killed two Swedish soccer fans and injured others.[7]

Terrorist attacks are executed using various means. Techniques often depend on the nature and location of the target itself. The scope of security around venues, such as an Olympic stadium, requires tactics that allow a would-be assailant to choose the proper means, including active shooter attacks, suicide bombings, and placement of explosive devices in or around the facility.[8]

In November 2023, the pro-ISIS Hadm Al-Aswar media outlet produced a threatening poster inciting acts of shooting, blasts, and stabbings targeting crowds at a music concert and fans at a soccer match. The poster featured a stadium and carried the logo of the 2024 Olympics.[9]

Other means that may potentially be utilized in attacks, as preached by terrorist organizations in the past and reiterated in recent jihadi content, are chemical and biological agents, as well as cyber-attacks, and food and water contamination.[10]

2013 Boston Marathon Bombing: Al-Qaeda Not As Loud, But Not To Be Disregarded

ISIS's key rival, Al-Qaeda, has also been exploiting the ongoing events in the Middle East, such as the Israel-Hamas war, which feeds into its anti-U.S., anti-Israel narrative.

Al-Qaeda's English-language flagship publication, Inspire, advised readers on methods to execute attacks in Western countries, and offered supporters what it described as "open-source jihad" content, inciting them to conduct attacks in the U.S., UK, France, and other E.U. nations, as retribution for Israel's war in the Gaza Strip following the Hamas October 7 attack.[11] 

A decade ago, jihadis celebrated the Boston Marathon bombing, crediting the attack to AQAP's publication Inspire, which carried instructions on the home manufacture of IEDs. Supporters praised Inspire as a military reference for would-be jihadis, asking rhetorically how significantly higher the casualty toll could have been, had similar IEDs been placed in stadiums and movie theaters.[12]

Somali Al-Shabab group media arm Al-Kataeb: "The 2013 Boston Marathon operation executed by Tsarnaev brothers."

Assessment

A few hours before the Paris Olympics kicks off, the examples of the Kerman attack in Iran and the Moscow Crocus Hall attack, both in scope and the high-profile targets, increased alarm over the possibility of acts of violence, both by lone operatives or by means of coordinated actions, similar to the 2015 Paris attacks. And while the scale of the capabilities currently demonstrated by jihadi groups does not rise to the level of replicating a major terrorist attack, it remains fair to say that the threat in general is higher than it was a year ago, taking into consideration the successful attacks claimed by ISIS over the past year in Europe. The tense international environment offers jihadis a sizeable margin to strike in a country where both Al-Qaeda and ISIS had successfully attacked in the past, and which they turned, at some point, into an incubator for Islamic extremism.

*K. Choukry is a research fellow at the MEMRI JTTM Project.