revistaieee7

Journal of the Spanish Institute for Strategic Studies Núm. 7 / 2016
cy in Syria or Iraq will go back to their respective countries interested in perpetrating
attacks between two and twelve months from their return.
NOTE: The two-month minimum was obtained by calculating the average of time
that took most of the returnees already arrested to perpetrate or plot an attack, when
the information was available. The hypothesis also considers that no more than 10% of
the returnees will pose a threat, based on the already mentioned counting of European
foreign fighters that plotted an attack upon return between 1990 and 2010.
These two hypotheses were tested through dataset analysis to find out the number
of returnees involved in plots as well as their background.
- Research questions
The study aimed at finding the answer to two main questions in order to conclude
which countries should be especially on alert to the threat of returnees and where security
measures need to be focused on.
RQ-1: How likely is that foreign fighters from the countries studied could perpetrate
an attack in the homeland if they have returned or are expected to return from
Syria or Iraq?
For this first question, social network analysis was used to link returnees with terrorist
organizations, extremist groups or other foreign fighters. Moreover, content
analysis was conducted to evaluate the existence of de-radicalization programs in the
countries studied and examine to what degree the return of foreign fighters is under
control. Returnees that continue operating in the extremist scene, whether they establish
suspicious connections or they just start recruiting or disseminating extremist
material, were considered potential threats. However, the performance of the last two
activities is less bound to the likelihood of attack than the first one.
RQ-2: What are the most likely targets that returning jihadists could attack in their
countries?
For the second question, dataset analysis was used to find out what kind of targets
returnees have so far chosen to attack. Content analysis was also conducted to examine
how returnees may fit into the strategy that terrorist organizations operating in
Syria or Iraq have. The typical scenarios that the study looked for in the data were
Jewish places and satirical magazines/artists that publish content on the prophet Muhammad,
although public spaces and landmarks were also taken into account.
BACKGROUND
Jihadists have today fewer opportunities to attack in the EU because most of the
governments have already become aware of the threat that jihadism entails, and leg-
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