Defense strategy against jihadis must evolve along with the threat

Nearly a decade after ISIS shocked the world with its brutal caliphate in Syria and Iraq, policymakers have moved on. The global spotlight has shifted toward great-power rivalries, AI regulation, and the wars in Ukraine and Gaza. Yet in the shadows, jihadist terrorism is mutating—and the West is increasingly unprepared.

The March 2024 Crocus City Hall massacre in Moscow, attributed to ISIS-K, killed 145 concertgoers in one of the deadliest terror attacks in recent memory. In Afghanistan, the Taliban’s grip is weakening as ISIS-K escalates bombings against Shi’a minorities and foreign targets. In sub-Saharan Africa, jihadist insurgencies are seizing territory in the Sahel and Horn regions, exploiting failed states. And in Europe, intelligence services are once again warning of lone-wolf attacks inspired by Gaza, TikTok, and encrypted online platforms.

The ideology never died. It simply adapted. And it’s gaining ground again.

This resurgence shouldn’t surprise us. In 2019, I argued that the jihadist genie hadn’t been put back in the bottle—only reshaped. In 2025, that genie is back in circulation: more fragmented, harder to detect, and perhaps more dangerous.

We urgently need to move beyond short-term disruption and adopt a comprehensive, preemptive counterterrorism strategy fit for today’s threat landscape. This strategy must rest on six interdependent pillars: education, legislation, intelligence, enforcement, deterrence, and defense.

Today’s jihadist ecosystem is no longer centered in Raqqa or Mosul. It operates as a decentralized constellation of cells, ideologues, and radicalized individuals. What connects them is not a hierarchy but a shared doctrine of perpetual insurgency.

In Syria, ISIS is quietly resurging in the eastern provinces of Deir ez-Zor and Hasakah, where weak governance, tribal tensions, and abandoned detention camps create a permissive environment. Over the past year, ISIS fighters have staged targeted assassinations, IED attacks, and ambushes against Kurdish-led forces, while online operatives amplify the group’s messaging from within Syria’s porous digital space. The illusion of a “post-ISIS” Syria is giving way to a more adaptive and insurgent threat—one that mirrors the group’s origins a decade ago.

The recent massacre of Druze civilians in southern Syria is another brutal reminder that jihadist ideology continues to inspire mass violence against vulnerable minorities. Whether carried out by ISIS remnants, radicalized militias, or opportunistic factions exploiting chaos, the result is the same: targeted slaughter designed to terrorize, divide, and destabilize. The West’s silence—or fatigue—in the face of such atrocities not only enables future attacks, but undermines its moral credibility and influence in the region. Counterterrorism must also mean protecting communities at risk, not just chasing operatives after the fact.

ISIS has morphed from a territorial actor into a transnational, low-signature threat. It still governs—in the digital sense. Its propaganda remains potent. Its operatives are now found in African jungles, Kabul basements, and French suburbs. Recruitment, coordination, and indoctrination have moved onto encrypted platforms like Telegram, Discord, and even gaming servers.

Critically, jihadists are learning from failure. The October 7th attack by Hamas against Israel reminded the world that intelligence assumptions can collapse in an instant—and that even modern border defense can be pierced by committed adversaries with surprise on their side. In some ways, Hamas has adopted playbooks honed by ISIS and al-Qaeda—coordinated, media-savvy, ideologically potent, and strategically timed.

To assume jihadist terrorism is yesterday’s threat is a dangerous illusion.

We must replace reactive postures with a deliberate, long-term framework. Below are the six dimensions a modern counterterrorism strategy must address:

1. Education – Undermining the Ideology

Terrorism begins in ideas long before it reaches explosives. We must invest in counter-ideological campaigns that discredit Jihadist propaganda, both in conflict zones and online ecosystems.

In northeastern Syria, youth in detention camps—many born to ISIS parents—are growing up without education, governance, or alternatives. These voids will not remain empty. Likewise, marginalized communities across Europe and the Middle East remain susceptible to radical narratives amplified via TikTok, encrypted messaging apps, and gaming servers.

Local authorities and civil society must be empowered to create counter-radicalization programs, particularly for vulnerable groups such as disenfranchised Sunni populations, refugee youth, and minority enclaves like the Druze, who have become direct victims of jihadist ideology.

Prisons, too, must be part of this battle. They can serve as incubators for violence—or as platforms for rehabilitation, depending on policy choices made today.

2. Legislation – Closing the Legal Gaps

The jihadist movement’s evolution has far outpaced our legal frameworks. Many countries still lack legal tools to prosecute foreign fighters, online inciters, or logistical supporters who never touched a weapon.

Returnees from Syria continue to slip through cracks—some living freely in European suburbs despite direct affiliation with ISIS governance structures. Others, including women and children, remain in legal limbo. We need unified legislation that defines affiliation, expands material support laws, and closes the gap between ideology and action.

Atrocities like the Druze massacre should trigger automatic mechanisms of accountability. If local courts cannot prosecute, regional or international courts must step in. Silence and paralysis create dangerous precedents.

Digital platforms must also face legal pressure. A clear liability structure for hosting extremist content—especially after repeated warnings—should be enshrined in law, not negotiated after tragedies.

3. Intelligence – Getting Left of Boom

Intelligence agencies must evolve with the enemy. Today’s jihadists no longer gather in safehouses—they assemble in Discord channels, encrypted backchannels, and closed digital forums using multi-language slang.

We must invest in AI-driven anomaly detection, Arabic dialect linguistics, and decentralized network mapping. The murder of Druze civilians and the buildup to the October 7th attack both involved digital activity that slipped past conventional filters.

Additionally, we must strengthen intelligence capacity in regions like Syria, where weak governance allows terrorist groups to reconstitute. Partnering with local actors, leveraging open-source intelligence, and integrating cultural expertise must become the standard.

International cooperation is essential. No agency—no matter how advanced—can track transnational threats in isolation.

4. Enforcement – Bridging Borders, Systems, and Fatigue

Enforcement cannot stop at detection. It must integrate police, immigration, cyber, and intelligence units under clear operational command.

Border zones like northeastern Syria are becoming black holes for justice. Kurdish forces cannot indefinitely guard tens of thousands of ISIS detainees. The international community must assume greater responsibility—or risk escapees igniting the next wave.

Meanwhile, enforcement capacity in Europe is again under strain. The same “counterterrorism fatigue” that existed before 2015 is reappearing—despite renewed threats after October 7. Agencies must be given not only funding and tools but staffing support and political cover.

Cross-border cooperation—on arrests, prosecutions, and repatriation—is the only way to stay ahead of decentralized threats.

5. Deterrence – Punish Enablers and Raise the Cost

Terrorists rarely act alone. They are enabled by financial facilitators, social media moderators, clerical inciters, and family members who look the other way. We must start treating facilitation as participation.

After the Moscow attack, Russian authorities arrested dozens of alleged enablers. Democracies must do the same—but with legal precision and oversight. The message must be clear: enabling terror, even silently, carries consequences.

Western inaction in the face of atrocities like the Druze massacre sends a different signal: one of permissiveness. That undermines deterrence and invites repetition.

Digital platforms must also be deterred—not just “engaged.” Repeat violations of terror-content policies should trigger fines, suspension of services, and legal scrutiny. Governments must stop asking nicely.

6. Defense – Hardened Targets, Soft Targets, and Mental Shifts

When all else fails, defense is the last line. But we must rethink what and how we defend.

October 7 proved that even a border ringed with sensors, surveillance, and physical barriers can be pierced by strategic surprise. The lesson: defense must be dynamic, layered, and constantly red-teamed.

Airports remain targets—but so do synagogues, Druze villages, mosques, schools, concerts, and city halls. These soft targets must be integrated into our defense architecture.

More importantly, we must shift from defending symbols to defending lives. Minority communities in conflict zones—whether Yazidis, Kurds, or Druze—must be included in international protection plans and security partnerships.

The Strategic Horizon

Terrorism isn’t disappearing—it’s metastasizing. From Africa to Asia to the West, jihadist groups are recalibrating, not retreating. Their next attack will be shaped not by old tactics but by new tools and unaddressed vulnerabilities.

The West must not confuse tactical success with strategic closure.

A six-dimensional strategy—education, legislation, intelligence, enforcement, deterrence, and defense—is not just a policy option. It is a necessity.

We must act not out of fear, but foresight. The Jihadist genie is not gone. Whether we contain it—or ignore it again—is a matter of political will and strategic maturity.

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Eyal Tsir Cohen is a senior researcher at the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) and a former senior executive in Israel’s intelligence community. He served as Israel’s chief hostage negotiator in 2023–2024 and is the author of many publications on strategy and defense including “Pushing the Jihadist Genie Back into the Bottle” (Brookings, 2019).