ISIL terrorists threaten to launch attacks in France, Belgium

Takfiri ISIL terrorists have threatened to carry out fresh attacks in France and Belgium in a new video released by the militants.

Published on Saturday, the nine-minute video in Arabic and French named “A Message to France” claimed that ISIL-linked elements are stationed throughout the two European countries awaiting instructions to launch attacks.

The video, which pictures two French-speaking ISIL militants, came a month after deadly raids in France, including on the headquarters of Charlie Hebdo weekly and a supermarket, that killed 17 people, as well as the three gunmen involved in the assaults.

"France's real nightmare starts now," the video says, adding that the terror group will carry out more attacks in Paris in response to France's crossing "all the red lines."

The ISIL terrorists, of whom many are foreign militants, currently control parts of Syria and Iraq. They have carried out heinous crimes in the two countries, including mass executions and the beheading of people.

Kurdish fighters in cage

The ISIL recently released another video purportedly showing 17 captured Iraqi Kurdish fighters in humiliating procession in Iraq’s northern city of Kirkuk.

The orange-clad Peshmerga fighters were paraded in cages through the streets filled with jeering militants.

ISIL foreign militants

The US National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) said in its latest estimate last Tuesday that more than 20,000 individuals from around the world, including some Americans, have traveled to Syria to join the ISIL and other extremist groups.

Foreign militants from over 90 countries, including at least 3,400 people from Western states and more than 150 Americans, have traveled to Syria to join the terrorist groups there, the NCTC added.

Security officials in Europe fear that European citizens who have joined the terrorist groups in the Middle East will use their combat skills against their homeland upon returning home.

Expansion of ISIL militancy

In a new act of brutality, ISIL published the photos of 21 Egyptian workers kidnapped in Libya, claiming that the pictures were taken moments before the killing of the Egyptians.

The workers, whose photos were published in the latest online edition of the terror group's magazine Dabiq, were kidnapped in the Libyan coastal city of Sirte in two attacks in December last year and January.

Following the event, Egypt’s foreign ministry warned Egyptians not to travel to Libya, advising those already living in the country to avoid areas of high tension.

A large number of Egyptians, many of them construction laborers, are currently working in Libya.

In a separate incident, a state-run radio station in Sirte was captured on Thursday by militants claiming to be members of the ISIL.

Following the seizure, websites affiliated with the terrorist group released pictures of several armed men in a radio station, sitting in front of microphones and brandishing their rifles.

A former local official said the militants have also established their headquarters in Sirte.

Sirte is partly controlled by the militant group Ansar al-Sharia. The city has been plagued by clashes between the Libyan army and militants fighting for the control of the Es Sider and Ra's Lanuf oil ports.

Libya plunged into chaos following the 2011 uprising against the dictatorship of Muammar Gaddafi. The ouster of Gaddafi gave rise to a patchwork of heavily-armed militias and deep political divisions.

MSM/NN/AS

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