ANALYSIS
Seated on cushions, in gray djellaba and henna-brown beard, a Kalashnikov by his side, the head of the Islamic State group (IS) made its first reappearance for five years, in a video released Monday. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi shows himself on these images in discussion with a jihadist seated at his side: he then recognizes the defeat of the caliphate of Daesh, before accepting the allegiance of several groups of West Africa and claim dozens of attacks in the world. A way for the head of the IS to sign a strong political act, according to the big reporter of Europe 1 Didier François, specialist of the questions of terrorism.
"The strategy is to exist internationally in terrorism"
"Five years ago, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi appeared by creating the caliphate of IS, a territory as large as England, but today he does not have this territory anymore, so he has to find In this video, he also says: 'Allah had ordered us to be jihad but did not order us to win', "French Didier points to Matthieu Belliard.
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The IS leader "admits that he is on a defeat, but he must exist and for that he claims 92 attacks in eight different countries, including that of Easter in Sri Lanka which was made by a A local group that has sworn allegiance to him, he also recognizes the allegiance of groups in Burkina Faso and Mali, "explains our reporter. "The strategy now is going to be to say 'I do not have any territory, I'm no longer a military threat, so I'm going to be fully international in terrorism'," he says.
Attacks and allegiances
In this video, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi also refers to the Clain brothers, the two French jihadists who claimed responsibility for the 13 November attacks. "The IS leader says how important propaganda is for the IS to continue to exist and to recruit." In this logic of propaganda, he tries to forget his military defeat by clinging to attacks and to these allegiances of small groups ", continues Didier François.
Despite the territorial death of the caliphate, since the resumption of its last Syrian stronghold last March in Baghouz, and its difficulty to organize complex attacks, Daech retains "a nuisance capacity", according to our reporter: "His only way to continue to exist in the long term, is to obtain cash from franchises, to bet on local recruitments, and that's what is dangerous. "