Morocco Faces Ongoing Terrorist Threat from Sahel Jihadist Groups, Security Chief Warns

In a statement to Reuters, Haboub Cherkaoui said that the jihadist groups in the neighboring Sahel region, who recruit and train their followers online, represent the greatest terrorist threat to Morocco. The kingdom has only experienced one major attack in the last decade (the murder of two Scandinavian tourists in 2018), but its geographical location "makes it a target for Sahelian groups," he said, explaining that the terrorist threat persists as long as there are groups recruiting and training their followers online, including the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara.

To support his argument, the head of the BCIJ said that his institution, created in 2015, has succeeded in dismantling dozens of terrorist cells and arresting more than a thousand suspected jihadists. Figures that show the persistence of the terrorist risk on Morocco. This, since the rise of the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq over the past decade, resulting in an increase in jihadist activity, which is thriving after the defeat of Daesh in its center in the Middle East.

"The Islamic State has refocused on the Sahel region and with other jihadist groups. It has taken advantage of porous borders and trafficking networks. Niger and Mali have both fought militant insurgencies while the civil war in Libya has created a space where jihadist groups could operate," added Haboub Cherkaoui, fearing that Moroccan jihadists who joined the Islamic State in the Middle East may have moved to the Sahel.

They number 1,645 these Moroccans who went to Syria and Iraq to join jihadist groups. 745 of them died in suicide attacks or in combat. Among the survivors, 270 returned to Morocco and 137 were prosecuted, the official said, specifying that 288 women and 391 minors also went to the conflict zones, following their main source of income.