CNN: in January 2015: A Western Intelligence source tells CNN that the ongoing terror threat appears to involve up to 20 sleeper cells of between 120 to 180 people ready to strike in France, Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands. The source said that European Union and Middle East intelligence agencies identified an “imminent threat” to Belgium, possibly also to the Netherlands.
The Belgian counterterrorism official said indications of ISIS ordering attacks in Europe mark an apparent significant shift by the terrorist group. Before the air campaign against it, the official said, there was little indication ISIS leaders were directly plotting attacks in the West. Instead, the group prioritized its project to create an Islamic caliphate.The official named France, the UK and Belgium as countries facing a particular threat. Counterterrorism agencies in Germany also are on high alert because of the number of fighters who have traveled. Several European countries, including Britain, France, Belgium and the Netherlands are participating in the air campaign against ISIS in Iraq.Why would ISIS change tack? Partly because of increased competition between ISIS and al Qaeda affiliates, including the Khorasan group in Syria, to be seen as the standard bearers of global jihad, according to the official.The official said there is also significant concern about Khorasan attack plotting against Europe. U.S. officials previously told CNN that French al Qaeda operative and bomb-maker David Drugeon was suspected to be talent-spotting European jihadis in Syria for operations in Europe. Drugeon was injured in a drone strike in November but is believed to be still alive.Last week, Andrew Parker, the head of Britain’s security service MI5, warned, “A group of core al Qaeda terrorists in Syria is planning mass casualty attacks against the West,” an apparent reference to the Khorasan group.
Belgium warned about emerging homegrown terrorist threat in 2007
The Belgian government was warned that the country’s intelligence agencies were ill-equipped to deal with the emerging threat from homegrown jihadists, nine years before the attacks on Brussels’ airport and subway system.
Some of the city’s suburbs were becoming an “operational base” for homegrown terrorists, according to a 2007 report by an independent committee tasked with reviewing the work of Belgium’s security services.
Although the report concluded that confronting extremism should not be the responsibility of intelligence agencies, it said they “(seemed) reluctant to investigate deeper causes of violent radicalisation… political, cultural, socialogical”
The report, unearthed by ITV News, warned Belgium’s parliament that “our country can at any time become the target of Jihadist terrorism.”
This week, Belgian authorities have been accused of not doing enough to act on warnings from Turkey and the United States about the Brussels attackers.
And one police chief admitted that his department had failed to share a dossier of evidence about associates of Salah Abdeslam, four months before he was arrested.
The 2007 report concluded that the Belgian government should “encourage the intensification of cooperation between law enforcement and security services of (EU) member states.”
It recommended that the spy agencies consider “the possibility of hiring… agents with specific profiles for the knowledge of cultures and foreign languages.”
“One of the attackers in Brussels is an individual we detained in Gaziantep in June 2015 and deported. We reported the deportation to the Belgian Embassy in Ankara on July 14, 2015, but he was later set free,” Mr Erdogan said.
“Belgium ignored our warning that this person is a foreign fighter.”
Mr Erdogan’s office confirmed Ibrahim El Bakraoui was deported to the Netherlands.
It said he was later released by Belgian authorities as “no links with terrorism” were found.
In previous cases, officials have said without evidence of crime, such as having fought in Syria, they cannot jail people deported from Turkey.