Belgian expert on Why ISIS wants a 'clash of civilizations'

Belgian expert on Why ISIS wants a 'clash of civilizations'. (CBC).

 Extremist tracker sees language of group moving toward notion of revenge.

The rash of arrests in Brussels late last week may impress some, but don't expect showers of praise for Europe's intelligence agencies from Pieter Van Ostaeyen.

"They're like a bunch of blind men," he says in his spectacularly blunt way. "Nobody knows what they are looking for, where they should look for it, who to look for. It's like this network will basically only grow. It's not like they are even close, in my opinion, to stopping this."

 Few understand ISIS like Van Ostaeyen. And what he sees now is a mutation in the group, in the rhetoric and the recruiting. He points out that the language is less about Islamic fundamentalism and is increasingly focussed on the notion of revenge.
"What they really want … is the clash of civilizations," he says. Revenge for what ISIS claims the West has done to Iraq and Syria. And the more ground ISIS loses there, the more the group lusts for bloodshed in Europe. Hmmm......I totally agree with him, this is just the beginning of a civilization clash. Read the full story here.

According to Homeland Security there were 35 attempted attacks by IS in Europe since 2014, 22 of them in 2015. An average of 2 per month

— Pieter Van Ostaeyen (@p_vanostaeyen) April 14, 2016