Islamic radicals groups are becoming an increasing problem in east German provinces, a senior counter-terrorism official told German media, like reported by politico.eu.

“We receive information on terror suspects every day,” said Stephan Kramer, the regional chief of state protection and counter-terrorism in Thuringia, a state in east-central Germany.

Many Islamic extremists came to the region during the summer of 2015, when Germany faced a wave of mass migration, Kramer said. At the time, a radical group had raised red flags in Saxony for building new prayer centers with the goal of instating Sharia law in Germany.

Kramer referred to the case of Dschaber al-Bakr, a 22-year-old Syrian who first eluded authorities in October and later committed suicide in a Leipzig jail after he was detained on suspicion of plotting an attack for the Islamic State. The case prompted an independent investigation into intelligence authority cooperation.

“We have similar information in Thuringia, too,” Kramer said. “I know from my colleagues in other eastern Germany states that the situation is similar there too. It’s a country-wide issue.”

Hackers linked to Islamic State have carried out an attack on a series of National Health Service (NHS) websites, exposing serious flaws in security systems holding personal information, it has emerged, like reported by rt.com.

Graphic images of violence from the war in Syria were put up on the sites by a group based in North Africa, which declared it was carrying out the cyberattack in retaliation for the West’s aggression in the Middle East.

The Tunisian Fallaga Team attacked the six websites three weeks ago. The sites, all based in the southwest of England, dealt with subjects like child care and funding, according to the Independent.

Patient data was vulnerable in the attacks, but initial checks do not indicate that any information was compromised.
It is the first time an IS-linked group has carried out a concerted attack on the NHS.

Khaled Fattal, the head of cyber-threat intelligence and security firm MLI Group, said the attacks were not random and exposed the vulnerability of institutions.

“They appear to be deliberately targeted at a British institution and in particular at an institution dealing with something which affects every member of the public, their health,” he told the newspaper.

“So of course, this is very worrying.”

The group has also targeted French, Tunisian and Israeli websites in the past few months.

The cyberattack comes after the government warned the NHS faced a serious risk of hacking.

In January, hackers brought down the NHS computer system at three North Lincolnshire hospitals, forcing the cancelation of all appointments for two days.

Even parking lot barriers were affected, and hospitals had to resort to using pens and paper.

The network had been taken over by a malicious virus which encrypted files. The hackers demanded a ransom to unlock them.

Around the same time as the IS-linked assault last month, the Barts Health Trust warned that its four hospitals – Royal London, St. Bartholomew’s, Whipps Cross and Newham – were experiencing a virus attack.

This, however, is believed to have been criminal rather than political in nature.

Spain’s Interior Ministry says two Moroccan men who are accused of indoctrination in Islamist extremism and recruiting others have been detained in Barcelona, like reported by arabnews.com.

The ministry said in a statement that the men, aged 25 and 27, allegedly raised money through drug trafficking and theft to support the Daesh group.

Agents of Spain’s Guardia Civil were searching the men’s apartment on Tuesday morning in Badalona, bordering Barcelona.

The ministry said police have arrested 185 suspected jihadi activists since Spain raised its national security alert to one step below maximum following attacks in France and elsewhere in 2015.

German authorities have arrested a Syrian man accused of membership in the Islamic State group and of raping a woman as she tried to flee IS-controlled territory in Syria, like reported by ap.org.

Federal prosecutors said the 31-year-old, identified only as Akram A. in line with German privacy rules, was arrested Tuesday in the Greifswald area of northeastern Germany. He’s accused of membership in a terrorist organization and committing a war crime.

Prosecutors say the suspect ran an IS checkpoint set up to control people leaving territory held by the group. The charges relate to an incident in early 2016 in which a Syrian woman tried to flee with her children.

According to prosecutors, the suspect lured the woman to a house under the pretext of getting her an “exit permit” and raped her.

President Donald Trump’s executive order to ban citizens of seven Muslim-majority states from entering the US for 90 days, and temporarily freeze all refugee arrivals (including Syrians indefinitely), has been interpreted widely as an attempt to curtail the inward migration of Muslims, which Trump and his supporters argue pose a threat to national security, like reported by chathamhouse.org .

Trump’s policy has generated a backlash among some of Europe’s leaders. Angela Merkel’s spokesman said the chancellor had ‘explained’ the Geneva Convention to the president in a phone call discussing the order, while London Mayor Sadiq Khan argued that the invitation to the president for a state visit to Britain in 2017 should be withdrawn until the ban is rescinded. Meanwhile, leaders of Europe’s populist right-wing parties, including Geert Wilders, Nigel Farage and Matteo Salvini, have heaped praise on Trump.

Amid these competing views, where do the public in European countries stand on the specific issue of Muslim immigration? There is evidence to suggest that both Trump and these radical right-wing parties reflect an underlying reservoir of public support.

Drawing on a unique, new Chatham House survey of more than 10,000 people from 10 European states, we can throw new light on what people think about migration from mainly Muslim countries. Our results are striking and sobering. They suggest that public opposition to any further migration from predominantly Muslim states is by no means confined to Trump’s electorate in the US but is fairly widespread.

In our survey, carried out before President Trump’s executive order was announced, respondents were given the following statement: ‘All further migration from mainly Muslim countries should be stopped’. They were then asked to what extent did they agree or disagree with this statement. Overall, across all 10 of the European countries an average of 55% agreed that all further migration from mainly Muslim countries should be stopped, 25% neither agreed nor disagreed and 20% disagreed.

Majorities in all but two of the ten states agreed, ranging from 71% in Poland, 65% in Austria, 53% in Germany and 51% in Italy to 47% in the United Kingdom and 41% in Spain. In no country did the percentage that disagreed surpass 32%.

Public opposition to further migration from Muslim states is especially intense in Austria, Poland, Hungary, France and Belgium, despite these countries having very different sized resident Muslim populations. In each of these countries, at least 38% of the sample ‘strongly agreed’ with the statement. With the exception of Poland, these countries have either been at the centre of the refugee crisis or experienced terrorist attacks in recent years. It is also worth noting that in most of these states the radical right is, to varying degrees, entrenched as a political force and is looking to mobilize this angst over Islam into the ballot box, either at elections in 2017 or longer term.

Our findings also reveal how, across Europe, opposition to Muslim immigration is especially intense among retired, older age cohorts while those aged below 30 are notably less opposed. There is also a clear education divide. Of those with secondary level qualifications, 59% opposed further Muslim immigration. By contrast, less than half of all degree holders supported further migration curbs.

Support is also fractured by where you live. Of those living in rural, less populated areas, 58% are opposed to further Muslim immigration. Whereas among those based in cities and metropolitan areas just over half agree with the statement and around a quarter are less supportive of a ban. Opposition is also more prominent among ‘left behind’ voters, with nearly two-thirds of those who feel they don’t have control over their own lives supporting the statement. Similarly, 65% of those Europeans who are dissatisfied with their life oppose further migration from Muslim countries. There is also some evidence that public opposition crosses political boundaries, with three-quarters of those who self-classify themselves as on the right of the political spectrum and more than a third of those on the left supporting a halt.

These results chime with other surveys exploring attitudes to Islam in Europe. In a Pew survey of 10 European countries in 2016, majorities of the public had an unfavorable view of Muslims living in their country in five countries: Hungary (72%), Italy (69%), Poland (66%), Greece (65%), and Spain (50%), although those numbers were lower in the UK (28%), Germany (29%) and France (29%). There was also a widespread perception in many countries that the arrival of refugees would increase the likelihood of terrorism, with a median of 59% across ten European countries holding this view. This mirrors some attitudes in the US.

It is also true that people in Europe vastly overestimate the number of Muslims living in their countries. An IpsosMORI poll in autumn 2016 found that public estimates of  Muslim populations were more than four times the actual level in France, and three times higher than the actual figure in the UK. But, that said, these results point to significant and widespread levels of public anxiety over immigration from mainly Muslim states. Many in the mainstream have protested against Trump’s visit but they will also need to focus on how to tackle these widespread public concerns.

More than 800 deadly firearms have been taken off the streets following a major operation by anti-terror police and officers from the National Crime Agency, like reported by telegraph.co.uk .

During a month long operation to prevent terrorists and criminals getting their hands on illegal guns, officers also arrested almost 300 suspects.

Among the weapons seized were 200 handguns, two machine guns, one sub-machine gun, 11 assault rifles, as well as 4,385 rounds of ammunition.

Some of the weapons were seized from registered firearms dealers who had had their licenses revoked, while others are thought to have been smuggled into the UK from the continent.

Islamic State provides free passage to Europe to refugees willing to join the terrorist group, offering potential recruits up to $1,000 while actively infiltrating migrant communities in countries of destination, a British anti-extremism think tank warns, like reported by rt.com.

A latest report by the leading British counter-extremism think tank Quilliam also says that underage asylum seekers are at increasing risk of being radicalized by Islamic State’s (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) preachers infiltrating refugee camps and local migrant communities.

“Groups such as Islamic State and Boko Haram recruit using financial incentives within refugee camps and work with smugglers and traffickers to facilitate the journey to asylum,” Quilliam’s report said. According to the think tank, IS is clearly aware of the value of migrant routes in the Eastern Mediterranean as it offers free passage and “a degree of security” to those willing to join IS.

In other instances, IS offers recruits up to $1,000, with the sum being a remarkable financial incentive for some refugees struggling to fund their journeys across the Mediterranean.

“More than 90 percent of arrivals in the EU were in some way facilitated by some form of illegal enterprise,” the report stressed.

Extremist organizations infiltrate and radicalize refugee communities in European countries, the researchers said citing example of Germany, where Islamists reach migrants at refugee centers or local mosques with the pretext of providing aid as well as providing opportunities to preach.

Capitalizing on local authorities’ failure to handle asylum seekers efficiently, Islamist recruiters are therefore “warning them about Western values and norms and inciting refugees against German officials and the German public.” In turn, using excessive force against refugees creates motives for them to radicalize, Quilliam warned.

“The main problem is that asylum seekers are treated like criminals when their crimes are simply fleeing their own country for whatever reason … The lack of humanity in how women were treated seems to result in a loss of privacy, sense of decency, compassion and respect as a result of being detained,” it continued, adding that the UK authorities routinely detain those who survived rape, sexual violence and other forms of torture, in direct violation of their own guidelines.

Consequently, a suspicion created by a mere possibility of IS capitalizing on refugees flowing into Europe “is likely to increase xenophobic and anti-refugee sentiment,” the think tank said. In particular, the UK-based far-right groups – such as English Defense League or PegidaUK – are cultivating “the ‘otherisation’ of refugees based on the threat of them ‘invading’ the West or carrying out sexual abuse of women and children.”

The Quilliam report follows recent statements by Italy’s chief of intelligence Alessandro Pansa, who asserted that IS is resorting to human trafficking as its primary sources of revenue shrink.

“Its sources of revenue, primarily smuggling oil products and antiquities, are at the edge of drying out. We think that terrorists are resorting to human trafficking as a new source of revenue,” he told La Stampa.

Throughout the past two years, security officials in Germany, the UK and other European countries raised concerns over IS’s engagement into human trafficking in order to recruit followers and export operatives able to build up sleeper cells or manage underground networks.

In 2016, more than 180,000 migrants were illegally smuggled by sea from Africa into Italy on board overcrowded vessels, according to the UN refugee agency. Europol, the EU’s police agency, believes criminal networks may have earned up €6 billion (US$6.44 billion) in 2015 alone providing transportation, housing and fraudulent IDs at overwhelmingly high prices.

The terror threat from ISIS is reaching new highs and cutting police budgets could cost lives, Sadiq Khan has warned, like reported by dailymail.co.uk.

The London Mayor said the danger of attacks in the capital had risen since he entered city hall last May and keeping people safe was becoming ‘increasingly difficult’.

Describing an ‘evolving’ threat focusing on radicalising young Muslims over the internet, Mr Khan raised fears that Donald Trump’s travel ban will hand ISIS a powerful propaganda tool.