Arrests show growing trend of IS wolf packs
KUALA LUMPUR: The arrests earlier this month of four men planning terror attacks and assassinations are the latest incident involving Islamic State (IS) wolf packs in recent years.
Police and counter-terrorism experts coined the term to describe small groups of terror cells made up of up to six or seven members who have no links to other cells.
These differ from lone wolf militants who plan and carry out attacks individually.
Federal police Special Branch Counter-Terrorism Division principal assistant director Datuk Ayob Khan Mydin Pitchay had described how terror cells were moving away from networks of multiple cells and were functioning through individual cell groups that operate on their own.
Bruce Riedel, a former United States Central Intelligence Agency counter-terrorism official, had told the Washington Post in 2016 that smaller terror groups worked with very well thought-out plans and were rapidly becoming an IS signature pattern
On Oct 10, 2017, Malaysian police intercepted a wolf pack of three people who had planned attacks on the Better Beer Festival at Publika in Kuala Lumpur, non-Muslim places of worship and entertainment outlets.
The three people — a Form Six student, 19, a former soldier and a contractor — were nabbed by counter-terrorism operatives in Kelantan for alleged ties with the militant group.
“The teen has never been to Syria, but was influenced through IS’ Facebook page and he learnt how to make bombs through websites,” Ayob told a press conference in November 2017.
Experts say IS sympathisers learn how to engage in terror activities by themselves instead of being recruited by the terrorists. Those who were interested in joining the group would look for websites and blogs to learn about its ideology.
In recent years, police have seen cases of IS sympathisers trained to carry out attacks on places of worship.
In September 2017, police arrested a man, 21, in Bagan Serai, Perak, for allegedly receiving orders from IS to launch attacks on non-Muslims and their places of worship. The suspect admitted to having been taught by a Malaysian terrorist high on the wanted list, Dr Mahmud Ahmad, and a Saudi Arabian bomb expert on how to build improvised explosive devices.
The man had also received instructions from another senior Malaysian IS fighter in Syria to buy a pistol, M-16 and AK-47 assault rifles and a hand grenade from a neighbouring country to launch an attack on non-Muslims and their places of worship.
The man was among three people arrested in three states at that time.