It’s been Russia’s turn to be visited by the emissaries of the ‘Religion of Peace’ who a few short days ago attacked a concert hall near Moscow killing 139 people and injuring and traumatising hundreds of others. Although the Russian government made noises that alleged that the Ukrainians were involved in the attack, the culprits were clearly Muslims allied with ISIS.

The attackers were from a group that many in the West at least had assumed were a spent force. ISIS might have been beaten in a territorial sense as they no longer hold any physical territory in Iraq and Syria but it is clear that this group is still dangerous and continues to receive support from extremist Muslims in a number of different countries including Pakistan, Afghanistan and some of the former Soviet states.

The fact that the ISIS group is still operating although in a different form than it once did is not only a problem for Russia, it’s a problem for everyone. What I see is that ISIS loyalists could pop up anywhere after this attack. Terrorists aligned with ISIS and its ideals could appear from any of Europe’s numerous hostile Islamic ghettos as well as contributing to and worsening the ongoing jihad against Christians in places like Africa.

Western intelligence and security agencies need to rise to the challenge of this new but also old threat. Any assumptions that those in these agencies might have made about ISIS being less of a threat than it once was needs to be put to one side. This group is still lethal and must still be considered as one of the higher level Islamic terror threats that Western nations face. There should be no complacency about this group nor about the fact that there are many supporters of this terror group embedded in different places around the world.