---
title: "The Islamic State's Quiet Resurgence: A Global Network Rebuilt for the Shadows"
description: "Slightly more than a decade ago, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria stood at the absolute peak of its power in the Middle East. Over the ten years that followed, the group's central caliphate was dismantled, its fighters were hunted down, and the world tried its very best to extinguish the ideology that had brought the jihadist proto-state into being. By most measures, that grand global effort succeeded. The Islamic State no longer holds substantial territory in most parts of the world, and governments and militaries long ago shifted their attention toward more urgent problems.\n\nBut even after the Islamic State lost its land, the movement never fully disappeared. It went underground, licked its wounds from the 2010s, and prepared for an eventual resurgence. The organization of the 2020s is a very different beast. It has gone global, it has gone online, and it has learned to exploit autonomous communications, cryptocurrencies, shell corporations, and more to expand into the shadows.\n\nThe group the world once called ISIS has become just one small part of a worldwide network of cells, franchises, and militant proto-states. Each pursues its own objectives, yet they coordinate and even finance one another's expansion. Whether in Africa, Asia, or the Middle East, this rebuilt version of the Islamic State is gaining ground.\n\nThis is the central argument of what follows: at a moment of global upheaval, when the world's attention is fixed elsewhere, the Islamic State has reorganized itself into a transcontinental insurgency that thrives precisely when it is ignored—and it is quietly expanding.\n\n## Key Takeaways\n\n- The Islamic State no longer functions as a single territorial caliphate. It now operates as a decentralized worldwide network of cells and franchises that coordinate financing, propaganda, and recruitment across continents.\n- IS-Somalia, based in Puntland and battered by Puntland forces and relentless US air power since late 2024, reinvented itself less as a territorial holder than as a financial and organizational nexus for the global movement—and its reach now extends to Europe.\n- On 25 March 2026, Moroccan intelligence (the DGST), working with Spanish intelligence, dismantled an IS-Somalia cell operating from Tangier and Majorca that was plotting an attack in Spain and coordinating with the IS-Sahel franchise.\n- The collapse of the Assad regime in December 2024 and the dismantling of the Kurdish-led northeast administration created a security vacuum in Syria. A mass breakout from the al-Hol camp left as many as 20,000 former Islamic State detainees at large.\n- Across Africa, IS-Sahel, ISWAP, and the Allied Democratic Forces are all expanding, exploiting chaos created by rival jihadists like JNIM and Boko Haram and targeting lucrative resources.\n- In Asia, IS-Khorasan is exploiting the Pakistan-Afghanistan border conflict and the war in Iran to recruit defectors and consolidate, without committing itself to the fighting.\n- The Islamic State's secrecy is now a deliberate strategy. By staying out of the headlines during a period of worldwide chaos, it expands its window of opportunity and makes its plans harder than ever to expose.\n\n## A Movement Rebuilt for a Changing World\n\nThe defining feature of today's Islamic State is not its strength on any single battlefield but its architecture. Where the caliphate of the 2010s tried to hold and govern contiguous territory, the organization that survived its collapse learned to operate as a distributed network. ISIS is no longer the whole; it is a component within a larger ecosystem of affiliates spread across three continents.\n\nThat ecosystem is held together by money, messaging, and shared ideology rather than by a contiguous map. The modern Islamic State leans on autonomous communications, cryptocurrencies, shell corporations, and transnational funding pipelines to move resources between franchises that would otherwise be separated by thousands of miles. Cells in one region produce propaganda for affiliates to distribute worldwide; leaders in one safe haven shelter senior figures from another.\n\nThe result is a structure engineered for survival rather than conquest. It is harder to map, harder to decapitate, and far harder to extinguish than a territorial state. And it is designed, above all, to operate quietly—to expand while the world's governments, militaries, and media are looking the other way.\n\n## New Fronts: Somalia Becomes a Global Nexus\n\nBy all outward indicators, the Islamic State franchise in Somalia—IS-Somalia—is on its last legs. Based in the autonomous Somali state of Puntland, on the easternmost tip of Somali territory, it has never been a serious threat to Somali stability. It pales in comparison to the other threats to Somali security, especially the much larger and more powerful jihadist insurgency, al-Shabaab.\n\nYet from their hideouts in Puntland's mountain ranges, IS-Somalia spent the first years of the 2020s evolving into something more. They took over villages, captured lucrative gold mines, and created other sources of income, but rather than expand their territory, they focused on becoming the nexus of the global Islamic State movement. They built elaborate transnational funding networks, produced propaganda for affiliates to post worldwide, and welcomed some of the most senior Islamic State leaders from across the globe. High in the mountains, in an ignored autonomous region of a nation with far bigger problems, IS-Somalia could do as it pleased in relative safety.\n\nThat changed in late 2024. IS-Somalia came under relentless attack—not just from Puntland's armed forces, but from barrage after barrage of US air power. By the start of 2026, the group was in total disarray, and its former base of operations had been torn apart.\n\n## The Morocco Cell and the Reach Into Europe\n\nFor that reason, close observers of the movement were very surprised by an announcement from Moroccan intelligence on 25 March 2026—several months after IS-Somalia was thought to have been basically dismantled. On that day, Morocco's General Directorate of Territorial Surveillance, the DGST, announced that it had dismantled an IS-Somalia terror cell on its soil.\n\nWorking with Spanish intelligence, Morocco had identified an IS-Somalia cell operating out of Tangier and Majorca. The cell had been coordinating financing and logistical support for multiple Islamic State franchises across Africa, including in Somalia—but its ambitions went far beyond that. According to Moroccan intelligence, the cell was also plotting an imminent attack, not in Morocco or anywhere in Africa, but in Spain.\n\nMaking the discovery stranger still, the IS-Somalia cell was reportedly working with representatives from another franchise, the powerful IS-Sahel, operating across the Sahel region just south of the Sahara. It was the latest sign of IS-Sahel's growing ambition, as a group once defined by its role as a fighting force in Africa begins to entertain the prospect of going global.\n\n## Libya's Hidden Revival\n\nThe Morocco cell was announced just one day after another unusual revelation. On 24 March 2026, the Africa Defense Forum released a report on the Islamic State's expansion into Libya. While Libya was a hotbed of Islamic State insurgency during the mid-2010s, the group was thought to have shifted its attention elsewhere long ago. As extremism researcher Aaron Zelin put it, \"The Islamic State has been quiet in Libya for almost a decade.\"\n\nAccording to the ADF report, that quiet was deceptive. The Islamic State has rebuilt itself all across the divided nation—in areas controlled by the internationally recognized Libyan government, and in areas controlled by the powerful warlord Khalifa Haftar. The group has grown cozy with the human trafficking networks that operate across Libya, funneling migrants from sub-Saharan Africa toward perilous Mediterranean crossings. In the south, particularly the Fezzan region, it has linked itself to transnational networks running from war-torn Sudan to unstable Chad to the embattled military regimes in Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso.\n\nAs Libyan analyst Adel Abdel Kafi told the Lebanese outlet An-Nahar, the Islamic State has been waiting for a moment like this in Libya for years. As tensions between Libya's two rival factions rise, Libyan intelligence has encountered resurgent cells with growing frequency—first recruiting fighters and sending them to Somalia and the Sahel, then laundering money, then operating shell corporations disguised as humanitarian groups. In August 2025, Libyan intelligence reportedly dismantled a cell that had acquired mortars, anti-aircraft guns, large quantities of ammunition, and a cross-border financial network that used cryptocurrency exchanges to move cash.\n\n## Azerbaijan and the Caucasus Foothold\n\nThose two reports came on the heels of a third investigation, this one by conflict analyst Pawel Wojcik, published via the Jamestown Foundation. It highlighted the Islamic State's growing presence in northern Azerbaijan.\n\nAs Wojcik describes, the Islamic State is a relatively new arrival there, only formalizing a franchise in 2024. But over the past several months, cells have been intercepted in the planning stages of multiple attacks, including a plot to strike the Israeli embassy in the capital, Baku.\n\nAzerbaijan is a particularly attractive base for several reasons. The country has struggled to track down and curtail other extremist networks on its soil. It is a hotbed for illicit weapons trafficking. And it offers a convenient platform from which to recruit fighters across the Caucasus—a region where jihadist ideology is known to be relatively common in Sunni Muslim communities compared with other Sunni communities across the globe.\n\nFrom Morocco to Libya to Azerbaijan, these reports point to the same concerning trend. Even though the Islamic State is not capturing global headlines, it is in a quiet but organized period of expansion into new areas.\n\n## Oversights and Opportunities: The Collapse in Syria\n\nIt would be overzealous to draw sweeping conclusions from three scattered examples. Most Islamic State insurgents are not located in Libya, Morocco, or Azerbaijan, and if the group were making only limited gains while being beaten back everywhere else, the honest conclusion might be that its influence is shrinking. Unfortunately, that is not the case.\n\nThe clearest evidence comes from the Middle East, where a recent headline by War on the Rocks phrased it best: \"Islamic State Containment is Collapsing in Syria.\" As that outlet explains—and as a small but vocal group of analysts have warned for more than a year—the Islamic State gained a critical opening in Syria after the December 2024 collapse of the Assad regime. That opening was not inevitable. It is the product of security failures, strategic miscalculations, infighting, and foreign interference in post-Assad Syria, often with zero regard for the threat the Islamic State poses.\n\nMost importantly, the new Syrian transitional leadership has effectively dismantled the autonomous Kurdish-led government that once ruled the northeast. That decision created a long and growing list of problems, but the gravest is this: the Kurdish-led government and its paramilitary, the Syrian Democratic Forces, were responsible for guarding massive refugee camps holding thousands of Islamic State fighters and families.\n\n## The al-Hol Breakout\n\nWhen Damascus launched its military offensive to recapture the Syrian northeast, the Kurdish forces guarding those camps were left unable to protect them. Despite limited US intervention to ferry Islamic State detainees to Iraq, the results were catastrophic.\n\nBefore the offensive, the largest camp in the area—al-Hol—was home to roughly 24,000 people, mostly women and children, with links to the Islamic State. When the Syrian Democratic Forces were forced to pull back, with no way to hand off competent oversight to the incoming military, al-Hol became the site of a mass escape. According to US intelligence officials who spoke with the Wall Street Journal, thousands upon thousands of Islamic State family members broke out of the camp and disappeared. American intelligence concluded that as many as 20,000 former detainees were now at large across Syria. As the Journal noted: \"Security experts have long warned that the wives of Islamic State fighters were effectively raising the next generation of militants at the sprawling Al-Hol facility.\"\n\nThe story here is not that Syria's transitional leadership chose to let these people go free. Whatever one's view of the leadership in Damascus—and there is plenty to say—the former jihadists who now rule Syria genuinely despise the Islamic State. The escapes appear to have resulted from complete mismanagement of the transition of camp authority, with Damascus and the Syrian Democratic Forces each blaming the other for the breakout.\n\n## A Permissive Environment\n\nEither way, those Islamic State loyalists escaped into Syria at a very bad moment for the rest of the world. The organization had already exploited the security vacuum left by the regime's fall, along with the political instability, sectarian infighting, and other problems besetting the transition.\n\nThe Islamic State understands its own dilemma clearly. If it used the vacuum to seize territory, it would risk unifying Damascus and its many internal enemies against the one insurgent threat they all despise enough to cooperate against. So instead of grabbing land, it stays quiet. As long as it does not draw attention, the new leadership remains far too distracted to confront it. Better still, the United States is withdrawing from Syria at the same time, and that withdrawal will likely conclude on schedule—provided the Islamic State gives Washington no reason to reconsider.\n\nAs War on the Rocks put it: \"This is creating a permissive environment for radicalization that the Islamic State can exploit to infiltrate state structures and rebuild networks. Washington's mission against the Islamic State is ending at the very moment the group is poised to resurge.\" The ongoing war in Iran, and the broader Middle Eastern chaos that has come with it, have only made the group's job easier.\n\n## Africa's Expanding Franchises\n\nAcross Africa, other franchises are gaining ground. The Islamic State – Sahel Province is rapidly accumulating power, operating across Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, and other Sahel nations—the region where the majority of global terrorism deaths now take place. IS-Sahel is not the most dangerous insurgency in the area; that distinction belongs to JNIM, an al-Qaeda affiliate. But JNIM has generated a level of pandemonium that has cleared the way for IS-Sahel to expand, positioning itself as an even more radical and ruthless force for locals who feel JNIM does not go far enough. In January, IS-Sahel used drones and mortars to assault a key international airport in Niger—a stunning display of its growing capabilities.\n\nIn Nigeria and nearby nations, the Islamic State – West Africa Province (ISWAP) has engaged government forces in larger and larger battles, even as it fights for dominance against the rival jihadist insurgency Boko Haram. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, several eastern provinces have been destabilized by an Islamic State-affiliated group called the Allied Democratic Forces—which, to be clear, are neither democratic nor allied with anybody except the Islamic State itself.\n\nThe Allied Democratic Forces have roamed the country in massive bands for years, but they have grown increasingly brazen in recent months. In one especially notable attack, the group stormed a Chinese-run gold mine, killing several local miners and forcing the Chinese nationals in charge to flee. Even in war-torn Congo, attacks on Chinese interests remain relatively rare, and this assault suggests the Islamic State's Congolese partners are growing interested in the foreign operations that extract lucrative resources from their country.\n\n## Asia: IS-Khorasan Waits Out the War\n\nFinally, the outbreak of two major conflicts in Asia has opened the door for one of the Islamic State's most dangerous franchises, IS-Khorasan, to expand its power and influence rapidly. IS-Khorasan is active across Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Afghanistan, and Tajikistan—and two of those four nations are currently at war.\n\nSince late February, Pakistan and Afghanistan have fought battles overshadowed by the war in Iran. Those clashes are taking place in the border region between the two countries, where IS-Khorasan is historically at its strongest, yet the group has mostly stayed out of the fighting. Instead, it appears to be exploiting the instability to expand operations, recruit new members, and attract defectors from the Pakistani Taliban and other insurgent groups whose members come seeking an even more hardline movement.\n\nJust as important, IS-Khorasan appears poised to capitalize on the war in Iran. As intelligence researcher Morgan Tadych wrote for the Atlantic Council: \"ISIS seems poised to exploit this moment of regional instability to its advantage. Specifically, ISIS appears eager to attract new followers, inspire attacks, and consolidate territory amid the chaos caused by the Iran war and by the security situations in Syria and Afghanistan.\" In this case, the acronym ISIS serves as a stand-in for the entire Islamic State movement.\n\n## Reading the Ripples on the Surface\n\nThe entire world is going through a period of upheaval, and it is hardly a surprise that the Islamic State has faded from the headlines. That fade is by design. The group has learned the lessons of its failed bid to build a caliphate in the 2010s and shifted to become a transcontinental insurgency that thrives when it is ignored. Periods of worldwide chaos—when governments, militaries, intelligence agencies, and media outlets shift their focus elsewhere—are exactly the moments when a quiet, well-coordinated insurgency can exploit its window of opportunity.\n\nWe do not get to present a comprehensive overview of the Islamic State's recent gains the way we can for the war in Iran or other crises across the globe. The organization has grown up, from its hotheaded adolescent years into a mature, well-connected, and extremely dangerous insurgency that fully understands the value of secrecy. Tracking it is like staring at a lake and trying to read what is happening underwater from the occasional waves and ripples on the surface.\n\nBut whenever news does emerge, the conclusion is the same. At a time of chaos across the globe, the Islamic State is gaining power, expanding its ambitions, and setting up new cells in new places with a focus on new targets. Worst of all, the organization knows the rest of the world is looking away. By the time that changes, it will have covered its tracks—and whatever plans it has developed by then will be more difficult than ever to expose.\n\n## Frequently Asked Questions\n\n### How has the Islamic State changed since the height of its caliphate?\n\nA decade ago, the Islamic State held substantial territory and operated as a centralized proto-state. After its caliphate was dismantled, the movement went underground and rebuilt itself as a global, decentralized network of cells and franchises that use autonomous communications, cryptocurrencies, and shell corporations to coordinate and finance one another's expansion across three continents.\n\n### What happened with the IS-Somalia cell discovered in Morocco in March 2026?\n\nOn 25 March 2026, Morocco's General Directorate of Territorial Surveillance, working with Spanish intelligence, dismantled an IS-Somalia cell operating from Tangier and Majorca. The cell had been coordinating financing and logistics for Islamic State franchises across Africa, was plotting an imminent attack in Spain, and was reportedly working with representatives of the IS-Sahel franchise—evidence that IS-Somalia's reach had extended into Europe even after being battered by US air power in Puntland.\n\n### Why is the security situation in Syria so dangerous for Islamic State containment?\n\nAfter the December 2024 collapse of the Assad regime, Syria's transitional leadership dismantled the Kurdish-led northeast administration, forcing the Syrian Democratic Forces—who guarded camps holding Islamic State fighters and families—to pull back. This triggered a mass breakout from the al-Hol camp, which had held roughly 24,000 people, leaving as many as 20,000 former detainees at large across Syria according to US intelligence, at the very moment the United States is withdrawing from the country.\n\n### Which African franchises are expanding and how?\n\nIS-Sahel is growing across Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso, exploiting chaos created by the al-Qaeda affiliate JNIM and demonstrating growing capabilities by using drones and mortars to assault a key international airport in Niger in January. ISWAP is engaging Nigerian government forces in larger battles while fighting the rival group Boko Haram. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Allied Democratic Forces have grown more brazen, including a raid on a Chinese-run gold mine.\n\n### Why does the Islamic State deliberately stay out of the headlines?\n\nThe group has learned from the failure of its 2010s caliphate that seizing visible territory unifies enemies against it. By staying quiet during the current period of global upheaval—when governments, militaries, and media focus elsewhere—it can expand cells, recruit members, and build financial networks without triggering a concerted response. As the article puts it, tracking the organization is like staring at a lake and trying to read what is happening underwater from the occasional waves and ripples on the surface.\n\n## Related Coverage\n\n- [Puntland's War on the Islamic State in Somalia](/articles/conflicts/puntland-islamic-state-somalia-counterinsurgency)\n- [ISIS, Three Dead Americans, and the Syrian Resurgence](/articles/conflicts/isis-killed-three-americans-syria-resurgence)\n- [Mozambique's Cabo Delgado Insurgency, Explained](/articles/conflicts/mozambique-cabo-delgado-insurgency-isis-crisis-explained)\n\n## Sources\n\n1. https://www.criticalthreats.org/analysis/the-islamic-state-in-somalias-area-of-operations\n2. https://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2025/07/us-ground-raid-captures-islamic-state-leader-in-northern-somalia.php\n3. https://smallwarsjournal.com/2026/03/25/preventing-isis-rising-resurgence-after-syrias-power-shift/\n4. https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/somalia-new-frontline-islamic-states-global-expansion\n5. https://adf-magazine.com/2026/03/islamic-state-group-quietly-gaining-momentum-in-libya/\n6. https://jamestown.org/islamic-states-new-threats-in-northern-azerbaijan/\n7. https://ctc.westpoint.edu/islamic-state-somalia-a-growing-global-terror-concern/\n8. https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/u-s-intelligence-says-at-least-15-000-at-large-after-isis-detention-camp-collapses-in-syria-3ede991b\n9. https://warontherocks.com/2026/03/islamic-state-containment-is-collapsing-in-syria/\n10. https://issafrica.org/iss-today/lake-chad-basin-s-military-bases-in-iswap-s-crosshairs\n11. https://adf-magazine.com/2026/01/rival-terrorists-in-battle-for-control-of-lake-chad-islands/\n12. https://www.lemonde.fr/en/international/article/2026/03/16/is-linked-rebels-stage-deadly-attack-on-dr-congo-mines-says-government_6751478_4.html\n13. https://www.theafricareport.com/399683/winner-will-decide-our-future-lake-chad-basin-caught-in-brutal-boko-haram-iswap-struggle/\n14. https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/islamic-state-claims-two-attacks-syrian-army-announces-new-phase-operations-2026-02-21/\n15. https://apnews.com/article/iraq-syria-islamic-state-detainees-transfer-b37665871dc5e199096bf22ea9e79af7\n16. https://thesoufancenter.org/intelbrief-2026-february-3/\n17. https://adf-magazine.com/2026/03/terror-groups-pressure-sahel-capitals/\n18. https://adf-magazine.com/2026/03/sahel-terror-groups-use-forest-safe-havens-to-launch-attacks/\n19. https://www.thetimes.com/world/middle-east/article/isis-islamic-state-somalia-iran-war-trump-wv3pqc609\n20. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cj32d8e2m5eo\n21. https://www.africanews.com/2025/08/21/security-forces-in-somalia-confront-islamic-state-militants/\n22. https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/dispatches/how-isis-and-its-affiliates-might-capitalize-on-the-iran-war/\n23. https://www.washingtonpost.com/ripple/2026/03/30/trump-war-iran-israel-lebanon-gulf-winner-loser/\n24. https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/the-new-war-in-afghanistan\n25. https://www.csis.org/analysis/why-did-pakistan-announce-open-war-against-taliban\n26. https://thesoufancenter.org/intelbrief-2025-december-19/\n27. https://x.com/_erikhacker/status/2036734393306259608\n28. https://x.com/smallwars/status/2036888350133555293\n29. https://x.com/azelin/status/2036760720767860751\n30. https://x.com/confusedeagledc/status/2036505855076471282\n\n<!-- youtube:aVUk66MGW9A -->"
url: https://warfronts.pub/article/islamic-state-global-network-resurgence.md
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datePublished: 2026-06-02
dateModified: 2026-06-02
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<!-- aeo:section start="lede" -->
Slightly more than a decade ago, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria stood at the absolute peak of its power in the Middle East. Over the ten years that followed, the group's central caliphate was dismantled, its fighters were hunted down, and the world tried its very best to extinguish the ideology that had brought the jihadist proto-state into being. By most measures, that grand global effort succeeded. The Islamic State no longer holds substantial territory in most parts of the world, and governments and militaries long ago shifted their attention toward more urgent problems.

But even after the Islamic State lost its land, the movement never fully disappeared. It went underground, licked its wounds from the 2010s, and prepared for an eventual resurgence. The organization of the 2020s is a very different beast. It has gone global, it has gone online, and it has learned to exploit autonomous communications, cryptocurrencies, shell corporations, and more to expand into the shadows.

The group the world once called ISIS has become just one small part of a worldwide network of cells, franchises, and militant proto-states. Each pursues its own objectives, yet they coordinate and even finance one another's expansion. Whether in Africa, Asia, or the Middle East, this rebuilt version of the Islamic State is gaining ground.

This is the central argument of what follows: at a moment of global upheaval, when the world's attention is fixed elsewhere, the Islamic State has reorganized itself into a transcontinental insurgency that thrives precisely when it is ignored—and it is quietly expanding.

<!-- aeo:section end="lede" -->
<!-- aeo:section start="key-takeaways" -->
## Key Takeaways

- The Islamic State no longer functions as a single territorial caliphate. It now operates as a decentralized worldwide network of cells and franchises that coordinate financing, propaganda, and recruitment across continents.
- IS-Somalia, based in Puntland and battered by Puntland forces and relentless US air power since late 2024, reinvented itself less as a territorial holder than as a financial and organizational nexus for the global movement—and its reach now extends to Europe.
- On 25 March 2026, Moroccan intelligence (the DGST), working with Spanish intelligence, dismantled an IS-Somalia cell operating from Tangier and Majorca that was plotting an attack in Spain and coordinating with the IS-Sahel franchise.
- The collapse of the Assad regime in December 2024 and the dismantling of the Kurdish-led northeast administration created a security vacuum in Syria. A mass breakout from the al-Hol camp left as many as 20,000 former Islamic State detainees at large.
- Across Africa, IS-Sahel, ISWAP, and the Allied Democratic Forces are all expanding, exploiting chaos created by rival jihadists like JNIM and Boko Haram and targeting lucrative resources.
- In Asia, IS-Khorasan is exploiting the Pakistan-Afghanistan border conflict and the war in Iran to recruit defectors and consolidate, without committing itself to the fighting.
- The Islamic State's secrecy is now a deliberate strategy. By staying out of the headlines during a period of worldwide chaos, it expands its window of opportunity and makes its plans harder than ever to expose.

<!-- aeo:section end="key-takeaways" -->
<!-- aeo:section start="a-movement-rebuilt-for-a-changing-world" -->
## A Movement Rebuilt for a Changing World

The defining feature of today's Islamic State is not its strength on any single battlefield but its architecture. Where the caliphate of the 2010s tried to hold and govern contiguous territory, the organization that survived its collapse learned to operate as a distributed network. ISIS is no longer the whole; it is a component within a larger ecosystem of affiliates spread across three continents.

That ecosystem is held together by money, messaging, and shared ideology rather than by a contiguous map. The modern Islamic State leans on autonomous communications, cryptocurrencies, shell corporations, and transnational funding pipelines to move resources between franchises that would otherwise be separated by thousands of miles. Cells in one region produce propaganda for affiliates to distribute worldwide; leaders in one safe haven shelter senior figures from another.

The result is a structure engineered for survival rather than conquest. It is harder to map, harder to decapitate, and far harder to extinguish than a territorial state. And it is designed, above all, to operate quietly—to expand while the world's governments, militaries, and media are looking the other way.

<!-- aeo:section end="a-movement-rebuilt-for-a-changing-world" -->
<!-- aeo:section start="new-fronts-somalia-becomes-a-global-nexus" -->
## New Fronts: Somalia Becomes a Global Nexus

By all outward indicators, the Islamic State franchise in Somalia—IS-Somalia—is on its last legs. Based in the autonomous Somali state of Puntland, on the easternmost tip of Somali territory, it has never been a serious threat to Somali stability. It pales in comparison to the other threats to Somali security, especially the much larger and more powerful jihadist insurgency, al-Shabaab.

Yet from their hideouts in Puntland's mountain ranges, IS-Somalia spent the first years of the 2020s evolving into something more. They took over villages, captured lucrative gold mines, and created other sources of income, but rather than expand their territory, they focused on becoming the nexus of the global Islamic State movement. They built elaborate transnational funding networks, produced propaganda for affiliates to post worldwide, and welcomed some of the most senior Islamic State leaders from across the globe. High in the mountains, in an ignored autonomous region of a nation with far bigger problems, IS-Somalia could do as it pleased in relative safety.

That changed in late 2024. IS-Somalia came under relentless attack—not just from Puntland's armed forces, but from barrage after barrage of US air power. By the start of 2026, the group was in total disarray, and its former base of operations had been torn apart.

<!-- aeo:section end="new-fronts-somalia-becomes-a-global-nexus" -->
<!-- aeo:section start="the-morocco-cell-and-the-reach-into-europe" -->
## The Morocco Cell and the Reach Into Europe

For that reason, close observers of the movement were very surprised by an announcement from Moroccan intelligence on 25 March 2026—several months after IS-Somalia was thought to have been basically dismantled. On that day, Morocco's General Directorate of Territorial Surveillance, the DGST, announced that it had dismantled an IS-Somalia terror cell on its soil.

Working with Spanish intelligence, Morocco had identified an IS-Somalia cell operating out of Tangier and Majorca. The cell had been coordinating financing and logistical support for multiple Islamic State franchises across Africa, including in Somalia—but its ambitions went far beyond that. According to Moroccan intelligence, the cell was also plotting an imminent attack, not in Morocco or anywhere in Africa, but in Spain.

Making the discovery stranger still, the IS-Somalia cell was reportedly working with representatives from another franchise, the powerful IS-Sahel, operating across the Sahel region just south of the Sahara. It was the latest sign of IS-Sahel's growing ambition, as a group once defined by its role as a fighting force in Africa begins to entertain the prospect of going global.

<!-- aeo:section end="the-morocco-cell-and-the-reach-into-europe" -->
<!-- aeo:section start="libya-s-hidden-revival" -->
## Libya's Hidden Revival

The Morocco cell was announced just one day after another unusual revelation. On 24 March 2026, the Africa Defense Forum released a report on the Islamic State's expansion into Libya. While Libya was a hotbed of Islamic State insurgency during the mid-2010s, the group was thought to have shifted its attention elsewhere long ago. As extremism researcher Aaron Zelin put it, "The Islamic State has been quiet in Libya for almost a decade."

According to the ADF report, that quiet was deceptive. The Islamic State has rebuilt itself all across the divided nation—in areas controlled by the internationally recognized Libyan government, and in areas controlled by the powerful warlord Khalifa Haftar. The group has grown cozy with the human trafficking networks that operate across Libya, funneling migrants from sub-Saharan Africa toward perilous Mediterranean crossings. In the south, particularly the Fezzan region, it has linked itself to transnational networks running from war-torn Sudan to unstable Chad to the embattled military regimes in Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso.

As Libyan analyst Adel Abdel Kafi told the Lebanese outlet An-Nahar, the Islamic State has been waiting for a moment like this in Libya for years. As tensions between Libya's two rival factions rise, Libyan intelligence has encountered resurgent cells with growing frequency—first recruiting fighters and sending them to Somalia and the Sahel, then laundering money, then operating shell corporations disguised as humanitarian groups. In August 2025, Libyan intelligence reportedly dismantled a cell that had acquired mortars, anti-aircraft guns, large quantities of ammunition, and a cross-border financial network that used cryptocurrency exchanges to move cash.

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<!-- aeo:section start="azerbaijan-and-the-caucasus-foothold" -->
## Azerbaijan and the Caucasus Foothold

Those two reports came on the heels of a third investigation, this one by conflict analyst Pawel Wojcik, published via the Jamestown Foundation. It highlighted the Islamic State's growing presence in northern Azerbaijan.

As Wojcik describes, the Islamic State is a relatively new arrival there, only formalizing a franchise in 2024. But over the past several months, cells have been intercepted in the planning stages of multiple attacks, including a plot to strike the Israeli embassy in the capital, Baku.

Azerbaijan is a particularly attractive base for several reasons. The country has struggled to track down and curtail other extremist networks on its soil. It is a hotbed for illicit weapons trafficking. And it offers a convenient platform from which to recruit fighters across the Caucasus—a region where jihadist ideology is known to be relatively common in Sunni Muslim communities compared with other Sunni communities across the globe.

From Morocco to Libya to Azerbaijan, these reports point to the same concerning trend. Even though the Islamic State is not capturing global headlines, it is in a quiet but organized period of expansion into new areas.

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<!-- aeo:section start="oversights-and-opportunities-the-collapse-in-syria" -->
## Oversights and Opportunities: The Collapse in Syria

It would be overzealous to draw sweeping conclusions from three scattered examples. Most Islamic State insurgents are not located in Libya, Morocco, or Azerbaijan, and if the group were making only limited gains while being beaten back everywhere else, the honest conclusion might be that its influence is shrinking. Unfortunately, that is not the case.

The clearest evidence comes from the Middle East, where a recent headline by War on the Rocks phrased it best: "Islamic State Containment is Collapsing in Syria." As that outlet explains—and as a small but vocal group of analysts have warned for more than a year—the Islamic State gained a critical opening in Syria after the December 2024 collapse of the Assad regime. That opening was not inevitable. It is the product of security failures, strategic miscalculations, infighting, and foreign interference in post-Assad Syria, often with zero regard for the threat the Islamic State poses.

Most importantly, the new Syrian transitional leadership has effectively dismantled the autonomous Kurdish-led government that once ruled the northeast. That decision created a long and growing list of problems, but the gravest is this: the Kurdish-led government and its paramilitary, the Syrian Democratic Forces, were responsible for guarding massive refugee camps holding thousands of Islamic State fighters and families.

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<!-- aeo:section start="the-al-hol-breakout" -->
## The al-Hol Breakout

When Damascus launched its military offensive to recapture the Syrian northeast, the Kurdish forces guarding those camps were left unable to protect them. Despite limited US intervention to ferry Islamic State detainees to Iraq, the results were catastrophic.

Before the offensive, the largest camp in the area—al-Hol—was home to roughly 24,000 people, mostly women and children, with links to the Islamic State. When the Syrian Democratic Forces were forced to pull back, with no way to hand off competent oversight to the incoming military, al-Hol became the site of a mass escape. According to US intelligence officials who spoke with the Wall Street Journal, thousands upon thousands of Islamic State family members broke out of the camp and disappeared. American intelligence concluded that as many as 20,000 former detainees were now at large across Syria. As the Journal noted: "Security experts have long warned that the wives of Islamic State fighters were effectively raising the next generation of militants at the sprawling Al-Hol facility."

The story here is not that Syria's transitional leadership chose to let these people go free. Whatever one's view of the leadership in Damascus—and there is plenty to say—the former jihadists who now rule Syria genuinely despise the Islamic State. The escapes appear to have resulted from complete mismanagement of the transition of camp authority, with Damascus and the Syrian Democratic Forces each blaming the other for the breakout.

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<!-- aeo:section start="a-permissive-environment" -->
## A Permissive Environment

Either way, those Islamic State loyalists escaped into Syria at a very bad moment for the rest of the world. The organization had already exploited the security vacuum left by the regime's fall, along with the political instability, sectarian infighting, and other problems besetting the transition.

The Islamic State understands its own dilemma clearly. If it used the vacuum to seize territory, it would risk unifying Damascus and its many internal enemies against the one insurgent threat they all despise enough to cooperate against. So instead of grabbing land, it stays quiet. As long as it does not draw attention, the new leadership remains far too distracted to confront it. Better still, the United States is withdrawing from Syria at the same time, and that withdrawal will likely conclude on schedule—provided the Islamic State gives Washington no reason to reconsider.

As War on the Rocks put it: "This is creating a permissive environment for radicalization that the Islamic State can exploit to infiltrate state structures and rebuild networks. Washington's mission against the Islamic State is ending at the very moment the group is poised to resurge." The ongoing war in Iran, and the broader Middle Eastern chaos that has come with it, have only made the group's job easier.

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<!-- aeo:section start="africa-s-expanding-franchises" -->
## Africa's Expanding Franchises

Across Africa, other franchises are gaining ground. The Islamic State – Sahel Province is rapidly accumulating power, operating across Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, and other Sahel nations—the region where the majority of global terrorism deaths now take place. IS-Sahel is not the most dangerous insurgency in the area; that distinction belongs to JNIM, an al-Qaeda affiliate. But JNIM has generated a level of pandemonium that has cleared the way for IS-Sahel to expand, positioning itself as an even more radical and ruthless force for locals who feel JNIM does not go far enough. In January, IS-Sahel used drones and mortars to assault a key international airport in Niger—a stunning display of its growing capabilities.

In Nigeria and nearby nations, the Islamic State – West Africa Province (ISWAP) has engaged government forces in larger and larger battles, even as it fights for dominance against the rival jihadist insurgency Boko Haram. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, several eastern provinces have been destabilized by an Islamic State-affiliated group called the Allied Democratic Forces—which, to be clear, are neither democratic nor allied with anybody except the Islamic State itself.

The Allied Democratic Forces have roamed the country in massive bands for years, but they have grown increasingly brazen in recent months. In one especially notable attack, the group stormed a Chinese-run gold mine, killing several local miners and forcing the Chinese nationals in charge to flee. Even in war-torn Congo, attacks on Chinese interests remain relatively rare, and this assault suggests the Islamic State's Congolese partners are growing interested in the foreign operations that extract lucrative resources from their country.

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<!-- aeo:section start="asia-is-khorasan-waits-out-the-war" -->
## Asia: IS-Khorasan Waits Out the War

Finally, the outbreak of two major conflicts in Asia has opened the door for one of the Islamic State's most dangerous franchises, IS-Khorasan, to expand its power and influence rapidly. IS-Khorasan is active across Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Afghanistan, and Tajikistan—and two of those four nations are currently at war.

Since late February, Pakistan and Afghanistan have fought battles overshadowed by the war in Iran. Those clashes are taking place in the border region between the two countries, where IS-Khorasan is historically at its strongest, yet the group has mostly stayed out of the fighting. Instead, it appears to be exploiting the instability to expand operations, recruit new members, and attract defectors from the Pakistani Taliban and other insurgent groups whose members come seeking an even more hardline movement.

Just as important, IS-Khorasan appears poised to capitalize on the war in Iran. As intelligence researcher Morgan Tadych wrote for the Atlantic Council: "ISIS seems poised to exploit this moment of regional instability to its advantage. Specifically, ISIS appears eager to attract new followers, inspire attacks, and consolidate territory amid the chaos caused by the Iran war and by the security situations in Syria and Afghanistan." In this case, the acronym ISIS serves as a stand-in for the entire Islamic State movement.

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<!-- aeo:section start="reading-the-ripples-on-the-surface" -->
## Reading the Ripples on the Surface

The entire world is going through a period of upheaval, and it is hardly a surprise that the Islamic State has faded from the headlines. That fade is by design. The group has learned the lessons of its failed bid to build a caliphate in the 2010s and shifted to become a transcontinental insurgency that thrives when it is ignored. Periods of worldwide chaos—when governments, militaries, intelligence agencies, and media outlets shift their focus elsewhere—are exactly the moments when a quiet, well-coordinated insurgency can exploit its window of opportunity.

We do not get to present a comprehensive overview of the Islamic State's recent gains the way we can for the war in Iran or other crises across the globe. The organization has grown up, from its hotheaded adolescent years into a mature, well-connected, and extremely dangerous insurgency that fully understands the value of secrecy. Tracking it is like staring at a lake and trying to read what is happening underwater from the occasional waves and ripples on the surface.

But whenever news does emerge, the conclusion is the same. At a time of chaos across the globe, the Islamic State is gaining power, expanding its ambitions, and setting up new cells in new places with a focus on new targets. Worst of all, the organization knows the rest of the world is looking away. By the time that changes, it will have covered its tracks—and whatever plans it has developed by then will be more difficult than ever to expose.

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<!-- aeo:section start="frequently-asked-questions" -->
## Frequently Asked Questions

### How has the Islamic State changed since the height of its caliphate?

A decade ago, the Islamic State held substantial territory and operated as a centralized proto-state. After its caliphate was dismantled, the movement went underground and rebuilt itself as a global, decentralized network of cells and franchises that use autonomous communications, cryptocurrencies, and shell corporations to coordinate and finance one another's expansion across three continents.

### What happened with the IS-Somalia cell discovered in Morocco in March 2026?

On 25 March 2026, Morocco's General Directorate of Territorial Surveillance, working with Spanish intelligence, dismantled an IS-Somalia cell operating from Tangier and Majorca. The cell had been coordinating financing and logistics for Islamic State franchises across Africa, was plotting an imminent attack in Spain, and was reportedly working with representatives of the IS-Sahel franchise—evidence that IS-Somalia's reach had extended into Europe even after being battered by US air power in Puntland.

### Why is the security situation in Syria so dangerous for Islamic State containment?

After the December 2024 collapse of the Assad regime, Syria's transitional leadership dismantled the Kurdish-led northeast administration, forcing the Syrian Democratic Forces—who guarded camps holding Islamic State fighters and families—to pull back. This triggered a mass breakout from the al-Hol camp, which had held roughly 24,000 people, leaving as many as 20,000 former detainees at large across Syria according to US intelligence, at the very moment the United States is withdrawing from the country.

### Which African franchises are expanding and how?

IS-Sahel is growing across Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso, exploiting chaos created by the al-Qaeda affiliate JNIM and demonstrating growing capabilities by using drones and mortars to assault a key international airport in Niger in January. ISWAP is engaging Nigerian government forces in larger battles while fighting the rival group Boko Haram. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Allied Democratic Forces have grown more brazen, including a raid on a Chinese-run gold mine.

### Why does the Islamic State deliberately stay out of the headlines?

The group has learned from the failure of its 2010s caliphate that seizing visible territory unifies enemies against it. By staying quiet during the current period of global upheaval—when governments, militaries, and media focus elsewhere—it can expand cells, recruit members, and build financial networks without triggering a concerted response. As the article puts it, tracking the organization is like staring at a lake and trying to read what is happening underwater from the occasional waves and ripples on the surface.

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<!-- aeo:section start="related-coverage" -->
## Related Coverage

- [Puntland's War on the Islamic State in Somalia](/articles/conflicts/puntland-islamic-state-somalia-counterinsurgency)
- [ISIS, Three Dead Americans, and the Syrian Resurgence](/articles/conflicts/isis-killed-three-americans-syria-resurgence)
- [Mozambique's Cabo Delgado Insurgency, Explained](/articles/conflicts/mozambique-cabo-delgado-insurgency-isis-crisis-explained)

<!-- aeo:section end="related-coverage" -->
<!-- aeo:section start="sources" -->
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