By Daniel Basabe – Geopolitical Monitor
While global attention has begun to splinter across the Ukraine war, renewed tensions in Gaza, and ongoing great power competition, Islamic State (ISIS) has executed one of the most successful strategic transformations in modern jihadism: it has transitioned from a centralized organization into a lethal, autonomous and self-sanitizing constellation of local insurgencies, with Africa indisputably its center of gravity. Today, the threat not only remains, but is evolving on the world’s most fragile continent, as it corners an increasingly reluctant, directionless international response.
From Proto-State to Global Network: The Resilience of Decentralized Jihadism
The Islamic State’s loss of land in the Middle East precipitated a mutation in the outfit. The organization moved to a “remote management” model, functioning as a global franchise rather than an empire. The ISIS core leadership provides the branded name, ideological direction, and propaganda and media operations, mainly through its weekly newsletter, Al-Naba, but the “provinces” (wilayats) operate almost fully through operational and financial autonomy.
This apparatus has exhibited incredible adaptability. It enables the organization to endure the loss of its leaders and adjust quickly, giving rise to a radical geographic re-location of violence. While in 2017, the majority of ISIS attacks were concentrated in Iraq and Syria, today the statistics are unequivocal: one recently issued report estimates that 90% of all terrorist attacks claimed by the Islamic State globally now happen on African territory. This is not an outlier but the indication of a newly emerging phase of the war on terror.
Africa: A Mosaic of Crises Provide Fertile Ground
The success of the Islamic State in Africa is not an accident; it is exploiting an ecosystem of chronic fragility. In several fronts we can see its entrenchment and expansion:
- The Sahel and the Lake Chad Basin. This region is the heart of the insurgency. The Islamic State in West Africa Province (ISWAP), a splinter of Boko Haram, has emerged as one of ISIS’ most sophisticated affiliates. It is conducting attacks as well as providing alternative governance (e.g., taxes and administering justice) in addition to engaging in violent operations, where it is providing services to disillusioned populations as an alternative to a corrupt and ineffectual state. Its rival, the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (ISGS), is more brutal than ISWAP, and has been successful in exploiting inter-ethnic dynamics between various farming and herding communities in its process of expansion across Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger.
- The Sahel’s “Coup Belt.” Recent coups in Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger have radically changed the security landscape of the Sahel. The new military juntas, fueled by anti-Western rhetoric, have expelled French and European forces that once led counter-terrorism operations. Their new partners are Russian mercenaries from the Wagner Group, now called the Africa Corps. This has not only created a security gap but also hampered international cooperation, allowing jihadist groups greater freedom to operate and expand.
- Mozambique and Central Africa.Islamic State – Mozambique (ISM) has terrorized the people of Cabo Delgado province, northern Mozambique, and threatened multi-billion-dollar natural gas projects. The group has received regional military access interventions which have been setbacks for the group but are still very active and has shown their ability to take advantage of exploitation of economic marginalization and state violence. An Islamic State affiliate, the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), is similarly perpetrating massacres across the border in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Financing Terror: Self-Sufficiency and Local Exploitation
A major factor in their success has been the growing financial self-sufficiency of African ISIS affiliates. These groups are not dependent on funds from the central core; they have developed local war economies. In fact, the revenue streams for these groups now come from various sources, including:
- Extortion and “taxation” of local populations, farmers, merchants, and transporters.
- Kidnapping of individuals, including foreign personnel, to generate revenue through ransom demands.
- Control of illicit trade routes, including smuggling gold, cattle, and other goods.
- Raids on military bases to loot weapons and equipment.
This level of financial autonomy affords tremendous resilience, allowing them to sustain ongoing operations without outside assistance.
A Disoriented Global Response
Despite mounting terrorism risk in Africa, the international response is dissipating. The “Global War on Terror” has taken a back seat to the more urgent strategic interests in Washington and Brussels, and a dangerous gap has emerged between the enormity of the issue and the resources to address it.
Furthermore, global counterterrorism strategy has taken a noticeably militarized turn. While countless tactical victories have been scored over many years of costly counterterrorism operations and conflicts, it has repeatedly been demonstrated that such victories alone create nothing more than a temporary window of opportunity for longer-term political change. The core issues driving terror include failed governance, systemic corruption, social injustice, and a lack of economic prospects, all of which can fuel radical violence. A sustainable solution can only be achieved with a holistic approach that combines military pressure with development, diplomacy, and supporting local capacities. Yet, this holistic approach has faded into the background as military-centric solutions increasingly predominate.
Mounting Geopolitical Risk in 2025 and Beyond
To view Islamic State as a defeated force is to fundamentally misunderstand its metamorphosis. The group has proved itself to be a resilient ideological foe, a strategically clever chameleon that changes its form as needed to survive and flourish. The Islamic State that we see today in Africa is not a territorial state but a “caliphate of the mind.” It manifests as a web of insurgencies, more dispersed and more embedded in local conflicts, and therefore much harder to eliminate than its initial form. It is not a foreign occupier; it is a parasite that has attached itself to the global jihadist narrative and linked its narratives and brand to the continent’s existing grievances surrounding governance, ethnicity, and distribution, creating a symbiotic relationship where local rebellions gain global recognition and legitimacy and the central ISIS brand can point to tangible victories.
The most serious threat now lies in strategic complacency. Just as the great power rivalries and global crises command the focus of the international community, this slow-motion catastrophe in Africa is slipping from global headlines. The current international response, which reflects the legacy of the post-9/11 world of drone strikes and special forces raids, is ill-suited to the new challenge. It treats structural political and social issues as a military problem. Military engagement may result in the deaths of individual terrorists, but it does nothing to dismantle the ecosystem of misery, injustice, and state failure that sustains the Islamic State and its affiliates. It is nothing more than a containment strategy, and at worst, it is a recruiting campaign for the very enemy it hopes to defeat.
If a new comprehensive strategy is not created, there is a risk of a domino effect, whereby instability in the Sahel spreads south to the historically more stable coastal states of West Africa, and a contiguous arc of crisis forms from the Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea. In light of this risk, we need to rethink how to proceed. There must be a long-term, coordinated and patient commitment by African states and their international partners, one that is based on establishing resilience via good governance, equity, and economic development above quick tactical wins. This can be an African-led initiative, but one that maintains ongoing, savvy international backing to empower local institutions rather than replace them.
The campaign against the Islamic State has not ended, and it has not simply shifted in geography. Rather, the fight has ontologically evolved: it is no longer a struggle for cities like Raqqa and Mosul, but a fight for legitimacy and the right to survive across the neglected villages and open borders of Mali, Mozambique and beyond.
*Daniel Basabe is a security professional with over 27 years of experience in high-risk environments including Libya, Somalia, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and Spain’s Basque Country. He has served in close protection, security consultancy, and maritime security roles for international organizations, private security firms, and European Union missions.