It has been a week since the New Year’s Eve attack in New Orleans, which left 14 people dead and many more injured. Despite being the deadliest attack by an ISIS supporter on the West in several years, the group has yet to issue a claim of responsibility. This is unusual, as ISIS typically claims responsibility for attacks, even if they did not have prior knowledge of them.
According to analysts, there are several reasons for this delay. One possibility is that the group may be waiting for the right moment to issue a claim, possibly to coincide with the start of the new administration in the United States. Another possibility is that ISIS is reluctant to claim the attack due to the attacker’s background as a veteran who served in the US military in Afghanistan.
Some experts believe that ISIS’s hesitation to claim the attack may be due to a lack of foreknowledge, but others argue that this has not stopped the group from trying to associate itself with attacks in the past. In fact, ISIS has claimed attacks it did not actually plan or coordinate, such as the 2017 mass shooting at a Las Vegas festival.
The delay in claiming responsibility has led many to speculate about the group’s internal dynamics. The United States has been conducting airstrikes against ISIS targets, which may have damaged the group’s leadership structure and made it more difficult for them to issue a claim. Additionally, the group’s media operation, including its news agency Amaq, is situated in Iraq and Syria, areas where the group is on the defensive.
Despite the doubt, analysts expect to see a claim of responsibility from ISIS in the coming days, possibly through its weekly “newspaper” al-Naba, which is published on Thursdays. Until then, the motives behind ISIS’s silence remain unclear.
