The Jihadi cell dismantled on Wednesday in Spain, Belgium and Germany represented a serious, specific and ongoing threat to security in Europe

The arrested individuals, all of Spanish nationality except for one of Moroccan nationality, formed a cell with a perfectly organised structure that, following orders from the terrorist organisation DAESH and fully assuming its ideology, acted via various Internet channels leading to the Facebook page entitled "Islam in Spanish", of which those arrested today were the administrators in Germany and Belgium. Their strategy and modus operandi was adapted to a young and Muslim sector of the population mostly from the Maghreb that almost exclusively uses Spanish for their communication activities.

Under the pretext of spreading religious content, the same website interspersed messages and comments of a radical nature that glorified the Jihadi combatant "martyrs", the actions carried out by DAESH and the importance of the individual Jihad.

The publications on this website are mostly in Spanish. The page has 32,500 followers, most of them Spanish-speakers. This number of followers is increasing at a significant pace, managing to attract some 500 new followers in just one week.

This organised group was focused on achieving the following objectives:

- To consciously implement the war tactic known as information terror. This consists of spreading images and/or videos with a specific style and containing extreme cruelty, in which terrorist actions and acts of the martyrs are glorified, as well as spreading messages of hate and publishing threats. The ultimate goal of this terrorist cell was to collaborate with the propaganda strategy of DAESH, terrorising and destabilising western society as a whole by creating a permanent sensation of insecurity among its citizens.

- To locate and recruit radical elements, both domestically and internationally, prone to glorifying the Jihadi ideology in order to proceed with their appropriate indoctrination, radicalisation and, finally, recruitment as collaborators. The "cell" - now dismantled - strongly emphasised the need to travel to the conflict zone and fight in the ranks of the terrorist organisation DAESH on these recruited and trained elements.

- To provide the necessary contacts to individuals recruited as future combatants for DAESH, whom they would assist in travelling to territories controlled by the terrorist organisation.

- To serve as a propaganda machine for the widespread popularisation of DAESH, following the expansion strategy set by the terrorist organisation. Furthermore, they adapted content to the language and idiosyncrasies of the consumer - young Spanish-speaking Muslims, thus exponentially increasing the chances that the radical message would be duly assimilated. The arrested individuals had thus filled a gap for DAESH: the absence in its powerful communication machine of pages and profiles on the social media networks in Spanish.

- Another constant in the activity of this terrorist network was that of proclaiming its extreme aversion to religions, ethnic and other groups that they consider enemies of its religious precepts. Its modus operandi consisted of creating a feedback network aimed at building a chain for the passing on of instructions and operational methods against these groups.

The dismantled group posed a serious, specific and ongoing threat to the security of western societies given that all its members - perfectly radicalised and fully compliant with instructions issued by DAESH - were highly active and consistent in the propagation of the terrorist ideology, raising the chances through its actions that new active "cells" would be created, willing to follow orders from the terrorist organisation DAESH.

The police operation was developed in a coordinated and simultaneous fashion with the Provincial Intelligence Brigades involved and the German and Belgian Police Forces, which led to a successful outcome in which a highly active and dangerous terrorist cell has been neutralised.

Since 2015, when the Anti-terrorist Alert Level (Spanish acronym: NAA) was raised to 4, the State law enforcement agencies of Spain have arrested 143 Jihadis. Of all these arrests, 113 took place in Spain and 30 in other countries in collaboration with the State law enforcement agencies.

This operation was supervised by the Central Criminal Investigation Court Nº 5 of the Spanish National High Court and coordinated by the Public Prosecution Service of the Spanish National High Court.

The operation remains ongoing.