Traveling to Europe? The State Department wants you to be careful. On October 3rd, the U.S. State Department issued a warning that “al-Qa’ida and affiliated organizations continue to plan terrorist attacks [in Europe] […] to target both official and private interests.” They want U.S. Citizens to “take every precaution to be aware of their surroundings and to adopt appropriate safety measures to protect themselves when traveling”
TIME reports that “while the threat of terror strikes remains high and pressing, there’s very little detailed information within the recent warnings to suggest that an attack is imminent. […] we’ve been watching out for a while.”
These threats, coming from areas including Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen, North Africa, and even internally in Europe, do show that al-Qaeda and related groups are ready to target the west again and wage a “jihad,” or holy war, reports TIME. Radicals have moved towards Afghanistan as their focus, and residents in both Germany and France have been reported by intelligence to have received terror training and then have returned to the country in recent years. Though this is making tourists nervous, intelligence agencies work hard to stay on top of terror trainees and spread information, although it’s not easy.
Again, European security officials said to TIME that “the general terror threat is relatively high, and not imminent,” and even the overall high threat is a joint effort of several threats coming towards different countries at once—not one distinct plot targeting Europe as a whole.
An anonymous European counter-terrorism official told TIME that “when the information isn’t specific enough to indicate the nature, timing, venues, or people likely to be involved in the contemplated attacks, then you can’t view a strike as imminent.”
U.S. military forces are taking action against threats that appear the most dangerous. One such attack originates in the Afghan-Pakistani border area, which is currently being pounded by U.S. drones with a goal of disrupting radicals thought to be planning an attack on Europe. Similar attacks are occurring in Pakistani tribal zones, an area believed to be the location of al-Qaeda associated extremists starting to form attacks against several European nations.
Despite the less-than-imminent nature of the threat, travelers and tourists are frustrated with information that they may be targeted by an attack, but left without any other details. Authorities within the United States and Europe are struggling with how to publicize a threat that is thought to be “credible, but not specific,” reports the New York Times. “The authorities do not want to be accused of hiding what they know. Nor do they want to panic the public unnecessarily.”
Most officials, including Bush administration homeland security official Frank J. Ciluffo, “err on the side of sharing the information” so that “vigilant citizenry can help prevent an attack,” reports the New York Times.
Rachel Swaine, an administrator at Boston University with plans to visit Paris, told the New York Times that “we have been able to avoid attacks and it should be the same [in France] […] You can’t let [a threat] ruin your life.” As a result of new terror warnings specific to France, the French government has upped security at busy tourists site and taken all precautions to protect its tourists. A French offical told the Washington Post that France is “not overestimating the threat or underestimating it” and that “[the government] is directly concerned.”