NEW YORK – The Dutch counterterrorism coordinator says intelligence experts estimate that the Islamic State extremist group has between 60 and 80 operatives planted in Europe to carry out attacks.
Dick Schoof said in an interview Friday with The Associated Press that would-be fighters are also heeding messages from the IS militant group "asking them not to come to Syria and Iraq, but to prepare attacks in Europe."
One result is that over the last six months the number of "foreign terrorist fighters" hasn't grown, he said, but the fact that they're not traveling "does not mean that the potential threat of those who would have traveled is diminished."
Schoof said ongoing military operations to oust the Islamic State from its self-declared caliphate in Syria and Iraq is also scattering its fighters.
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