Islamists who post fierce messages on the internet along with bomb-making instructions are becoming a key part of international terrorism, Germany’s prosecutor general Monika Harms said Friday. The internet served as a means of communications between different terrorist groups and as a source of information on how to mount attacks, she said in Karlsruhe.
“The internet has become the home handyman store for the do-it-yourself terrorist,” said Harms at a news conference.
“The desk man in front of a personal computer has become an essential component of the global jihad,” she said, referring to the Arabic term for “struggle.”
She said this had been proven with a trio of men detained in Germany earlier this year on suspicion of planning bombings.
Her office is also investigating a German-language Islamist site, the Global Islamic Media Front (GIMF), and seeks to prosecute its writers on the serious charge of supporting of terrorism. Half the group are said to be German converts to Islam. This week, magistrates released two of the GIMF suspects on bail.
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