(TLP:CLEAR) Center for Strategic and International Studies – Global Terrorism Threat Assessment 2025

Summary: The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a Washington-based think tank, published a report analyzing the terrorist threat landscape around the world. The report, “Global Terrorism Threat Assessment 2025,” asserts that terrorism remains a serious threat to the U.S. and its allies.

Analyst Note: The report notably emphasizes that, in the current terrorist threat landscape, domestic terrorism represents a greater threat to the U.S. homeland than international terrorism. Similar to previous years, most domestic terrorist attacks in the U.S. are carried out by lone actors or small groups who believe in a wide range of ideologies, such as white supremacy, partisan extremism, and Salafi-jihadism. A notable trend in the domestic terrorist landscape is an increase in attacks and plots against government targets in the U.S. motivated by partisan extremism.

Since 2020, white supremacy has motivated more terrorist attacks/plots and killed more people in the U.S. than any other violent extremist ideology. In addition to conducting mass casualty attacks, an increasing amount of white supremacist terrorism in the U.S. is directed at energy infrastructure. “While there is a long history of extremist attacks on critical infrastructure in the United States, the rise in the number of plots motivated by white supremacist beliefs is a new phenomenon,” according to the report. Despite the increase in the domestic terror threat, the report notes that foreign terrorist organizations, like al Qa‘ida and the Islamic State, remain committed to conducting attacks against the U.S. homeland as well as U.S. interests, although these groups are weaker than they were during their heyday.

Original Source: https://www.csis.org/analysis/global-terrorism-threat-assessment-2025  

Additional Reading:

• The Rising Threat of Anti-Government Domestic Terrorism: What the Data Tells Us
• Murder and Extremism in the United States in 2024

Mitigation Recommendations:

• US Violent Extremist Mobilization Indicators 2021 Edition
• CISA – Personal Security Considerations Action Guide
• FBI Guidance on Keeping Potential Attackers off the ‘Pathway to Violence’

Related WaterISAC PIRs: 1 & 2