With the international community focused on the conflict in Syria, reports of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant’s (ISIS) activities in Libya have gone effectively unheeded. However this may be set to change, as last week the UN reported that Libya has become ISIS’ effective fall back position. This message echoes what intelligence agencies have been saying for months – that as NATO and Russian forces intensify their campaigns in Syria, ISIS has greatly expanded its reach into Northern Africa.

This increasing threat from ISIS is just another blow to a country that has yet to recover from the 2011 UN-sanctioned military intervention. In 2012, Ivo Daalder, then the U.S. permanent representative to NATO, declared, “NATO’s operation in Libya has rightly been hailed as a model intervention.” Despite this early optimism, Libya’s first elected prime minister, Mustafa Abu Shagour, lasted less than one month. Subsequent elected parliaments have failed to mediate any resolution between Islamists and liberals.

Since then, Libya has been split into warring factions, with the Islamist General National Congress (GNC) controlling north-west Libya from Tripoli, and the Council of Deputies and the Libyan National Army controlling eastern Libya from Tobruk. Tuareg tribesmen have taken control of the far west, whilst, among this instability, ISIS has taken territory along the north coast, including Sirte, the birthplace of former dictator Muammar Gaddafi.

As ISISU expands its reach, increasing numbers of people have fled northern Libya, often for the cities of Tripoli or Tobruk. Upon reaching Tripoli, escapees speak of Raqqa-style brutality, including crucifixion, beheadings and the hanging of townsfolk accused of apostasy or spying. Reprisal attacks undertaken by ISIS in response to local resistance have reportedly included setting fire to a local hospital, burning 22 patients alive, whilst the slaughter of 21 Egyptian Christians in February 2015 triggered an aerial military response from Egypt.

However the limited bombing strikes undertaken by Egypt, and ongoing surveillance from the US and France, have done little to deter ISIS on the ground. ISIS’ control of Sirte presents serious international concerns. Not only does Sirte provide a seaport, and access to the Sirte Basin, the centre of Libya’s oil production; it also offers the largest airbase in Libya. The Guardian reports that ‘suicide planes’ are being prepared, whilst witnesses speak of an ongoing program of indoctrination, where the children of Sirte are groomed as ‘suicide cubs,’ prepared to detonate themselves for ISIS’ goals.

This instability has not been limited to Libya, with reports that a Libyan-trained bomber killed 12 presidential guards in Tunisia, leading to the closing of the border between Libya and Tunisia. Further, French Defence Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian has been vocal in warning that Libya has become a key supply point for ISIS in distributing weapons and personnel to affiliated groups in Mali and Algeria, and to Boko Haram in Nigeria. ISIS recently claimed responsibility for an attack on the Radisson Blu hotel in Mali that cost the lives of 130 people, whilst Boko Haram is alleged to be responsible for over 3 500 civilian deaths this year.

In the face of this increasing instability, the international response has been mixed. US airstrikes in Ajdabiya and Derna are claimed to have killed a prominent ISIS leader, Abu Nabil, whilst French paratroopers are reported to be intercepting jihadi convoys along Libya’s southern border.

In the face of growing instability, it is hoped that the recent agreement between the GNC and the Council of Deputies may mark the beginning of a co-operative approach to combatting ISIS. Whilst it is claimed that Libya’s tribal-based society is largely immune to calls to join a worldwide caliphate, it is unclear whether these groups, after four years of civil conflict, can effectively join together against a common enemy.