Terrorism expert not surprised ISIS lied about Las Vegas shooter

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VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) – ISIS takes any glory it can get, even if the group wasn’t involved, according to a local terrorism expert.

Andre Gerolymatos, with Simon Fraser University’s terrorism and security studies program, is addressing early reports that the Las Vegas shooter was acting on ISIS orders.

“It isn’t easy to convince idiots to go blow themselves up, or to go kill people,” he says.

In Gerolymatos’ experience, he has seen ISIS take responsibility for any shooting to keep its followers loyal. Many of those followers, he says, have psychological issues.

“Some of them buy into the ISIS narrative to go out there to kill with a car or a knife. So ISIS has to demonstrate that they’re alive and well, despite the fact that they’re getting booted out of the Middle-East.”

He says he would be interested to know the shooter’s actual motive, but believes any link to terrorism will come out in the investigation.

“What the police have found so far, this man who did the killing in Las Vegas, no criminal record, no indication of any strong political or religious beliefs, certainly no connection to ISIS.”

Without providing any evidence to support the claim, the Islamic State group on Monday said the gunman in the mass shooting in Las Vegas was “a soldier” from its ranks who had converted to Islam months ago.

Authorities have yet to identify a motive for the shooting, and said initially there was no evidence of any connection to international terrorism.

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