you could have ansar al sharia, al qaeda, very active but to the west.uld be oany of the islamic groups. islamic extremists they called them, haven't identified the group yet. they will. it's a matter of time. i think we need to give the tunisians the time to find out who did this. >> absolutely. colonel, stay with us. let's bring in cnn terrorism analyst paul cruickshank. i know this is your area of expertise. the colonel and i have been talking about the fact, he said it's surprising they haven't found links to any group. the one guy has been monitored and flagged. what are you hearing now? >> in the last few minutes, there's been a claim in a 3 minute audiotape put out on twitter. cnn are working to confirm this, but a intelligence group found this posting claimed by isis claiming responsibility for this attack in tunisia. >> this is a big deal. this is the group we often look to. they flag these things quite often. cnn, as paul points out, is going through the vetting process to look into this claim. but you all along suspected there would be a link

ansar al sharia al qaeda in the maghreb is there. tunisia has the most number of jihadi fighters in syria and iraq more than 3,000 by the government's estimates. and over the last few years, hundreds have been returning home. so turkey -- turkish security officials have been warning for some time of the possibility of an attack like this but clearly weren't able to stop it this time. >> baa compare it to its neighbor libya, tunisia has been very very positive in terms of the fallout from what used to be called the arab spring relatively peaceful a lot of tourists still go there, as we see today, atika. so this is highly unusual for an attack like this to occur in tunisia. >> reporter: absolutely. in fact tunisia was the birthplace of the arab spring. and it was considered the success story because it had successful peaceful elections. but even as the lid was lifted off the political landscape in tunisia, it also meant this explosion of very extremist political islamist thought. and we have seen a number of groups like this operating

most likely ansar al sharia or isis plot behind it. it's a western target. tunisia has been -- it was the birthplace of the arab spring really the beacon of hope for democracy in the region the only one. i think that's why they are trying to bring down tunisia. first looking at their parliament to hit that then western tourists at the museum. >> even if it is this sort of birthplace of -- it is the birthplace of the arab spring a place of promise certainly and it's a country that is trying to figure out how it balances security with democracy right now, but you also have this very real statistic that tunisia has the most number the biggest number of people who are going to fight with isis. why is that? what is driving tunisians to syria and iraq? >> well a lot of northern africans are going to the region to iraq and syria, to join the fight which is making northern africa a very dangerous place. we are seeing really i think northern africa is falling now, not just to al qaeda affiliates but now to isis. we are seeing more and more al qaeda affiliates pledgin

government officials believe the group ansar al sharia in tunisia may have been behind the attack. members reportedly pledged allegiance to the islamic state group last september. tunisian interior minister says authorities have arrested 23 people in connection with the assault. he says they're still searching for an algerian and other foreigners. the minister says the assailants are linked to a militant group based in syria, bordering algeria. >>> u.s. authorities have arrested an army national guard soldier and his cousin on charges of conspiring to join islamic state militants. the two are also suspected of planning an attack on a military facility in illinois. justice department officials say the two men are hassan edmunds, a 22-year-old member of the illinois national guard, and 29-year-old jonas edmunds. both are u.s. citizens. fbi agents arrested hassan edmunds at an airport in chicago as he was attempting to fly to egypt. he allegedly planned to join islamic state militants in syria and make use of his experience in the military reserves. u.s. authorities believe more than

told a french tv station that the dead gunmen are linked to an islamic extremist group called ansar al sharian tunisia. the organization is said to be associated with al qaeda. the president has not mentioned any connection between the gunmen and the islamic state group. authorities beefed up the security in tunisia's capital a day after the worst attack the country has seen in more than a decade. officials say they are deploying soldiers on the streets to guard against another assault. >>> japanese police have sent specially trained officers to tunis. the terror response team will look into the deaths of the japanese tourists in the museum attack. >> translator: i strongly condemn such unforgivable violence. i feel anger over the unjust despicable terror attack. >> members of the police unit will work with officials from the foreign ministry. the national police agency set up the team in 1998 following the hostage crisis at the japanese ambassador's residence in peru. the team was sent to jordan in january when two japanese citizens were taken hostage and believed to be killed by islamic sta

there any collaboration going on now, isis claiming responsibility there's another group called ansar al shariaiming responsibility, al qaeda in the islamic maghreb, are they all working together, maybe? >> i kind of doubt it. al qaeda in the islamic maghreb and isis wouldn't cooperate, i don't think. it's possible. ansar al sharia are a local group, might collaborate with either one of those. isis is the biggest kid on the block right now. we have seen the attack in libya last month that killed ten foreigners at an upscale hotel, including an american. we have seen an attack in the sinai last month, in egypt, where 26 people were killed by an isis affiliate. this was even a separate issue, which was police and military officials. isis is really -- i find it very hard to believe that al qaeda and isis will cooperate. >> colonel, you are there in the region. is there collaboration going on between these various terror groups all of whom by the way, consist largely of sunni arabs? >> yeah right now what we are seeing here is like peter said isis is the big dog on the block. they have pushed some

there was a massive attack on the synagogue just off the coast and a series of attacks ansar al sharia launched against the embassy in 2012. they killed off candidates in 2013. yes, there has been a lot of tunisians who have traveled to iraq and syria as part of this movement. in the wake of the revolution in 2012 there's been a vacuum as tunisia asserts itself and security services to kind of you know keep the country safe. and so there's been a vacuum where there's been high unemployment, young people looking for things to do. so yeah it's a officerfertile environment and then return home to plot within tunisia. >> there are three still at large, three of the attackers. how did they find them? how did they look for them jim? >> that's the million dollar question. tunisia security services are very good for -- i was in tunisia in 2013 and 2014. all up and down the avenue bordeo a broadway they will be going through all of their contacts and known networks. the new government has been in tune to the security situation and we'll putting forth their maximum effort over the next few days.

there's a very large pro-jihadi movement in tunisia called ansar al sharia. rried out an attack on the u.s. embassy in tunis just a few days after the attack in 2012 and there is also a very active north african al qaeda affiliate based in tunisia in the mountainous region near the algerian border. late last year they said they were going to bring jihad to tunis. >> what do we know about the individuals who carried out this attack? we heard that one of them was known to tunisian authorities. are there other terror suspects they are still searching for? >> we know very little about the individuals so far beyond the fact that one of them was on the radar screen of tunisian security services. but they have not yet been able to link the perpetrators to any established terror group. i think the fact that there have been nine arrests including four people they say were directly tied to the attack suggests there's a wider cell wider logistical network that was behind this. that may point to the involvement of a larger more established terrorist group like al qaeda or

the ansar al sharia. and indeed general heftar's campaign was to root out those groups. i think what you have is not the defeat of those groups but rather their dispersal and mutation. this is what we're seeing with isis. isis is really peeling away a lot of members of these older post revolutionary jihadist groups that had affiliation to al qaeda. you had influx of volunteers that went to iraq and syria to fight with isis. libyans that went, started returning last spring and last summer. that formed the nucleus of isis in the city of derna. you've had isis spread to all three of libya's major provinces. and of course they have conducted some very high profile attacks against corinthia hotel and most recently tragic killing of egyptian cops. again, let me move to some thoughts about policy option. one thing that makes this so confounding, we're faced with a terrorist problem in libya that is embedded in a very complex civil war. there's no government to work through. there are two competing factions and we face this in iraq and syria and yemen is what partner do we assis