Terrorism lately has become a much more complex phenomenon in terms of both its organizational structure and leadership, and so have the strategies employed to combat terrorist activities. Its center of gravity appears to have moved to the Middle East, where a number of terrorist groups not linked organizationally or ideologically to Al-Qaeda have recently been uncovered. These groups adopt terrorist strategies for political, religious and ethnic reasons, and are in intellectual and operational terms "leaderless", which complicates the process of monitoring and tracking their development. However, the number of causalities from this type of terrorist activities is still low compared to previous waves. The shift in terrorist activities has coincided with certain changes taking place in countries of the region. Surprisingly a high rate of development and extensive internet and smart phone usage is one of the main catalysts for the spread of this form of terrorism. The Gulf States, which have one of the highest rates of development in the Middle East, could therefore in the future become a favorable environment for the outbreak of such terrorist activities. Terrorism is also thriving in countries undergoing complex transitional periods, such as Egypt, or experiencing severe political crises, such as Bahrain. Distinct Characteristics: New terrorist organizations have a number of distinct characteristics that distinguish them from the first generation represented by Al-Qaeda, and the second generations comprised of local versions of Al-Qaeda, which retained the same organizational structure and centralized leadership issuing commands, a “Shura" i.e., advisory council, a number of committees, and several operational leaders responsible for area and cells. The new organizations, on the other hand, have the following characteristics: 1.
Flat network: These organizations include a limited number of individuals bound together through family connections or friendship. They do not have a single ideological or operational leader. Decisionmaking is a collective process in which all members have almost equal say. These networks are usually formed through online social platforms and are difficult to track.