Spanish police detain five as part of European anti-Jihadist operation

Three suspected jihadists were arrested in Spain on Wednesday as part of a joint operation which also saw arrests carried out in Germany and Belgium, the Spanish Interior Ministry confirmed.

Two of those arrested in Spain were detained in Barcelona and one in the Spanish north-African enclave of Melilla. The ministry described those arrested as "forming part of a cell with a perfectly organized structure, which, following the dictates of the terrorist organization DAESH (Islamic State), acted through various Internet channels."

One of those channels was a Facebook page, Islam en Espanol (Islam in Spanish), which was administered by those detained in Germany and Belgium.

The page has 32,500 followers and its publications, which are mainly written in Spanish, "have the pretext of spreading religious content and swapping messages and comments of a radical nature, where jihadist fighters and actions carried out by DAESH are praised."

Investigators believe the group also attempted to "incite terrorist acts," and selected "radical elements" for possible indoctrination and recruitment."

Wednesday's arrests follow the detention of two suspected jihadists in the cities of Valladolid and Murcia on Monday and the detention of two people, one of whom was a secondary school teacher, for spreading jihadist propaganda and making threats on September 22. Endit