ISIS Suspected in Russia Crash: What It Means

Growing evidence is leading investigators to believe a bomb may have downed the Russian passenger plane over the Sinai this past weekend.

A U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, says intercepted communications played a role in the tentative conclusion that the Islamic State group's Sinai affiliate planted an explosive device on the plane.

But the official says there has been no formal judgment because forensic evidence from the blast site, including the airplane's black box, are still being analyzed.
 
Meanwhile, intelligence analysts say they don't believe the operation was ordered by ISIS leaders in Raqqa, Syria. Rather, they believe that if it were a bombing, it was planned and executed by the Islamic State's affiliate in the Sinai, which operates autonomously.

CBN News Terrorism Analyst Erick Stakelbeck says if ISIS claims responsibility for something, they're usually right.
 
"ISIS has had a pretty good track record [when it comes to] responsibility," Stakelbeck said. "When they claim responsibility for an attack, it usually does turn out to be them. We don't know so far in this case, but ISIS has not been known to go out on a limb and say something that they didn't do."

*Click below to watch CBN's Terrorism Analyst Erick Stakelbeck, Chief International Reporter Gary Lane, and Senior International Reporter George Thomas discuss the implications of this event.

The British government did not wait to take action to protect its tourists.

"There will be no U.K. passenger flights out to Sharm el-Sheikh from now [on]," U.K. Foreign Secretary Phillip Hammond said. "Passengers who are on the ground in Sharm el-Sheikh will be returned to the U.K.

Some British tourists were not happy about the move.

"I would prefer to come here and make my own decision, rather than the government tell us I couldn't go," British tourist Julie Wattenberg said.

"It would be a really bad decision because I think that nowadays, this could happen anywhere in the world," another tourist from Great Britain, Helen Collins, said. "You need to live your life and not let the terrorists win."

Investigators will now be looking at how a bomb might have gotten on board. 

"What these aviation experts from the U.K. are going to be looking at is was it possible someone who worked for one of the airlines, [like] a grounds crew person, actually went in and planted that bomb," CBN News Chief International Correspondent Gary Lane said.

Russian teams are now wrapping up their search for human remains from the Saturday crash that killed all 224 people onboard. Only 140 bodies have been recovered so far.