By: Amanda Vicinanzo, Senior Editor
02/16/2015 (10:00am)
With estimates that 20,000 foreign
fighters—including 3,400 Westerns— from 90 countries around the globe
have traveled to Syria to fight for terrorist organizations, US
counterterrorism officials are becoming increasingly worried that they
will return to American shores to conduct an attack on the homeland.
“We need to accurately define the threat – violent
Islamist extremism – and recognize it is spreading like wildfire around
the globe,” said House Committee on Homeland Security Chairman Michael
McCaul (R-TX). “These fanatics want nothing less than destruction of our
way of life, and now their ability to match words with deeds is growing
at an astonishing rate. In recent years, their safe havens have
proliferated and their ranks have swelled.”
In the wake of the Islamic State’s (ISIS) barbaric
display of the horrific murder of the Jordanian pilot, the House
Committee on Homeland Security held a hearing last Wednesday to examine
current efforts to thwart the dual threats of foreign fighters and
homegrown terror.
“This evolving Islamist terror landscape has given
rise to the ―dual threats of foreign fighter returnees and homegrown
terrorism,” McCaul said. “The recent terror attack in Paris, and other
attacks and plots in Belgium, Germany, the UK, Australia, Canada, and
here in the US are proof that the threat has surged and that the enemy
is dead set on attacking the West.”
Nicholas J. Rasmussen, director of the National
Counterterrorism Center, said the rate of foreign fighter travel to
Syria is “without precedent,” and is due in large part to ISIS’
demonstrated mastery of social media and online tools as mechanisms for
spreading propaganda. In fact, since the first of this year, ISIS has
already published more than 250 official ISIS products online.
McCaul agreed, saying, “Extremists do not need to
travel overseas in order to become a threat to our homeland. Through
Hollywood-like propaganda videos and social media, Islamist terror
groups are inciting their followers and potential recruits to wage war
at home.”
“ISIS social media also gives step-by-step instructions on how to get to the fight and how to return,” Mr. McCaul added.
Rasmussen indicated that curbing the threat of
foreign fighters returning to the homeland to conduct an attack will be
very challenging, since there is no single pipeline for foreign fighters
in and out of Syria. However, most routes involve transit through
Turkey, prompting Turkey to step up its efforts to deny entry to
potential foreign fighters based on information provided by the
fighters’ countries of origin.
In addition, in the wake of the attacks on the offices of Charlie Hebdo
in Paris, the European Union is discussing ways to enhance border
controls, implement stronger watchlisting and improve information
sharing.
To identify and stop foreign fighters at their
borders, Rasmussen recommended countries begin “screening visa
applicants; using Passenger Name Records or other data to identify
potential foreign fighters; applying increased screening measures at
points of departure; and a willingness to share information through
INTERPOL, the UN and bilateral relationships."
Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials told a congressional committee nearly a year ago
that “the alarming number of countries that report very little -- and
in some cases no -- lost and stolen passport data to INTERPOL for
inclusion in the Stolen and Lost Travel Documents (SLTD) database” is
“disturbing.”
Additionally,
nearly
13,500 passports were issued by the US Department of State to
individuals who used the Social Security Number (SSN), but not the name,
of a deceased person. Another 24,278 passports were issued to
applicants who used a likely invalid SSN, according to the results of a
Government Accountability Office (GAO) review last year of a 140-case
generalizable sample and a 15-case nongeneralizable sample for these two
populations, respectively.
Francis X. Taylor, DHS Under Secretary of
Intelligence and Analysis at the US, testified that "we are unaware of
any specific, credible, imminent threat to the homeland." However, he
did express concern that Americans who join violent extremist groups in
Syria "could gain combat skills, violent extremist connections and
possibly become persuaded to conduct organized or 'lone-wolf' style
attacks that target US and Western interests.”
DHS emphasized that strengthening local communities
as the first line of defense against violent extremism. Taylor also
asserted that developing partnerships on a state and federal level, as
well as between nations, is crucial to improving information sharing on
terrorist activities.
Taylor noted that, “Following the Paris attacks, DHS
worked with some of these countries and the Department of State to link
members of civil society and community stakeholders in respective
countries so that they could coordinate and build grass roots responses
to the attacks in Paris.”
To track foreign fighters, this fall DHS
strengthened the security of the Visa Waiver Program through
enhancements to the Electronic System for Travel Authorization (ESTA).
The agency hopes these improvements will facilitate visa-free travel to
the US while providing an additional layer of security.
As
Homeland Security Today previously reported,
the 38 VWP countries where a visa is not required for US entry have to
provide additional passport data, contact information and other
potential names or aliases in their travel application submitted via
ESTA before they can travel to the United States."
Many of the leading visa-waiver countries are seeing
their citizens going to Syria to join [the Islamic State] or Al Qaeda
affiliates in that country and potentially returning home with training
and new skills," a senior DHS official told the Washington Post.
McCaul also expressed concern over the State
Department’s desire to resettle tens of thousands of Syrian refugees in
the United States, fearing “ISIS could exploit this effort in order to
deploy operatives to America via a federally funded jihadi pipeline.”
Last month, McCaul
wrote a letter
to the State Department urging them to consider the long-term security
implications of terrorist groups exploiting the refugee resettlement
process. While the US has a history of welcoming refugees, McCaul
believes the Syrian conflict is a special case, since Syria is the home
of one of the largest confluences of Islamist terrorists in history.
“The United States has historically taken a leading
role in refugee resettlement and humanitarian protections,” said McCaul.
“But we cannot allow the refugee process to become a backdoor for
jihadists.”
This week the White House will be holding a
Countering Violent Extremism Summit to discuss domestic and
international efforts to counter violent extremism. As
Homeland Security Today recently reported, the Obama administration has been criticized for omitting “Islamist” from the title.
"Calling our enemies what they are is vital," said
retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn while speaking to a group of Special
Forces members recently. "Many today don’t like that type of clarity.
They want us to think that our challenge is dealing with an undefined
set of violent extremists or merely lone wolf actors with no ideology or
network."
"But that’s just not the straight truth," he stated.
"Our adversaries around the world are self-described Islamic militants.
And that means ... as the President of France has rightly said ... that
our fight is with Islamic extremists using terrorism as their means to
fight."
As part of the committee’s focus on counter violent
extremism, McCaul has established a Task Force on Combatting Terrorist
and Foreign Fighter Travel. The task force will review US government
efforts to track foreign fighters and, ultimately, provide
recommendations on how these efforts can be improved.
“We must keep those barbaric terrorists out of the homeland to protect the American people,” said McCaul.
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