How authorities missed signs ISIS wanted to strike Europe
Insight from terrorism analyst Michael S. Smith II
“Our openness to refugees” is not how we will defeat the Islamic State (ISIS). A climate change summit is also not a “powerful rebuke” to ISIS.
From Paris to San Bernardino to Brussels, the American people see what is happening and there is trepidation. They are fearful of terror deniers whose policies will let the wolves into the sheep’s den to kill innocent men, women and children.
President Obama’s terror denial has been apparent since his administration described the 2009 terror attack at Fort Hood as “workplace violence.”
In 2012, Hillary Clinton and other officials blamed a well-coordinated terrorist attack on our embassy in Benghazi on a YouTube video.
When the evil blade of ISIS decapitated Steven Sotloff in 2014, President Obama was on the golf course just minutes after telling Americans that “we will be relentless and we will be vigilant to see that justice is done.”
Americans are now being told by terror deniers that climate change and “openness” to Syrian refugees will stop the ISIS death march. How delusional.
The reality is that we must suspend the refugee resettlement program because it is endangering the American people.
Intelligence officials told the chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee last December that Syrian terrorists were looking to exploit the program.
Two ISIS terrorists involved with the attacks in Paris and Brussels infiltrated Europe by posing as Syrian refugees when they entered Greece.
Terrorists have said they would slaughter innocent people -- and they have.
Terrorists have said that they would take advantage of refugee programs and they have.
When will the terror deniers start listening?
This is why I filed a bill last December to suspend the admission of refugees to the United States. My legislation provides that no funding shall be made available for refugee resettlement operations until the following four conditions are met:
1. Congress passes a joint resolution approving the President’s refugee resettlement plan.
2. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) provides a report to Congress scoring the long term cost of any refugee resettlement proposa.
3. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) submits a report identifying terrorist and criminal activity of refugees admitted into the U.S. since 2001.
4. President Obama submits a report to Congress of the prior year’s cost of admitting refugees and proposes offsetting spending cuts to pay for his resettlement agenda.
These are common-sense measures that should be passed immediately.
The president has not listened to his own Department of Homeland Security secretary who said last fall that the federal government won’t “know a whole lot” about the refugees being brought to American soil.
He also hasn’t listened to NATO commander Philip Breedlove who told Congress that ISIS “is spreading like cancer” among the refugees.
He has, however taken the time to consult with tech leaders like Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg, another liberal terror denier. It seems like a commendable effort on face value, but maybe it’s time for a new strategy. After all, Zuckerberg, who was directly targeted in an ISIS propaganda video, suggested just this week that we can fight terror with “love.”
The American people are not delusional. The American people do not need to be lectured by terror deniers like President Obama, Mark Zuckerberg, and other Democrats about “openness,” “compassion,” and “love.”
The American people are sick and tired of being patronized and being told their fears are irrational.
This week we learned that radical Islamic extremists killed a staggering 28,000 people in 2014-15.
Americans are rightly concerned about the tentacles of radical Islam infiltrating our country.
Compassion is a two way street, Mr. President, and it is time the administration begin showing some for the concerns of the American people.
Terror deniers lectured Europeans about the virtues of bringing Syrian refugees to their continent.
Months later refugees lead ISIS death squads that slaughtered innocent men, women, and children in Paris and Brussels.
Now is not the time for denial.
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