Report: White House Lacks Plan to Deter US Jihadis
The United States has failed to stop more than 250 American Muslims from joining terrorist groups, according to a new report.
Since 2011, those U.S. jihadists have been travelling overseas to fight with terror groups like ISIS.
The 65-page congressional report says the Obama administration lacks a strategy to prevent Americans from traveling abroad to join groups like ISIS or to catch those who return to the United States with plans to commit terror attacks -- or even to stop their recruitment in the first place.
The study says of the hundreds of Americans who have sought to travel to the conflict zones in Syria and Iraq, authorities have blocked only a fraction of them. To make matters worse, several dozen potential terrorists have managed to make it back into the United States.
Of special concern, according to the report, are Western European Muslims who travel to Iraq or Syria and can then fly to the United States without applying for a visa.
At a U.N. terrorism summit Tuesday, world leaders discussed the ongoing problem of Muslims who travel to the Middle East to fight with the Islamic State.
"Our most recent data shows a 70 percent increase in foreign terrorist fighters from over 100 countries to regions in conflict," U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said.
The report's damning conclusion is that the U.S. government lacks a national strategy for combating terrorist travel and has not produced one in nearly a decade.