(Reuters) — Concern was mounting in the United States and Europe on Wednesday (August 27) over the flow of foreign fighters to Syria and Iraq after news that an American man supected of fighting alongside Islamic State (IS) militants had been killed in Syria.
U.S. officials confirmed Douglas McAuthur McCain’s presence and death in Syria, amid reports of dozens of Americans joining the ranks of foreign fighters in the war-torn country.
U.S. intelligence agencies estimate roughly 7,000 foreign fighters in total are operating in Syria, out of roughly 23,000 violent extremists.
Attorney General Eric Holder said federal prosecutors had opened fewer than 100 investigations into American citizens who may have traveled to Syria or Iraq to fight.
President Barack Obama will convene a UN Security Council meeting next month on the threat posed by foreign fighters.
“We of course use every tool to disrupt and dissuade individuals from travelling abroad for violent jihad, and to track and engage those who return,” State Department spokeswoman Jen Psakitold reporters during a news briefing on Wednesday (August 27).
“But this (McCain) of course is a case that I mentioned yesterday that is a reminder of the growing concern that the United States has, that many countries in the world have, about the thousands of foreign fighters from 50 countries who are engaged in Syria and are affiliating themselves with these extremist groups,” she said.
McCain’s death comes after reports of a 22-year-old man from Florida carrying out a suicide bombing in Syria’s Idlib province in May.
A video, uploaded to the Internet on July 28, purports to show U.S citizen Moner Mohammad Abu-Salha threatening the West, before carrying out a suicide mission in Syria. Using the nom de guerre Abu Hurayra al-Amriki, Abu-Salha carried out one of four bomb attacks on May 25 inSyria’s Idlib province on behalf of Jabhat al-Nusra, an al Qaeda affiliate fighting to oust the government of President Bashar al-Assad.
The video, which Reuters cannot independently verify, shows Abu-Salha destroying his American passport before launching into a tirade against the West and warning that nowhere is safe from the mujahideen.
“I have one word to say to you kafir (infidel): we are coming for you al-hamdulillah (thank God) and I am glad to say this. Finally I get behind cameras and say this: you kufar, you kafir, we are coming for you. Mark my words, listen to my words you big kufar. You think, oh, you killed Osama bin Laden. You did nothing, you sent him to jennah (paradise) al-hamdulillah (thank God), you sent him to paradise. You think that you have won – you have never won. You will never defeat Islam, you, Bush, any of your kufar leaders. And you Israel, oh Israel I’m talking to you too, Israel: just know that we are coming. After Sham (Syria), mujahideen will march to Filisteen (Palestine), we will free the people, we’ll free al-Aqsa, we will bring you down. You are definitely going to the dirt and you prepare yourselves to enter the hellfire of Allah,” he says in the video.
Abu-Salha, who was born in Florida and grew up in a middle-class neighbourhood about 90 minutes south of Orlando, is believed to be the first American suicide bomber in Syria. His family are of Jordanian-Palestinian origin. The U.S. government was aware before the suicide bombing that Abu-Salha had travelled to Syria to join militants.
In Denver, a woman was arrested in July on suspicion of trying to fly to Syria to support insurgents, and two men in Texas were taken into custody on similar charges in June.
A report released in June by the Rand Corporation found that the threat to the U.S. from militant Islamists is increasing.
“This person with an American passport, this militant ideology and skills that they’ve acquired on the battlefield. That’s a dangerous combination that we need to prevent from coming back. And we’re a lot better at this now than we were 10 or 15, certainly before 9/11. We have an entire bureaucracy that is really pretty efficient at identifying individuals once they are overseas and trying to prevent them from coming back,” Rand Corporation spokesman Andrew Liepman said.
Concern across Europe has intensified since a video released by Islamic State last week showed the beheading of American journalist James Foley, apparently by a masked knifeman speaking English with a London accent.
Britain’s top counter-terrorism police officer said arrests linked to fighting in Syria had risen dramatically this year and that significant progress was being made to trace a British man suspected of murdering Foley.
On Sunday (August 24), the British ambassador to the United States said Britain was close to identifying Foley’s killer.
Britain has wrestled with how to deal with Islamist militants at home since the Sept. 11, 2001al-Qaeda attacks on the United States.
Since then, four young Britons carried out suicide bombings in London which killed 52 people in July 2005 while the murder last year of an off-duty soldier on a London street by two British Muslim converts has exacerbated concerns.
The government estimates at least 500 Britons have traveled to Syria or Iraq, where IS has seized large swathes of territory, and has repeatedly warned that those who have gone posed a serious risk on their return.
The issue of foreigners fighting in Syria and Iraq extends well beyond the U.S. and Britain.Kosovo Islamic Community (ICK) condemned the inclusion of Kosovo people in the fighting’s inSyria and Iraq.
The secretary of ICK Resul Rexhepi says people are joining the cause because they are being paid in fat contracts.
“I consider that there are two main reasons why a considerable number of people took this road of no return: harsh economic situation that we have in the country with high unemployment and the other reason is highly priced contracts that were offered by the ’employers'” Rexhepi said.
Kosovo Police say 16 Kosovars have been killed in Syria and Iraq and intelligence sources believe between 100 and 200 are fighting there.
Mainstream Muslims have expressed outrage at the militants’ use of social media and other outlets to spread views about Islam that they say are wrong.
“These criminal groups definitely are, they know how to use the mic, they know how to use the media and they are savvy in their propagandam,” said Nihad Awad, Executive Director of theCouncil on American-Islamic Relations.
“When they use the declaration of faith, which means there is no god but Allah the creator, and they use it on the battlefield, they exploit my faith and this is very offensive to all Muslims and we speak against it. If they are extremists and criminals, they should have their own banners, their own declaration, but they should not use our faith,” he said.
The Syrian government and Islamic State insurgents are both committing war crimes and crimes against humanity in their war against each other, U.N. investigators said on Wednesday.
Islamic State forces in northern Syria are waging a campaign to instill fear, including amputations, public executions and whippings, they said.
Government forces have dropped barrel bombs on civilian areas, including some believed to contain the chemical agent chlorine in eight incidents in April, and have committed other war crimes that should be prosecuted, they said in a 45-page report issued in Geneva.
