Obama: Large US troop deployment against IS ‘a mistake’

But Obama said refugees would only be admitted to the USA after being subjected to “rigorous screening and security”.

In the wake of the horrific Paris attacks, leaders from the world’s top economies ended a two-day summit at this Mediterranean resort Monday with a vow to step up the fight against terrorism.

Obama said he disagreed with his predecessor, Republican President George W. Bush, on many issues, but applauded his statements after the 9/11 attacks that the United States is not engaged in a war with Islam. France’s Interior minister said police arrested 23 people accused of being members of a sleeper cell behind Friday’s attacks in Paris, and recovered weapons as well.

“We’ve seen that when we have an effective partner on the ground ISIL can and is pushed back”, Obama said during his speech. One option floating in Capitol Hill would be to delay the refugee program until those officials can certify their background checks.

“If you have a handful of people who don’t mind dying, they can kill a lot of people”, Obama said. “They are parents, they are children, they are orphans”.

“The strategy that we are putting forward is the strategy that is ultimately is going to work”, Obama repeated during a news conference at the close of two days of talks with world leaders.

While officials say the U.S. had been aware of the Islamic State’s desire to strike targets outside the Middle East, Obama said he had not been briefed on any intelligence that indicated an attack in Paris was likely.

Trump, on CNBC, said: “We have no idea who these people are…”

The G20 leaders said they are “resolved to address this threat by enhancing our cooperation and developing relevant measures to prevent and tackle this phenomenon, including operational information-sharing, border management to detect travel, preventive measures and appropriate criminal justice response”.

President Barack Obama defended his strategy for combating ISIS, saying that having ground troops in large numbers would be a “mistake”.

Obama said the government can’t “shoot first and aim later”, and but must stick with the strategy, while still being flexible.

“But I do think there is a special important need to make sure that Christians from Syria are being protected because they are being slaughtered in the country and, but for us, who?” After the Paris attack, he has called for not accepting any Syrian refugees in the US, after previously being open to helping a few.

Obama said the USA often collects intelligence that suggests overseas terrorist attacks might be in the offing, but that it had “no specific mention of (the Paris) attack that we could provide France”, nothing that it could have taken military action against. We could follow their advice and put tens of thousands of American and allied troops in Iraq – for the third time – and they could take Ramadi and Mosul from Islamic State forces, and we could capture territory in Syria as well, but then what?

“My only interest is to end suffering and to keep the American people safe”, he added, noting that he was not interested in adopting a strategy because “it is going to work politically, or it is going to somehow in the abstract going to make America look tough, or make me look tough”.

“The president was right when he called the Islamic State a cancer, but it is a cancer that metastasized on his watch”.

Putin on Tuesday said France may extend support to the Syrian opposition as well in the battle against IS.