Barack Obama: Attacks ‘terrible’ setback in Islamic State campaign

”The awful events in Paris were obviously a bad and sickening setback”.

Airstrikes France conducted Sunday against Islamic State were targeted by the French military based on information the US shared with them under the new arrangement, Davis said.

Obama lit into his domestic critics, particularly a few Republicans running in the 2016 presidential campaign who’ve called for a more robust military campaign against Islamic State.

The US has accepted only 1,500 refugees from Syria since 2011, but the White House said in September that 10,000 would be allowed entry next year.

Instead, he said, “We’ll do what is required to keep the American people safe”.

He said that airstrikes by the U.S.-led coalition have been effective in taking out key members of the terror group’s leadership and that a large presence of ground troops in Syria would be a “mistake”.

“What happens when there’s a terrorist attack generated from Yemen?”

Obama has been criticised for his administration’s handling of the current turmoil in Syria and Iraq, with a few Republicans calling for a more aggressive approach that would include more U.S. troops on the ground in the region. “Or Libya, perhaps? Or if there’s a terrorist network that’s operating anywhere else – in North Africa, or in Southeast Asia?” From Turkey, Obama headed to Asia for regional summits in the Philippines and Malaysia. And he called on other nations to step up their involvement in the fight against the extremists.

The remarks by Obama and Bush about Syrian refugees followed Friday night’s bombing and shooting attacks in Paris that killed 129 people. The U.S.is also helping opposition forces in their effort to cut off supply lines to the Islamic State stronghold of Raqqa.

But Obama did announce that the United States would begin a new “streamlined” process of sharing intelligence with France.

The Islamic State’s increasing focus on wider targets has raised questions about whether Obama underestimated the group. He once referred to the extremists as a “JV team” and said shortly before the Paris attack that their capacity in Iraq and Syria had been contained.

Obama dismissed the suggestion that he failed to comprehend the Islamic State’s strength, but said there were challenges in defeating a group whose fighters have a “willingness to die”.

“When I hear political leaders suggesting that there would be a religious test for which a person who is fleeing from a war-torn country is admitted, when a few of those folks themselves come from families who benefited from protection when they were fleeing political persecution, that’s shameful, that’s not American”, Obama said.

He said US intelligence agencies have been concerned about a potential attack on the West by Islamic State militants for over a year but they did not pick up specific threats about an attack on Paris that would have enabled officials there to respond effectively to deter the assault.

“I will call both Obama and [Russian President Vladimir] Putin to unite our efforts and seek a solution”, Hollande said.