United States isn’t second guessing Syrian refugee plan: Obama aide

He faced a barrage of tough and probing questions from global journalists at a G20 summit in Antalya, Turkey, that often put him on the defensive.

This past weekend in Vienna, Secretary of State John Kerry led negotiations to resolve the Syrian civil war, which led to the rise of the Islamic State.

Speaking of his broader approach to fighting ISIS, Obama said, “We have the right strategy and we’re going to see it through”. No matter that the Islamic forces of ISIS are terrorists and despised by most Muslims around the world; to their supporters and potential volunteers, they are able to project an image of Muslim resiliency if Western forces do in fact become more militarily engaged in Syria and Iraq. “This is unlike the political fights we have about Obamacare and other things that are important”, he said.

For now, Obama is resisting pressure to change his strategy or escalate America’s military involvement in Iraq and Syria.

Obama used much of the press conference to strike back at his critics, sounding at times defensive and combative.

President Francois Hollande has already proclaimed that ISIS is at war with France.

“France is at war”, Hollande declared, indicating he would ask parliament to impose a three-month-long state of emergency.

Monday’s press conference was the latest of a string of comments from Obama that have sparked concern among his fellow Democrats – including the president’s remark last week that ISIS has been geographically “contained”. It’s not just my view, but the view of my closest military and civilian advisers that that would be a mistake, not because our military could not march into Mosul or Raqqa or Ramadi and temporarily clear out ISIL, but because we would see a repetition of what we’ve seen before, which is that if you don’t have local populations that are committed to inclusive governments, and who are pushing back against ideological extremes, that they resurface unless we’re prepared to have a permanent occupation of these countries. “But I think we do need to do our part to take those refugees who are in need”.

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

No, we haven’t underestimated our abilities, this is precisely why we’re in Iraq as we speak and why we’re operating in Syria as we speak.

“[Obama] is absolutely right to want to avoid an occupation, but that’s not what we’re talking about here”, says Jeffrey, now a visiting scholar at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

It is also possible Islamic State may have wanted to leave a Syrian passport behind to stoke fears about migrants in Europe.

IS was also implicated in a bombing in Ankara on October 10, but has not claimed responsibility for that attack. Self-defense, although French officials never said why.

“To that he adds that, without a dramatic shift in strategy, “[Obama] is going to be handing this problem off to his successor”.

While Obama did not single out his critics by name, a few Republican presidential candidates, including former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, have called for sending USA forces into Syria.

Friday night’s attack in Paris was shocking in that it marked the worst violence on French soil since World War II. The meeting ran for 35 minutes.

Clearly our nation has ample military strength to crush the murderous terrorists in Iraq and Syria. ISIS’s predecessor, al-Qaeda in Iraq, followed the same pattern of increasing its suicide attacks as it lost territory, especially from 2007 onward.

The president also announced a new effort to share intelligence with France following the coordinated terror spree across Paris that killed at least 129 people and injured hundreds. He added that the USA has a “very careful vetting process” for all Syrian refugees. Mr. Obama is correct to declare such action as un-American. It should therefore come as no surprise that the social media sphere exploded with tens of thousands of postings during and after the Paris attacks, jubilating about the “conquest of Paris” and the “killing of infidel pigs”.

The moment a young girl who was abducted by ISIS is reunited with her family in a camp for displaced people in northern Iraq.