Dr Walid Phares on Fox News

Professor Walid Phares was interviewed on Fox and Friends discussing the latest national security threats. Following are the talking points:

Question: The heads of US national security agencies testified this week that al Qaeda is planning on more attacks against US homeland this year and we expect attempts within six months. Why did they make that assessment?

Walid Phares: The main basis for this assessment are the events of last year. There were twelve terror attempts, two were bloody in Arkansas and Ft Hood, and a third could have been a disaster. But such assessment is still a reactive mode. We know there will be attacks, but the Government isn't able to identify the threat so far.

Question: "Why are we not able to identify the threat, the cells, and the means they will use? Haven't we learn enough in 8 years?"

Walid Phares: It is a policy problem. Our analysts and agencies are denied to act on ideology, they can only act on the basis of a crime committed as in the cases of Abdelmutalib, Nidal hasan, and others.

Question: "Officials admitted the lone wolves are the main threat, Is this the terrorism of the future that we will have to face in America: individuals who decide to become terrorists on their own?"

Walid Phares: Yes, we will be facing more and more with homegrown lone wolves but they aren't so alon. They are produced by a machinery, thus they aren't so isolated.

Question: "Recently we've been seeing that these radical jihadists like Abdelmutalib and Hasan are linked to radical clerics such as Imam Awlaki, now hiding in Yemen. and now we discover that Yasir Qadhi, another American born Islamic scholar had links to Abdelmutalib. What does that mean?"

Walid Phares: It means that the radicalization is happening inside the United States. It is a result of radical ideologues impactign the minds of indoctrinated individuals

Question: "Isn't the US Government aware of it?"

Walid Phares: Actually the bureaucracies have been fooled by many Jihadists who have been posing as cultural advisors and have been penetrating our system.

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