Vetting for terror ties has failed for two decades
New York City firefighters work amid debris after September 11, 2001.Photo: AP
In the growing debate over President Obama’s decision to accept 10,000 Syrian refugees even after the terrorist attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, Calif., we need to take a much harder look at our vetting process. History is not encouraging.
In February 1993, I was the newly assigned executive officer of the NYPD’s Special Investigation Division, working out of One Police Plaza, when the call came in about the bombing of the World Trade Center. Our investigation would reveal that a Jordanian, Eyad Ismoil, drove Kuwaiti Ramzi Yousef and a 1,300-pound nitrate-hydrogen bomb stuffed with cyanide into the parking garage underneath the towers.
The resulting explosion would kill six, and injure over 1,000. Yousef was arrested in Pakistan in 1995 and, along with five of his co-conspirators from the Middle East, convicted. The one American-born conspirator, Abdul Yasin, fled to Iraq and is still a fugitive.
The investigation also revealed what a poor job this country does in vetting people seeking admission and doing next to nothing when a criminal alien is living here illegally.
Yousef, the plot’s mastermind — and nephew of 9/11 planner Khalid Sheikh Mohammed — entered the United States in 1992 with a questionable Iraqi passport. His companion, Ahmed Ajaj, carried multiple immigration documents. Ajaj was arrested when officials found bomb manuals and videos of suicide car-bombers in his luggage.
Yousef was held for 72 hours but released because immigration holding cells were full.
Eight years later came 9/11. Once again, a group of Middle Eastern males, with sketchy backgrounds and suspect immigration paperwork, were welcomed into our country where they proceeded to kill close to 3,000 Americans. That should’ve been a wakeup call. It wasn’t.
Will the San Bernardino attacks finally wake us up?
American-born shooter Syed Farook was able to bring Tashfeen Malik into the country in 2014 from Pakistan on a “K1-fiancé” visa. Together they shot and killed 14 people and injured 21 before being shot to death by police. How well was Malik vetted? Not well.
According to The New York Times, Malik passed three background checks: “None uncovered what Ms. Malik had made little effort to hide — that she talked openly on social media about her views on violent jihad. She said she supported it. And she wanted to be part of it.”
“Had the authorities found the posts years ago, they might have kept her out of the country. But immigration officials do not routinely review social media as part of their background checks,” the Times reported. The Wall Street Journal reported Monday that the Department of Homeland Security is considering it.
One wonders what the loved ones of those slaughtered in the attack would have to add to this discussion?
Which brings us to the refugees.
The president says they’ll only be admitted after undergoing a rigorous vetting process. What exactly will this consist of? Will they produce Syrian Social Security cards and driver’s licenses?
Will investigators travel to Syria to speak with applicants’ relatives, friends and neighbors? What Syrian government agencies will assist in this effort? What databases will their fingerprints be run through? How much data is available in this war-torn country?
FBI Director James Comey said in October that the feds don’t have the ability to conduct thorough background checks on all of the 10,000 Syrian refugees.
“We can only query against that which we have collected,” Comey said. “And, so if someone has never made a ripple in the pond in Syria in a way that would get their identity or their interest reflected in our database, we can query our database until the cows come home, but there will be nothing [to] show up because we have no record of them.”
Comey this week reported that ISIS “has the capability to manufacture fraudulent passports.”
House Homeland Security Chairman Mike McCaul this week said, “ISIS has said in its own words that they want to exploit the refugee process to infiltrate the West. And, they did exactly that to attack Paris. I can reveal today that the United States government has information to indicate that individuals tied to terrorist groups in Syria have already attempted to gain access to our country through the US refugee program.”
There is no doubt that dangerous fanatics want to come here to kill Americans. It’s a lesson we refuse to learn.
Bob Martin served the NYPD for 32 years. He was a member of the International Association of Chiefs of Police Committee on Terrorism.
Bob Martin served the NYPD for 32 years. He was a member of the International Association of Chiefs of Police Committee on Terrorism.
No comments:
Post a Comment