Thousands of foreign jihadis pouring into Syria to join IS
Eric Schmitt & Somini Sengupta
Washington:
NYT NEWS SERVICE
Volunteers Doubled In Last 12 Mths
Nearly 30,000 foreign recruits have now poured into Syria, many to join the Islamic State, a doubling of volunteers in just the past 12 months and stark evidence that an international effort to tighten borders, share intelligence and enforce antiterrorism laws is not diminishing the ranks of new militant fighters. Among those who have entered or tried to enter the conflict in Iraq or Syria are more than 250 Americans, up from about 100 a year ago, according to intelligence and law enforcement officials.
President Obama will take stock of the international campaign to counter the IS terror group at the United Nations on Tuesday , a public accounting that comes as American intelligence analysts have been preparing a confidential assessment that concludes that nearly 30,000 foreign fighters have traveled to Iraq and Syria from more than 100 countries since 2011.
A year ago, the same officials estimated that flow to be about 15,000 combatants from 80 countries, mostly to join the militant outfit.
That grim appraisal coincides with the scheduled release on Tuesday of a sixmonth, bipartisan congressional investigation into terrorist and foreign fighter tra vel, which concludes that “despite concerted efforts to stem the flow, we have largely failed to stop Americans from traveling overseas to join jihadists.“ Other parts of the Obama administration's policies on Syria and for combating the IS have suffered significant setbacks, as well. A $500 million Pentagon effort to train rebel forces to take on the IS in Syria has produced only a handful of fighters. Russia has defied American attempts to block Moscow's buildup of a new air base with warplanes in Syria -a topic Obama will discuss with President Vladimir V Putin of Russia at the UN on Monday . And in a break in continuity for the mission, John R Allen, the retired four-star general who since September 2014 has served as the diplomatic envoy coordinating the coalition against the IS, has told the White House that he will step down at the end of the year.
