Historian: Terrorists exploiting U.S. border not 'hypothetical'

It's not "hypothetical" that Islamic terrorists are exploiting the porous southern U.S. border with Mexico, according to Raymond Ibrahim, a senior fellow at the Gatestone Institute.

"The idea that Islamic terror groups are operating in Mexico and eyeing – and exploiting – the porous US-Mexico border is not a hypothetical; unfortunately, it appears to be a fact," wrote Ibrahim, also a fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center and the Middle East Forum, at the Gatestone website.

"At least 15 – though likely many more – suspected terrorists have already been apprehended crossing the border since 2001. One suspected terrorist who crossed the border, an ISIS supporter, already launched a terrorist attack in Canada that nearly killed five people," he said.

"The only question left is how much more evidence, and how many more attacks – and with what greater severity – are needed before this problem is addressed?"

He cited recent developments, including the case of a captured ISIS fighter who told said ISIS is committed to exploiting the border and inflicting terror inside America.

"Whatever one thinks of President Donald Trump's heightened rhetoric about the U.S.-Mexico border and his many claims that it is vulnerable to terrorists, ISIS apparently also thought so," said a report from the Government Technology and Services Coalition.

One statement came from Abu Henricki, a Canadian citizen of Trinidadian origin, Ibrahim reported.

Henricki said ISIS tried to recruit him and others to cross the border.

The report warned it would be both erroneous and "detrimental" to the nation's safety to "downplay the potential terrorist threats."

Ibrahim noted that in 2017, Somalia-born Abdulahi Hasan Sharif launched a terror attack in Edmonton, Canada, stabbing a police officer and ramming his vehicle into four pedestrians.

Sharif, who came into the U.S. originally by crossing the U.S.-Mexico border illegally, had an ISIS flag in his vehicle.

The Center for Immigration Studies has documented other cases.

"The U.S.-Mexico border is so alluring that long before ISIS came onto the scene, other Islamic terrorists were eying it – including as a potential gateway to smuggle anthrax into America in order to kill 330,000 Americans – and operating in it," Ibrahim reported.

As recently as a few years ago, a cache of M-16 rifles, hand grenades, C4 explosives and other weapons were uncovered at the home of a jihadi cell in Mexico.

"The weapons, it turned out, had been smuggled by Muslims from Iraq," Ibrahim reported.