‘ You are next’
Obama urges allies to do more in fight against ISIL.
• President Barack Obama said Monday the U. S.-led coalition is making progress against militants of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant in both Iraq and Syria, as he delivered an update on the campaign aimed at reassuring Americans worried about the spread of extremism-fuelled terrorism.
“We are hitting ISIL harder than ever,” Obama said.
He said airstrikes have increased and the coalition has successfully knocked out key figures in the group’s leadership “one by one.”
“The point is, ISIL leaders cannot hide and our next message to them is simple: ’ You are next.”’ Obama said.
The tough talk came after Obama met with his top national security advisers at the Pentagon, part of weeklong push to explain his strategy for stopping ISIL abroad and its sympathizers at home. Obama is also slated to attend a briefing at the National Counter-terrorism Centre later in the week.
After a series of setbacks, the U. S. and its coalition partners have claimed progress recently in wresting back territory from ISIL and eliminating some of its key leaders in Syria and Iraq.
The military has said hundreds of U. S airstrikes in recent days dealt a major blow to ISIL ranks in the western Iraqi city of Ramadi, which ISIL seized in May.
But progress in Ramadi, as elsewhere, has been slow, leading to calls in the U. S. and abroad for a tougher U. S. response. Aside from authorizing a small number of special forces, Obama has insisted he won’t budge from his determination not to send in major U. S. ground forces.
Flanked by top military brass, Obama offered some of the first public details about the status of those special forces, ordered before the recent attacks in California and Paris. He said special forces in Syria had started their work helping local groups cut off ISIL supply lines and put pressure on Raqqa, the unofficial capital of Islamic State group’s “caliphate.”
In an effort to encourage coalition allies to contribute more to the fight, Obama said he was dispatching Defense Secretary Ash Carter to the Middle East on Monday. The high- profile visits to agencies charged with keeping the U. S. safe follow an Oval Office address Dec. 6 that aimed to reassure the public but that critics said failed to do the job.
“The American people are smart enough to know when something is working or not, and it’s obvious that the president’s current strategy isn’t working,” House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, a Republican, said in response to Obama’s appearance at the Pentagon.
As national security takes centre stage in the presidential race, Obama is also hoping to draw a contrast with Donald Trump and his inflammatory remarks about Muslims, which the Obama administration has said endangers U. S. national security.
On a conference call Monday with religious leaders, top White House officials pledged vigilance by the Justice Department in pursuing hate crimes and other civil rights violations, calling an attack on any faith an attack on all faiths. Obama’s aides were also holding separate meetings at the White House with Muslim and Sikh leaders.
The public relations campaign, one week before Christmas, comes as the public is jittery about the spectre of extremism after deadly attacks in California and Paris.
Seven in 10 Americans rate the risk of an attack in the U.S. as at least somewhat high, according to an Associated Press- GfK poll — a sharp increase from the five in 10 who said that in January.