There is little that can stop the terrorists behind the Moscow theater attack from joining the thousands of migrants crossing the U.S. border and attempting something even bigger on American soil, officials warned.
Isis-K, the jihadist splinter group that killed 143 people in the March 23 massacre, considers the United States a “bigger” target and “could slip undetected” across the United States’ 2,000-mile border United with Mexico.
“The open border is a major concern for terrorists entering the United States in light of the attacks in Moscow,” a U.S. counterterrorism official told the New York Post.
‘We are taking the threat of an ISIS-K internal attack very seriously.
‘They hate us and everything we represent. And they are bold and always looking for goals.
Security footage recorded four Isis-K terrorists massacring 143 people at Moscow’s Crocus City Theater earlier this month in Europe’s deadliest terror attack in 20 years.
U.S. security officials fear that the terrorist group views the United States as a more attractive target and that there is little to stop it from sneaking agents into the thousands crossing the southern border.
“It will only take a few to bring terrorism to American soil,” said former Army intelligence officer Morgan Lerette.
More than 2 million people were intercepted while crossing the southern border last year, but no one knows how many more crossed unseen.
Meanwhile, the number of intercepted immigrants who are on the FBI’s terrorist watch list has skyrocketed from 15 in 2021 to 169 last year.
One of them, Lebanese migrant Basel Bassel Ebbadi, 22, told officials, “I’m going to try to make a bomb” after Border Patrol agents captured the Hezbollah member near El Paso, Texas, early of this month.
Afghanistan-based Isis-K already claimed American lives when it carried out a bomb attack that killed 183 people during the US evacuation of Kabul in 2021.
Daniel Byman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies said they are “the most operationally capable branch of the Islamic State” which took control of much of Iraq and Syria between 2016 and 2018.
The group used Tajik nationals for the Moscow attack, but Byman said they are actively recruiting in other Central Asian countries: Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.
The FBI revealed last year that Isis-K had established a trafficking network to smuggle Uzbeks into the United States and that more than a dozen had disappeared after being prosecuted by DHS officials.
FBI Director Christopher Wray warned of the danger less than two weeks before the Moscow attack when he spoke at a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing earlier this month.
Wray responded “I do” when Cornyn asked if he was concerned that potential terrorists crossing the southern border could cause harm to Americans earlier this month.
The Tajik terrorists used automatic rifles, bombs and Molotov cocktails in their attack.
Social media images showed gunmen dressed in camouflage clothing opening fire in the packed Moscow theater.
The attack left the theater in flames and Russian society faces an unprecedented terrorist threat.
The FBI discovered an ISIS terrorist cell that used human smuggling operations to infiltrate the US, but its members had disappeared by the time they realized it.
At least 7.2 million people have entered the US through the southern border since President Biden took office
Marco Rubio, vice president of the committee, said the briefing left him “very concerned” about the potential threat.
“I think common sense tells you that if they run a human trafficking network, they will surely use it to transfer agents to the United States,” he added.
‘If they could do what they did in Moscow, in the United States, they would do it in the blink of an eye. They want to do it.’
“And it’s something we have to be very vigilant about when we have a border that 9 million people have crossed in the last three years.”
Migrants who cross the border can often be forced to wait several years for officials to review their applications and make a decision on their status.
Most are released to roam the streets of the United States, including 2 million “high priority” cases of career criminals seeking asylum.
At the end of fiscal year 2023, on Sept. 30, more than 6 million people were registered in what officials call the “non-detainee docket.”
And government projections, as reported in Homeland Security documents sent to Congress, suggest that the backlog will have grown to 8 million by October 1.
Isis-K considers the United States, Russia, Iran and even its Taliban hosts in Afghanistan to be enemies.
Their attack in Moscow was the deadliest on European soil in more than 20 years and one they would love to replicate in the United States, according to Morgan Lerette, a former U.S. Army captain and Blackwater contractor.
“It will only take a few of them to arm themselves and attack a big event, a concert, a baseball game, Times Square to bring terrorism to American soil,” he added.
Basel Bassel Ebbadi, 22, admitted he was a member of Hezbollah and had come “to make a bomb” when he was intercepted by agents on the Texas-Mexico border on March 9.
And Colin Clarke, an analyst at security consulting firm Soufan Group, warned that they wouldn’t need huge resources or many agents to cause carnage once they got here.
“A terrorist is going to find it difficult to build a bomb or buy a weapon here, but low-cost attacks, such as ramming a car or truck, are still possible,” he said. ‘Everything is possible.
“It is common for terrorist groups to see an attack gain momentum, which can cause their sympathizers to take action elsewhere.
“There is no doubt that this latest attack in Moscow will inspire others to act on behalf of ISIS.”