FBI Director Christopher Wray believes that an organised terror attack on the US, similar to the Moscow terror attack in a concert hall, is a very real possibility. This is what he plans to tell a House of Representatives panel on Thursday.
According to a Reuters report the FBI is concerned about the possibility of an organised attack in the United States similar to the one that killed scores at a Russian concert hall last month, the bureau’s director plans to tell a House of Representatives panel on Thursday.
The FBI director is all set to tell the panel that the US has never faced so many threats at once. “Looking back over my career in law enforcement, I’d be hard pressed to think of a time where so many threats to our public safety and national security were so elevated all at once,” Christopher Wray is set to tell lawmakers during a budget hearing. “But that is the case as I sit here today.”
US intelligence officials has been voicing its concerns not just about ISIS but about other radical groups that may pose a danger According to an ABC report, a recent US intelligence bulletin had expressed concern that radical groups in the US can respond to ISIS’ call to target the US. The intelligence bulletin warns ISIS operatives worldwide, and so-called “lone wolves”, might respond to recent statements from the terrorist group. But other radical groups may also be encouraged to conduct attacks on public venues in the US, especially after seeing the success of the ISIS attack in Moscow
Former US Centcom chief Frank McKenzie stated that future attacks by ISIS on the US are inevitable and that Washington should be prepared. “We should believe them when they say they’re going to try to do it,” General Frank McKenzie said in an interview to ABC.
Gen McKenzie was reacting to the message that ISIS had issued recently. The Islamic State (ISIS) has recently made a fresh call to its followers to kill Christians and Jews across America and Europe. A report in the Mirror stated that Hudhayfah al-Ansari, the new ISIS spokesperson, made an over 40-minute-long address on social media celebrating the deadly terror attack that killed 140 people in Moscow. He called upon “lone wolves” to carry out attacks against American forces in Iraq.
US officials have been worried about the possibility of an attack carried out by an individual or small group inspired by the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. But the FBI is growing concerned about a more coordinated attack following the concert massacre in Russia, Wray will say during testimony.
(With inputs from Reuters)
