FBI Director Christopher A. Wray warned during a Senate hearing today (Tuesday) that Hamas poses the greatest threat of domestic terrorism the US has faced since ISIS.
"The reality is that the terrorism threat has been elevated throughout 2023, but the ongoing war in the Middle East has raised the threat of an attack against Americans in the United States to a whole other level," Wray said.
"We assess that the actions of Hamas and its allies will serve as an inspiration the likes of which we haven't seen since ISIS launched its so-called caliphate several years ago," he explained.
"In just the past few weeks, multiple foreign terrorist organizations have called for attacks against Americans and the West. Al Qaeda issued its most specific call to attack the United States in the last five years. ISIS urged its followers to target Jewish communities in the United States and Europe. Hezbollah has publically expressed its support for Hamas and threatened to attack US interests in the Middle East. And we've seen an increase in attacks on US military bases overseas carried out by militia groups backed by Iran," he said.
"Here in the United States, our most immediate concern is that violent extremists, individuals or small groups, will draw inspiration from the events in the Middle East to carry out attacks against Americans going about their daily lives. That includes not just home-grown violent extremists inspired by a foreign terrorist organization, but also domestic violent extremists targeting Jewish or Muslim communities. We've already seen that with the individual we arrested last week in Houston who'd been studying how to build bombs and posted online about his support for killing Jews. And with the tragic killing of a six-year-old Muslim boy in Illinois in what we're investigating as a federal hate crime."
The FBI director warned: "We also cannot and do not discount the possibility that Hamas or another foreign terrorist organization may exploit the current conflict to conduct attacks here on our own soil. We have kept our sights on Hamas and have multiple ongoing investigations into individuals affiliated with that foreign terrorist organization."
Wray noted Iran's campaign of assassination attempts against dissidents throughout the world, including in America.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken also addressed the Senate hearing, during which he explained that the Biden Administration opposes the imposition of a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas at this time because such a ceasefire would "simply consolidate what Hamas has been able to do and allow it to remain where it is and potentially allow it to repeat."