Local Editor

The United States believes about "a dozen" Americans are fighting with Daesh [ISIL] extremists, a Pentagon spokesman said Thursday.

There are about 100 US nationals "operating inside of Syria" but it was unclear which extremist groups they were associated with, spokesman Colonel Steven Warren said.

"We believe there are maybe a dozen that are with ISIL," he said.

Senior US officials have voiced concern at the presence of foreign fighters among the extremists who hold Western passports, potentially enabling them to return from the battlefield prepared to carry out terror attacks in Europe or the United States.
US intelligence officers have estimated that there are roughly 1,000 European volunteers among extremist groups in Syria, but it remains unclear how many were linked to the ISIL extremists.

At least one American fighting for ISIL was killed in combat in Syria, officials say, while authorities were investigating if a second US national also died as an ISIL recruit.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation has arrested several people trying to travel from the United States to Syria to support the ISIL militants, Matthew Olsen, director of the so-called " US National Counter-Terrorism Center", said Wednesday.

While there was no indication the ISIL extremists were plotting an imminent attack on the United States, there was a danger that a sympathizer of the group could carry out a "limited" attack on American soil, according to Olsen.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team