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   From: go@isis.com   
      
   Washington (CNN)The U.S. is losing the battle to stop Americans   
   from traveling abroad to enlist in ISIS, a bipartisan   
   congressional task force concluded in a report released Tuesday.   
      
   More than 25,000 foreigners have flocked to war-torn Syria and   
   Iraq since 2011 to fight with Islamist terrorist groups   
   including ISIS, according to U.S. government estimates noted in   
   the report.   
      
   "Despite concerted efforts to stem the flow, we have largely   
   failed to stop Americans from traveling overseas to join   
   jihadists," the task force determined in its report.   
      
   In just the last nine months, more than 7,000 foreign fighters   
   have swelled the ranks of those radical militant groups waging   
   war and committing atrocities in Iraq and Syria. And while most   
   recruits continue to come from the Middle East and North Africa,   
   thousands of Westerners have traveled to fight in the region --   
   including more than 250 Americans, more than half of which have   
   left in the last year.   
      
   Those figures prompted the eight-member task force, commissioned   
   by the House Homeland Security Committee and including three   
   House Democrats, to call for an overhaul of the U.S. strategy to   
   stem the flow and threat of foreign fighters in what the task   
   force called "the largest global convergence of jihadists in   
   history."   
      
   "We have to have a strategy to deal with this: both a military   
   strategy abroad, a political solution, but also a prevention   
   strategy here in the United States to prevent this threat,"   
   Homeland Security Committee Chairman Michael McCaul, a Texas   
   Republican, said at a press conference announcing the reports   
   conclusions Tuesday.   
      
   The report's release Tuesday comes as President Barack Obama is   
   chairing a summit at the United Nations on how to counter ISIS   
   and the threat of extremism worldwide.   
      
   Federal officials have ramped up their efforts to stop and   
   arrest individuals inspired by ISIS to either travel to Syria   
   and Iraq or carry out attacks on U.S. soil, but gaps still   
   remain. Of the more than 250 American who sought to travel to   
   Iraq and Syria, U.S. officials caught just 28 before they could   
   make it to the region, according to the task force's report.   
      
   The task force also estimated that women account for more than   
   30 of the 250-plus Americans who have traveled to join extremist   
   groups in Iraq and Syria.   
      
   Texas Republican Rep. Will Hurd, who worked for nine years as an   
   undercover CIA agent, said that while coordination between   
   agencies fighting to prevent attacks on U.S. soil still needs   
   work, he said he's noticed improvements.   
      
   "One of the good things is information sharing has improved   
   since I joined the CIA back in 2000, but there's still a lot   
   more work to be done," Hurd said Tuesday.   
      
   The group also pointed to gaps in international intelligence   
   sharing efforts, noting that "there is currently no   
   comprehensive global database of foreign fighter names."   
      
   "Instead, countries including the United States rely on a   
   patchwork system for swapping individual extremist identities,"   
   the report found, calling that system "an inherently weak   
   arrangement that increases the odds a foreign fighter will be   
   able to cross border(s) undetected when traveling to and from a   
   terrorist sanctuary."   
      
   The fighters pose "a triple threat," the group wrote in a   
   summary of its findings: "they strengthen terrorist groups,   
   incite others back home to conduct attacks, and can return   
   themselves to launch acts of terror."   
      
   The flow of foreign fighters is continuing to fuel the conflict   
   in Iraq and Syria, allowing groups like ISIS to replenish their   
   ranks even as U.S. officials assess more than 10,000 extremist   
   fighters have been killed by U.S.-led coalition airstrikes since   
   that bombing campaign launched in the summer 2014.   
      
   ISIS's force currently consists of between 20,000 and 30,000   
   fighters according to the latest CIA estimate -- mimicking the   
   group's numbers in fall 2014.   
      
   Ranking Member Bennie Thompson, a Mississippi Democrat, called   
   the threat of foreign fighters "clear and alarming" and said the   
   task force's report would help focus attention on the foreign   
   fighter issue.   
      
   "The threat of a terrorist-trained extremist returning to the   
   United States from the battlefields in Iraq and Syria is   
   serious, and we must do what we can to prevent it," he said.   
      
   http://www.cnn.com/2015/09/29/politics/foreign-fighters-isis-   
   congressional-task-force-report/   
        
      
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