Revelations last week that more than 13,000 illegal aliens convicted of murder and 15,000 convicted of sex crimes are now freely roaming the country have rightly shocked the public. But those convicted criminals aren’t the only group of illegal aliens Americans should be concerned about.
One of the other most alarming aspects of the ongoing border crisis has been the dramatic increase in suspected terrorists apprehended trying to enter the United States. Since 2021, at least 375 individuals on the FBI’s terrorist watch list have been stopped at the border – a 3,000 percent increase from 2017-2020.
While these terrorist threats were thankfully not granted entry, there is no telling how many more were among the at least 1.7 million “gotaways” who have escaped into the country undetected over the past four years.
Even more concerning, mounting evidence suggests that illegal border crossings by individuals on the terrorist watch list and mass arrivals from global terrorist hotspots are not random, but are in fact coordinated by bad actors hostile to the United States.
In June, for instance, the Department of Homeland Security announced that it had identified more than 400 illegal aliens successfully smuggled into the United States by ISIS affiliates. At the time, only 150 had been arrested, and the whereabouts of over 50 remained unknown. At least one of those individuals reportedly used the CBP One app – a government system that migrants can use to gain entry into the country – to pass through a checkpoint.
Another video report from an independent journalist on social media, which has now been shared widely throughout the Middle East, details the sophisticated human smuggling operation that has taken root in Tijuana, just across the border from San Diego, for Arab Muslims.
The center of this operation is a mosque which serves as a staging ground for Muslim migrants to rest before crossing the border. Along with being given food and water, migrants are given information on how to fill out CBP request forms to take advantage of the U.S. asylum system – or how to sneak across the border if they might show up on a watch list.
In the video, one Algerian Muslim at the mosque assures the cameraman that only migrants from Mexico face deportation. “They are fine,” he said, gesturing toward the Arab migrants in the mosque. “The U.S. can’t do it [deportation] to other foreigners.”
Later on, individuals affiliated with the mosque point out the locations where border security is lax, how to climb over the border fence, and at least one entrance to an underground tunnel.
Migrants also explain how they destroy their passports and any identification documents before entering the United States. Many arrive in Tijuana after applying for a U.K. visa, which is easy to obtain. They then fly to Nicaragua before traffickers transport them to Honduras. The typical cost to smuggle one person along this route is around $6,000.
In many cases, migrants from Muslim-majority countries are hoping for a better life in the United States, lured by promises of an open border and favorable treatment from the current administration. But experts I spoke with warned that the influx of young men in particular from the Middle East, Central Asia, and North Africa should be a matter of grave concern for Americans.
“They seem to be forming an ‘Allah army’ as they call them in the Middle East,” retired historian and political science Professor Emre Demiroğlu told me. “It is my belief that Islamic groups are exploiting the open border to place their assets in the United States,” he said. Instances like the DHS announcement in June seem to support this analysis.
Retired Professor Elias Papathanasiou, a philosopher and historian of Greek descent with extensive experience in the Middle East shaping counter-terror strategies, also told me that Americans should be wary of the Muslim Brotherhood gaining influence in the United States as it has throughout the Middle East and Europe. The Muslim Brotherhood is a transnational Islamist organization that Professor Papathanasiou said employs “a unique blend of socialist ideology and the unyielding principles of Islam” that is dedicated to challenging and ultimately prevailing over Western Civilization.
Ayan Hirsi Ali, a former Muslim who converted to Christianity, former Dutch politician, and advocate for the rights of Muslim women has further warned about the presence of the Muslim Brotherhood in the United States, including how it could influence American elections as Democrats move to grant mass amnesty and a path to citizenship to millions of migrants. As she recently explained on her blog, part of the Muslim Brotherhood’s agenda includes enacting laws based on Islamist principles and Sharia law. “If the borders stay open and the Brotherhood remains active, then local demand for Islamist legislation will inexorably increase,” she writes. “The phenomena of honor violence and female genital mutilation have now been a reality in various European countries for at least three decades. Even in the minority, Islamists will be able to ratchet up restrictions.”
Professor Gianluca Sorrentino, who advised Italian Prime Minister Amintore Fanfani on Middle Eastern affairs in the early 1980s, added that Democrats’ growing hostility toward Israel and the tacit support for Hamas from some corners of the party has only encouraged the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist organizations abroad. As he explained, “they see hope in Democrats’ capitulation to Gaza protests, which are part of a centuries-long Islamist war against Jews… Democrats advertise this fight as one for ‘social justice,’ but Muslims perceive it as jihad.”
Professor Sorrentino further warned that many Americans fail to understand the centrality of religion to Arab Muslims. “To them, Islam represents a governing order that they seek to establish.”
Despite these concerns, the Biden-Harris administration has only encouraged the continued flood of migrants from all over the world, including the Middle East and terrorist hot spots. The American people may just be beginning to see the full scope of the dangers from this open borders agenda.
Ben Solis is the pen name of an international affairs journalist, historian, and researcher.
