Scary Warning From Greece: Picking Out the Jihadists from the Refugees is ‘Nearly Impossible’

By Michael Hausam

  Getty - :Spencer Platt

 

A passport and a fingerprint from a Greek database allowed authorities to trace the movements of one of the suicide bombers from Paris. Working together, French and Greek authorities were able to figure out that Ahmad al-Mohammad had registered as a Syrian immigrant on the island of Lesbos a month before the attack.
This reveals a problem with separating legitimate refugees from terrorists embedded within them, says Dimitris Amountzias, the head of refugee registration on the island:

“If they are not already registered in the database, it’s nearly impossible.”

Ahmad al-Mohammad was able to be identified as a terrorist only after the fact. His fingerprint was taken and he was registered when he passed through the processing center. At the time, he was considered to be a fleeing refugee along with everyone else.
A European official, who insisted on anonymity, further commented on the problem:

“In any event, this proves that the unchecked flow poses an unequalled challenge for European security. We simply don’t know who is coming through.”

All of these European authorities, dealing with the deluge of refugees coming from the Middle East, are directly confronting the same sorts of issues that the United States is facing.
In stark contrast to the comments made by these officials, supporters of the Obama Administration’s plans for vetting refugees continue to describe the process as “robust.”