US President Obama. Illustrative. Photo Courtesy of UN Photo/Mark Garten
It’s a nightmare scenario with mass casualties and unleashing untold fear—terrorists using a nuclear weapon, and US President Barack Obama warned it’s not such a far-fetched threat. Obama pointed out that ISIS (ISIL) has already used chemical weapons in Syria—and that’s just the start. “Individuals involved in the attacks in Paris and Brussels videotaped a senior manager who works at a Belgian nuclear facility,” said Obama in comments published by the White House. “…There is no doubt that if these madmen ever got their hands on a nuclear bomb or nuclear material they most certainly would use it to kill as many innocent people as possible.”
Obama, speaking at the Nuclear Security Summit last week, said even a small amount of nuclear material could be devastating. “The smallest amount of plutonium—about the size of an apple—could kill and injure hundreds of thousands of innocent people. It would be a humanitarian, political, economic, and environmental catastrophe with global ramifications for decades.”
ISIS’ radical agenda of a global Islamic empire—or caliphate—along with it’s extreme violence and global recruiting ability has already led to terrorism around the world, including major attacks in Europe. And that’s with conventional weapons.
Obama outlined a to-do list to avoid the unthinkable. “We have to commit to better security at nuclear facilities; to removing or disposing of more dangerous material; to bringing more nations into treaties and partnerships that prevent proliferation and smuggling; and to making sure that we have the architecture in place to sustain our momentum in the years ahead,” he said.
Obama noted the anti-ISIS coalition members present at the summit offered an opportunity to put more effort into keeping weapons of mass destruction out of terrorists’ hands.
Obama’s not the only government official promoting the joint efforts of nations to combat ISIS. Israeli President Reuven Rivlin thanked an Australian official for their counterterrorism during a visit on Sunday. “Even though you are on the other side of the world, you know very well that the spread of hatred and the instability that we are witnessing in the Middle East is a danger to the whole world, and I want to thank you for your country’s strong position against extremism,” said Rivlin in comments released by his office.
Rivlin went on to note that despite the fact that Syria’s government is no friend for Israel, neither are ISIS and other terrorists fighting the regime. “To Israel’s north, five armies are fighting each other, and none of them are friends of Israel,” said Rivlin. “The Islamic State thugs are carrying out acts of terror across the world, and the whole free world must be united against this threat.”
(By Joshua Spurlock, www.themideastupdate.com, April 3, 2016)