The Intense Backlash to Syrian Refugees ‘Plays Right Into’ ISIS’ Hand

A powerful backlash against asylum-seekers from the Middle East in the wake of the Paris attacks culminated last week in the US House of Representatives, which passed a bill that would stifle the flow of Syrian and Iraqi refugees into the US.

The legislation — passed after more than two-dozen governors announced they would not allow Syrian refugees to resettle in their states — effectively bars Syrian and Iraqi asylum-seekers from entering the US unless the director of the FBI and the Director of National Intelligence personally certify to Congress that they do not pose a national-security threat.

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“IS has utilized its propaganda apparatus in an effort to dissuade Syrians from fleeing to Europe,” Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, said Thursday at a hearing before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.

“One theme that emerged in this propaganda was the idea that Muslim refugees who flee to Europe will suffer oppression at the hands of secular and Christian governments, and will be forced to abandon their faith.”

But, as Gartenstein-Ross said in his testimony before Congress, the backlash against refugees remains a valuable propaganda tool for ISIS because it reinforces the group's claims that Muslims can only be safe in the caliphate.

“IS believes that if it can drive a wedge between Muslim populations in Europe and the rest of European society, it can present itself as a protector of European Muslims, thus building its base of support in Europe,” he said.

He added: “This strategy — in which the group carries out attacks to accelerate societal schisms, then steps in to defend the group against whom its attacks triggered discrimination — is one that IS utilized to great effect in Iraq in the mid-2000s.”

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