Faith-Based Daily Awareness Post 01 November 2023

These updates are shared to help raise the situational awareness of Faith-Based organizations to best defend against and mitigate the impacts from all-hazards threats including physical security, cybersecurity, and natural disasters. 

FBI Director Wray: Threats to the Homeland

Director Wray testified to the following:

• The greatest terrorism threat to our homeland is posed by lone actors or small cells of individuals who typically radicalize to violence online, and who primarily use easily accessible weapons to attack soft targets. We see the lone offender threat with both domestic violent extremists (“DVEs”) and HVEs, two distinct threats, both of which are located primarily in the United States and typically radicalize and mobilize to violence on their own.
• Domestic and homegrown violent extremists are often motivated and inspired by a mix of social or political, ideological, and personal grievances against their targets… (Gate 15 SUN note: for reference, Mixing Ideologies Requires Multipronged Terrorism Prevention Efforts, 25 May 2023)
• The top domestic terrorism threat we face continues to be from DVEs we categorize as racially or ethnically motivated violent extremists (“RMVEs”) and anti-government or anti-authority violent extremists (“AGAAVEs”). The number of FBI domestic terrorism investigations has more than doubled since the spring of 2020. 
• The FBI assesses HVEs as the greatest, most immediate international terrorism threat to the homeland. HVEs are people located and radicalized to violence primarily in the United States…
• While we work to assist our Israeli colleagues and understand the global implications of the ongoing conflict in Israel, we are paying heightened attention to how the events abroad could directly affect and inspire people to commit violence here…We have seen violent extremists across ideologies seeking to target Jewish and Muslim people and institutions through physical assaults, bomb threats, and online calls for mass casualty attacks. Our top concern stems from lone offenders inspired by—or reacting to—the ongoing Israel-HAMAS conflict, as they pose the most likely threat to Americans, especially Jewish, Muslim, and Arab-American communities in the United States. We have seen an increase in reported threats to Jewish and Muslim people, institutions, and houses of worship here in the United States and are moving quickly to mitigate them.
• …we have no information to indicate that HAMAS has the intent or capability to conduct operations inside the U.S., though we cannot, and do not, discount that possibility, but we are especially concerned about the possibility of HAMAS supporters engaging in violence on the group’s behalf.
• Also discusses cybercrime, foreign intel threats, crime, and more.

The following news items report on FBI Director Wray’s testimony:

• Wray warns of increased terrorist threat, says U.S. is in a ‘dangerous period’
• FBI Director Christopher Wray warns Congress of terror threats inspired by Hamas’ attack on Israel

FBI Director Wray’s Written Testimony can be downloaded.

Analyst Comments:

The FBI’s main concern is domestic violent extremists (DVEs) and homegrown violent extremists (HVE). The FBI emphasizes that the Israel-Hamas conflict has increased the threat of lone offenders attacking Jewish, Muslim, and Arab-American communities.

While DVEs and HVEs may be the main threat, international terrorists cannot be ignored when developing a Faith-Based Organization’s security posture. NBC News reported and the Washington Examiner reported that hundreds of people on the FBI’s terrorist watchlist have been stopped at the US border in the last couple of years. It is unknown how many crossed undetected.

FBI Director Wray’s Written Testimony also states:

“The FBI remains concerned about the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan and that the intent of FTOs, such as ISIS and al-Qa’ida and their affiliates, is to carry out or inspire large-scale attacks in the United States.” (FTOs are foreign terrorist organizations.)

The item below also shows that ISIS is calling for attacks on America.

Last Issue of Al Naba, Official Weekly Newspaper of ISIS.

The latest issue of Al Naba, which is the official publication of ISIS included a post titled,  “How is the elimination of the Jews achieved?”

FB-ISAO members can find the entire text, as well as information about threats, domestic protests, and security coordination activities in FB-ISAO Slack. Join here. In addition, FB-ISAO prepared and shared a bulletin regarding the post mentioned above as well as other threats to people and places that have been shared by FB-ISAO members in the past 24 hours.