Hit harder

Obama vows to hit ISIL 'harder than ever'

By Nahal Toosi

The United States will "continue to hit" the Islamic State "harder than ever," President Barack Obama said Friday, but he offered no new specific proposals for how he planned to eliminate the terrorist network.

The president also acknowledged the difficulties in tracking "lone wolf" attackers inspired by jihadist groups, especially when it comes to monitoring their private messages on social and other media, a nod to fears that have risen in the wake of the San Bernardino attacks.

Obama used his year-end press conference to list a series of accomplishments in 2015, including deals reached on climate change, trade and Iran's nuclear program, but he couldn't escape what many see as his administration's biggest failure: its initial underestimation of the threat posed by the Islamic State and its inability to end the civil war in Syria.

After what some considered a slow response following the attack in San Bernardino, California, Obama has been trying to reassure the public on several stages -- delivering an Oval Office address, speaking at the Pentagon and also visiting the National Counterterrorism Center, where he also spoke this week. The White House has ramped up its public outreach on the battle against the Islamic State, also known as ISIL or ISIS, as well as efforts to make its case to the media.

Public anxieties still linger, however. Obama, who leaves later Friday for Hawaii, where he will spend his Christmas holiday, will face them head on during a stop in California to meet with relatives of those killed in the San Bernardino attacks, which were carried out by a married couple apparently inspired by Islamist radicals.

Pressed by reporters, the president stressed that law enforcement and intelligence agencies are always on alert for would-be terrorists seeking to attack the United States. But tracking down every single lone-wolf attacker, who is often self-inspired and self-trained, is more difficult than detecting complicated plots involving trained operatives.

"It’s not that different from us trying to detect the next mass shooter," Obama said. "You don’t always see it. They’re not always communicating publicly."

Obama said, amid reports that the couple implicated in the San Bernardino killings had communicated about their desire to stage on attack through private messages, that it's harder to monitor people's use of social and other media if the posts are not public. And trying to delve into their private messages raises civil liberties issues, he said.

"Our law enforcement and intelligence professionals are constantly monitoring public posts," he said. The government is reviewing what it can do in terms of going beyond public posts, and "one of the things we will be doing is engaging with the high tech community to find out how we can in an appropriate way… be able to track a suspected terrorist."

He added: “If it’s not posted publicly, then there’s going to be feasibility issues that are going to be insurmountable at some level.”

Obama defended his policies toward Syria, arguing that he's done as much as possible to try to end that country's bloody civil war, which has killed 250,000 people and displaced millions, according to U.N. figures.

Obama, who is determined to avoid sending U.S. combat troops to stop the fighting in the Arab country, also held firm on his stance that Syrian President Bashar Assad must step down in order to bring an end to the war. Assad's brutality has alienated so many Syrians that it is inconceivable they would accept his staying in power, Obama argued.

"You cannot bring peace to Syria, you cannot get an end to the civil war unless you have a government that ... is recognized as legitimate by a majority of that country," Obama said.

The president also linked Assad's ouster to the ultimate defeat of the Islamic State, noting that Assad's presence fuels the civil war, which allows the terrorist network to capitalize on the chaos in Syria. "Our long-term goal has to be to stabilize these areas so that they don’t have any safe haven," Obama said of the Islamic State's fighters.

Obama came into office vowing to end the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. But he has found far harder to disentangle the U.S. from the broader Middle East than it is to promise to do so. He has sent advisers and special operations forces to fight the Islamic State terrorist network in Iraq and Syria. He also agreed to slow down the reduction of U.S. troops in Afghanistan, where the Taliban are rising 13 years after the U.S. ousted them from power.

The president spoke the same day Congress approved a $1.1 trillion spending measure he plans to sign, though he noted he doesn't like everything in it. That the spending bill passed well before the holiday and without a government shutdown is already considered something of a Christmas miracle in Washington.