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American homegrown IS supporters hail from 19 states: think tank

Xinhua, May 8, 2015 Adjust font size:

A total of 62 American in 19 U.S. states have tried to join militant groups in Syria, a U.S. think tank expert said on Thursday.

"We (New America Foundation) have identified 62 individuals from news reports or public records who have tried to join IS (the extremist group Islamic State), have joined IS or supported others doing so," said Peter Bergen, director of the International Security Program of New American Foundation in his hearing at the Senate Homeland Security Committee.

Among the 62 individuals identified by his organization, Bergen said though they tended to be young with an average age of 25, no particular ethnic profile could sum them up.

"One of the fundamental challenges facing law enforcement about ferreting out which Americans are being drawn to the Syrian conflict is that they fit no profile," according to a written statement submitted earlier by Bergen to the committee.

They are Caucasian, Somali-American, Vietnamese-American, Bosnian-American, and Arab-American, among other ethnicities and nationalities, the statement revealed.

Though the majority of those involved are male, Bergen underscored an "unprecedented number" of women -- more than one in five of the 62 individuals -- involved in Syria-related militant activity.

Meanwhile, Bergen said homegrown lone-wolf attacks with no direct connection to the terrorist groups in Syria pose "a more immediate challenge" than attacks by returning fighters from Syria.

Bergen's remarks echoed words by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation Director James Comey in last September when referring to the arrest of Terry Loewen in December, 2013, who was then accused of plotting an attack on Wichita Airport in Kansas.

"We have made it hard for people to get into this country, bad guys, but they can enter as a photon and radicalize somebody in Wichita, Kansas," Comey said.

According to Washington-based think tank the Brookings Institute, Twitter accounts from the United States make up the fourth largest group sending pro-IS messages on the social media outlet. Endite