Judge Jeanine Pirro: The week 19-year-od Shannon Conley pled guilty to offering to assist extremists in Syria. What's the attraction? With me Investigative Project founder Steve Emerson. Good evening Steve. What is the attraction for young American women to get involved in this kind of extremist terrorism?
Steve Emerson: Actually it's been going on for years since 9/11. There probably have been at least a dozen young or middle aged white women converts who tried to volunteer for either al Qaeda or other radical Islamic groups, the latest being ISIS or al-Nusra. The allure is actually action or men who have sort of lured them, attracted them to the notion that they're gonna have a great life ahead of them. This one in particular got engaged to an ISIS man online. So maybe we should start an ISIS dating service online.
Judge Jeanine: ISIS.com! Oh Steve, what about the fact that last night we actually talked about John Kerry, Secretary of State, saying you know we've got nine nations with us. Today, there's 40 of them. Did something change overnight that I missed or is somebody kind of expanding or puffing a bit?
Emerson: You know what it reminds me of, the Jon Lovitz character from Saturday Night Live years ago who just changed his line every two minutes. He can't name those countries because they would deny it. In particular none of those countries will admit to the fact that they will support the United States. None of the Arab countries will say anything about what they will contribute. At most they will say that they morally support the notion that ISIS should be defeated. But in terms of practical support none of them will say [exactly what] they're contributing military material support. None of them will say that they are actually providing troops on the ground. None of them [have said] that they are in the [military] alliance themselves. So the notion that there is this coalition of Arab states [ ready to send ground troops] is absolutely ludicrous, and he can't name them because he won't go on the record saying… [what] they [will] support the U.S. [with].
Judge Jeanine: What's interesting is that he said they've agreed to contribute to the fight, 40 of these nations, against the militants but it remains unclear which countries are gonna do what. But you know it is in the interest of most of these Arab nations, Muslim or not, to join in the fight against ISIS. But the fact that they're not willing to openly says to me that maybe they don't trust us or they don't think we're gonna follow through. What does it say to you?
Emerson: Well I think that the Ambassador [John Bolton] was right just now [in saying] that they're hedging their bets. Look, ISIS' second agenda besides consolidating a territory as a real caliphate and a state with borders is to then take over… the Levant. Take over the other states – Saudi Arabia, Jordan. And these states are scared out of their minds that their own population, mostly Sunnis, are going to be sympathetic to ISIS and rebel against their elites. So at this point when Obama says he's going to take a three year plan, a slow-delivered process, these countries do not want to ally themselves with a plan that's going to see themselves sucked under in which they [fear they] will basically be overthrown. They want a plan in which ISIS will be destroyed within six months. There's no reason in the world why the United States is not embarking on an aggressive, immediate strategy to destroy ISIS within three to six months. We have the ability to do so, and if that were announced I can guarantee you the Arab states would have the confidence to ally themselves with the United States.
Judge Jeanine: Steve, quickly before we go to break, if they keep killing Americans I don't care who's with us, we should go after them. Am I wrong?
Emerson: No, there's no doubt we should go after them. I sort of feel like the President is sort of putting his finger in the air feeling which way the wind is blowing. You know there is the problem of leadership here. The President needs to look at what happened in WW2. Winston Churchill was really a demonstration of a man who was a world leader. He didn't care about what popular opinion was in London or in Britain during the Blitz and everything. He said we have to fight against the Nazis. We need a leader like that in the United States today.
Judge Jeanine: Blood, tears, toil and sweat. Steve Emerson, thanks so much for being with us this evening.
Emerson: You bet.