Pressy Obama acknowledges Americans' fear of terrorism but vows to overcome threat

President Barack
Obama vowed on Sunday to hunt down anyone
plotting militant attacks against the United States
as he sought to reassure Americans after a
deadly California shooting rampage that has
raised new questions about U.S. defenses against
homegrown extremism.
In a rare Oval Office address, Obama tried to
counter mounting criticism he has not acted
decisively enough to keep the United States safe
from the Islamic State militant group, but he
stopped short of offering any major shift in his
strategy.
"The threat from terrorism is real but we will
overcome it," Obama said in a nationally televised
speech.
Obama spoke just four days after U.S.-born Syed
Rizwan Farook, 28, and his Pakistani wife,
Tashfeen Malik, 29, opened fire on a holiday party
for civil servants in San Bernardino, California,
killing 14 people. The pair were killed hours later
in a shootout with police.
Obama condemned the attack as "an act of
terrorism designed to kill innocent people," but
also called it a "new phase" in the fight against
Islamist militancy.
The FBI is investigating the paramilitary-style
attack as inspired by Islamic State, which
controls swaths of Syria and Iraq and has shown
an expanded reach beyond its Middle East
strongholds, including complicity in the Nov. 13
assaults in Paris that killed 130 people.
But Obama said there was no evidence the
assault was directed by a militant group overseas
or part of a broader conspiracy at home.
The Obama administration plans to seek greater
cooperation from U.S. technology companies to
help ferret out such apparently homegrown attack
plots, which could rekindle a privacy-versus-
security debate between the government and
Silicon Valley.
Even so, Obama cautioned against over reaction
to the terrorism threat at home.
"We cannot turn against each other by letting this
fight be defined as a war between America and
Islam," he said, alluding to the incendiary rhetoric
by Republican presidential candidates like Donald
Trump, which is seen by critics as fear-mongering
against the Muslim community.
Given that the California couple were not on the
U.S. national security radar before they launched
their shooting spree on Wednesday, Obama faced
the challenge of convincing the U.S. public he is
doing everything possible to deal with an evolving
militant threat.
There was mounting evidence that the pair were
“lone wolf” assailants who may have become
radicalized by Islamic State propaganda and then
acted independently, making it all the more
difficult for authorities to track them.
Obama’s address came amid growing pressure
from Republicans and even some Democrats for a
tougher response to Islamic State now that the
San Bernardino shootings have raised fears
among Americans about the threat of more
attacks at home.
Last week's massacre, if proven to be linked to
or motivated by foreign Islamist militancy, would
be the deadliest such incident on U.S. soil on
Obama’s watch and since the Sept. 11, 2001,
attacks on New York and Washington.