The Obama administration's confused and weak foreign policy is paving the way for terrorism to flourish, according to Pete Hoekstra, former chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.
"We now are seeing a resurgent al-Qaida, a resurgent Islamist movement. They see America as weak. They are training and people are participating in Syria, other parts of the world," Hoekstra told "The Steve Malzberg Show" on Newsmax TV.
"They're participants; they're fighting with al-Qaida and radical jihadists. They're from the West, they're from Europe, they're from Canada, and, yes, they're from the United States. They're going to come back and we are growing this problem.
"This problem is not diminishing under this president. It is growing by leaps and bounds."
He said Americans should be outraged by the "mess" being created by the White House on the world scene.
"Our friends no longer trust us, we've lost Egypt, Israel is beside itself – they're alone. It appears their only ally now in the Middle East is Saudi Arabia. How does this happen?" he said.
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Hoekstra said the United States is perceived as no longer knowing who its friends and enemies are.
"This goes all the way back to early on when Obama moved into the White House. Remember the Green Revolution in 2009?" he said, referring to the massive anti-regime protests in Iran when then-incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad claimed an election victory over his main opponent.
"The people go to the streets [and] whose side are we are we on? We're on the side of the regime," he said.
A similar siding occurred in Cairo during the overthrow of President Hosni Mubarak, a longtime U.S. ally, according to Hoekstra.
"The people go to the streets in Egypt, whose side are we on, we're on the side of the Muslim Brotherhood who's overthrowing Mubarak, someone who has been an ally for 20 to 30 years."
He said that in Libya, the U.S. has allied with jihadists in the past.
"A lot of folks we don't know who ended up attacking us in Benghazi and then this week we hear, oh, by the way, we're negotiating with the Islamists in Syria," he said.
"Then it's like, wait a minute, don't you understand the Islamists in Syria, they're the ones that attacked us, or their friends are the ones that attacked us in Benghazi, killed Americans?"
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