The Trump administration has warned of Iranian \u201csleeper cells\u201d operating in America as the United States braces for Tehran\u2019s response to strikes on three of its nuclear sites over the weekend.<\/p>\n
Sleeper cells generally refer to foreign agents who lie low, going about their seemingly normal daily life, until called on to carry out a mission or attack. <\/p>\n
NBC News reported that Iran sent a communique to President Trump in the days before the strikes threatening sleeper-cell terrorist attacks inside the U.S. in retaliation. <\/p>\n
Former national security and defense officials say the threat should be taken seriously, even if it\u2019s less likely than other forms of Iranian retaliation<\/a>. <\/p>\n \u201cLook, they operate that way, not just in the United States, but around the world,\u201d former Defense secretary and CIA chief Leon Panetta told CNN earlier this week. \u201cThat\u2019s something that Iran is very capable of and has shown that it can do that in other areas.\u201d<\/p>\n Retired Gen. Wesley Clark told MSNBC he believed Iranian agents in the U.S. could \u201cself-activate\u201d in response to American bombings, potentially seeking to murder certain officials or blow up the electric grid. <\/p>\n However, he said there was a \u201clow probability\u201d of such attacks, and that an Iran-linked militia attacking U.S. troops in the Middle East was more likely. <\/p>\n Javed Ali, a former counterterrorism director at the National Security Council during Trump\u2019s first term, said Iran had little to gain from any direct attacks on the U.S. <\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t think we\u2019re in a threat window where Iran is going to respond against the United States anywhere. I just think it would be completely counterproductive to the position that they\u2019re in,\u201d he said, citing the fragile ceasefire<\/a> between Iran and Israel.<\/p>\n Bruce Hoffman, a Georgetown professor and former executive of the RAND Corporation, said cyberattacks linked to Iran were an \u201comnipresent threat \u2026 that probably has become sharpened in the past week,\u201d while a lone wolf attack was the \u201cpreeminent threat.\u201d<\/p>\n The Department of Homeland Security warned Sunday<\/a> that American networks could face low-level cyberattacks by either Tehran-affiliated or pro-Iran independent hackers. Iran-aligned hackers took credit<\/a> for an attack over the weekend on Truth Social, Trump\u2019s social media network.<\/p>\n The threat posed by Iran on American soil has been a recurring issue as tensions with Tehran rise and fall. <\/p>\n The U.S. has accused Iranian individuals of plots to kill Trump, his former national security adviser John Bolton and former Secretary or State Mike Pompeo. <\/p>\n In 2011, authorities foiled a plan<\/a> to kill Saudi Arabia\u2019s then-ambassador to the United States using a bomb in Georgetown\u2019s Cafe Milano. Manssor Arbabsiar, an Iranian American used car salesman, was allegedly recruited by his cousin, a senior official in Iran\u2019s Quds Force. But the plan fell apart after Arbabsiar attempted to partner with a Mexican drug cartel member who was actually a federal informant. <\/p>\n \u201cAmateurish on the one hand, but at the same time, that\u2019s a chilling determination. That would have been a major terrorist incident,\u201d said Hoffman.<\/p>\n \u201cTime and time again, it seemed like the people who were given the task to carry out those types of missions here were not professionals,\u201d said Ali. <\/p>\n The Trump administration has linked it\u2019s latest warnings to former President Biden\u2019s immigration policies, suggesting would-be Iranian terrorists were allowed to cross the border. <\/p>\n \u201cI think it\u2019s a real threat<\/a>,\u201d said Interior Secretary Doug Burgum of sleeper cells Wednesday on Fox News.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is just a carryover of the disastrous open border policies of Joe Biden,\u201d he added. <\/p>\n A memo sent Saturday from Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Rodney Scott, obtained by The Hill\u2019s sister network NewsNation, said \u201cthousands of Iranian nationals have been documented entering the United States illegally and countless more were likely in the known and unknown got-a-ways.\u201d <\/p>\n \u201cThough we have not received any specific credible threats to share with you all currently, the threat of sleeper cells or sympathizers acting on their own, or at the behest of Iran has never been higher,\u201d Scott added.<\/p>\n During a Senate hearing Wednesday, Attorney General Pam Bondi sidestepped a question<\/a> from Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-La.) about whether Iran had sleeper cells in the United States.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have thus far arrested 1,500 illegal Iranians in our country,\u201d Bondi said after a pause. \u201cThat is something that I would like to talk about in a classified setting.\u201d<\/p>\n