Despite Trump swipe, Islamic State likely prefers guns to knives

Aamer Madhani | USA TODAY

When President Trump took a swipe at gun control advocates following last week's deadly van-and-knife attack in London, he appeared to be trying to make the point that terrorists will find other means if they don’t have access to guns.

"Do you notice we are not having a gun debate right now? That's because they used knives and a truck!" Trump offered on Twitter.

Lost in Trump’s criticism is the fact that on U.S. soil, firearms are most frequently used in mass killings and have played a major role in some of the deadliest foreign-inspired terror attacks in recent years.

From 2006 to 2016, there were at least 247 mass killings in the United States in which a gun was the primary weapon used in the crime, according to USA TODAY’s database on mass killings in the United States. A mass killing is typically defined as a single incident in which four or more victims are killed.

Do you notice we are not having a gun debate right now? That's because they used knives and a truck! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 4, 2017

On average, 5.24 people were killed in each of those mass killing incidents in which a gun was used — the deadliest being the June 2016 terror attack on an Orlando nightclub by a single gunman who investigators say had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State. The incident in Orlando left 49 dead and scores wounded. In fact, there have been at least 20 mass killings using guns over the last decade in which at least eight people have been fatally shot.

Those deadly attacks included the December 2015 attack on a San Bernardino, Calif.-holiday party by a radicalized Muslim couple that left 14 dead and the 2009 shooting rampage at Fort Hood, Texas, by an Army officer who had been communicating with an Al Qaeda operative that left 13 dead and dozens more wounded.

There were only 28 mass casualty incidents during the same period in which the primary method of killing was stabbing, according to USA TODAY’s database. An average of 4.45 people were killed in those incidents — with the deadliest incidents, on three different occasions, leaving six people dead.

In her own Twitter post, former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, who was severely wounded in 2011 attack and went on to become a gun control advocate, pushed back against the president by pointing to the sobering number of Americans killed by suicide or homicide every day.

“Mr. President, every day we are having a gun debate because every day 90 people in our country die from gun violence. Many of them are kids,” Giffords, a former Democratic lawmaker from Arizona, noted.

Mr. President, every day we are having a gun debate because every day 90 people in our country die from gun violence. Many of them are kids. https://t.co/Pv6z2ILKl1 — Gabrielle Giffords (@GabbyGiffords) June 4, 2017

The vast majority of mass killings in the U.S. are related to domestic or family violence. The nation experienced another such one of these incidents on Monday, when a disgruntled former employee returned to an Orlando RV accessory business Monday and fatally shot five people before killing himself. Trump has not commented about the latest incident of workplace violence.

4) We must demand our lawmakers pass common sense gun laws that have been proven to save American lives. — Shannon Watts (@shannonrwatts) June 5, 2017

“Let's start that gun debate,” said Shannon Watts, the founder of the gun control advocacy group Moms Demand Action, after the Orlando business shooting. "Americans should be able to go to work, a nightclub, or the movies without the very real threat of gun violence. This isn't freedom."

To be certain, the Islamic State has encouraged radicalized members in the West to use whatever means they may have to carry out attacks on Western soil that require little technical expertise, such as the truck-and-knife attack near London Bridge on Saturday.

In April, an Uzbek man was charged for ramming a truck into a crowd in Stockholm, killing four. In December, a Tunisian-born resident of France plowed his truck into a Berlin Christmas market, killing 12 and injuring dozens more. Weeks before that attack, a Somali-born student at the Ohio State University rammed a car into a crowd of people near campus before attacking them with a butcher knife. He was killed by a police officer, but not before injuring 11.

In Nice, France, a truck driver ran over dozens of people, killing 86, on the city’s promenade Bastille Day celebrations last July. The Islamic State has been tied to or claimed responsibility for all four attacks.

But there also signs that the Islamic State has pushed its sympathizers in the United States to consider guns for carrying out attacks.

In the most recent issue of its propaganda magazine, the Islamic State encouraged recruits in the United States to take advantage of the so-called gun show loophole that allows people in the U.S. to buy firearms with minimal vetting.

“The acquisition of firearms can be very simple depending on one’s geographical location,” according to the recruitment article. “In most U.S. states, anything from a single-shot shotgun all the way up to a semi-automatic AR-15 rifle can be purchased at showrooms or through online sales — by way of private dealers — with no background checks, and without requiring either an ID or a gun license.”