NYC Syrian community leader: “In Syria, there’s no such thing. So when they tell you that [the refugees] are vetted, are you out of your mind?” he said."

Syrian community leader: ISIS is already in America

By Reuven Fenton and Bruce Golding

November 19, 2015 | 1:21am

Modal Trigger

Aarafat "Ralph" Succar Photo: Gabriella Bass

A leader of New York City’s Syrian community told The Post on Wednesday that ISIS terrorists have “absolutely” sneaked into America by posing as civil-war refugees — and joined sleeper cells just waiting to be activated.

“I believe the terrorists from Syria have been coming into the United States, not only in the past few years, but way before that,” said Aarafat “Ralph” Succar of Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, home of the city’s largest enclave of Syrian immigrants. “I think they’re already at work.”

Succar, a member of the Bay Ridge Community Council, said corruption in his homeland is so rampant that anyone could easily pay bribes and obtain official identification papers bearing a fake name to disguise their real identity.

“You can go to the Syrian government today and say to them, ‘I need a piece of paper that says I’m Tony Caterpillar.’ And they give it to you,” he said.

“These are not forged documents. These are written out by a government employee who needs money, whose family has no food.”

Succar, 57, who immigrated to the United States when he was 10, also noted that “Third World countries, particularly places like Syria, do not have the network of information the United States has.”

“In Syria, there’s no such thing. So when they tell you that [the refugees] are vetted, are you out of your mind?” he said.

Meanwhile, officials in Honduras said Wednesday that five Syrian nationals headed for the United States had been caught with fraudulent ID papers in the capital city of Tegucigalpa, Reuters reported.

The men were detained late Tuesday after arriving from Costa Rica when authorities discovered their Greek passports had been stolen and doctored to replace the photos with pictures of the Syrians.

Mayor Bill de Blasio said Wednesday that “a grand total of eight” Syrian refugees had settled in the city as part of an official State Department program, and City Hall later lowered that number to four, blaming the information mixup on the feds.