Obama Set to Attack IS militants in Syria

Expanding the campaign against the Islamic State into new terrain, President Barack Obama is set to authorize U.S. military airstrikes in Syria, a senior administration official saidTuesday.

Sources said that President Obama is not considering taking formal congressional approval for the move.

The Sunni militant group, the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, considers Syria as a safe haven.  The Obama administration is seeking to block foreign fighters from entering Syria and Iraq, to provide more aid to the moderate branches among the Syrian rebels and to expand the airstrikes in the war-torn region, Bloomberg reports.

However, the U.S. President is still trying to figure out a reasonable solution to a number of challenges, which include how to train and equip a proper ground force to fight ISIS in Syria, how to take part in the operation to oust the jihadist group without providing any aid to Syria's President Bashar al-Assad, and how to make potentially reluctant partners like Turkey and Saudi Arabia join the campaign, the New York Times reports.

President Obama will explain to Americans his strategy for "degrading and ultimately destroying the terrorist group," in an address set to take place Wednesday evening, a statement from the White House said.

The President met a group of foreign policy experts Sept. 8 and over dinner discussed his plans to counter the terrorists. He stated that he had the authority to attack ISIS in both the countries - Iraq as well as Syria - so as to protect the U.S. national security, the Washington Post reports.

"They know that Syria has to be a piece of the plan," said Jane Harman, former House Intelligence Chairman, who participated in the meeting. "He's seriously considering all options."