The civil war in Syria has become a matter of US homeland security over concerns that “a small number of Americans” have gone to fight with Syrian rebels and returned home, the new US Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said Friday, in his first speech since taking office last year. The estimated 7,000 foreigners from 50 countries fighting in the bloody war include those from the United States, Canada and Europe, he said. Last month, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper told the Senate Intelligence Committee that al-Qaeda groups in Syria have set up camps "to train people to go back to their countries.” Johnson added that Westerners are being recruited and indoctrinated in Syria to carry out “extremist missions” on their return home.