America has grown increasingly concerned about the rising threat of the Islamic State (ISIL) as recent polls and election campaigns suggest that national security and the war against terrorism issues may be motivating factors for voters to head to upcoming polls in November.

According to an international CNN/ORC poll published last week, most Americans are in favor of military action against the ISIL.

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Additionally, National Republican Congressional Committee's (NRCC) ad campaigns in the past week have begun to target Democrats on national security and terrorism issues.

The campaign targets Rep. Dan Maffei of New York, Rick Nolan of Minnesota and candidate Staci Appel of Iowa through the use of ISIL imagery and alleges the candidates' policies on addressing the terrorist threat are too weak.

It's still too early to discern whether the issue of national security has overtaken the U.S. economy as 2014's top voter concern, but poll results make it hard to exclude the issue in political campaigns, said NRCC Chairman Greg Walden (R. -Oregon) on Friday during a roundtable at The Christian Science Monitor.

Based on the CNN poll, seven in 10 Americans believe ISIL has sufficient capabilities to launch an attack against the country, even as President Barack Obama said last week that there is no "immediate intelligence" to back claims the group is a U.S. threat.

The poll also showed 14 percent of Americans ranked terrorism as the nation's most important problem, up three percent from September 2010 and second only to the 30 percent who ranked the economy as the U.S.' most pressing problem today.

A separate NBC/WSJ poll found that close to 50 percent of respondents felt the country was less safe compared to before the Sept. 11 attacks, up 27 percent a year after the twin towers fell in September 2002.

Perhaps, the most compelling factor driving America's awareness of the growing terrorist threat is the gruesome beheading the two American journalists, CNN relayed.

"The beheadings are so chilling to the American public," said Democratic researcher Peter Hart of Hart Research.

Ninety-four percent of Americans have knowledge the beheaded journalists, a record-breaking number compared to other news events polled by NBC/WSJ in the last five years.

But despite all this, majority of Americans (61-38 percent) are still against sending U.S. combat troops in Iraq and Syria.

TagsNovember elections, ISIL, ISIS, CNN/ORC poll, NBC/WSJ poll, NRCC, Dan Maffei, Rick Nolan, Staci Appel, Greg Walden