ISIS Won’t Resist Israel in Syria

Background

In 2005 the CIA intercepted a letter from Ayman al Zawahiri  — bin Laden’s then-designated leader of al Qaeda — imprisoned at that time in Tora prison, Egypt; the letter sent to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in Iraq.

Zarqawi was fighting in Iraq versus the US occupation there, and Zarqawi led the battle versus Shi’ites in Iraq as well, who he considered to be apostates thus sentenced to death. (Zarqawi was killed by the US in June, 2006)

al Zawahiri’s letter regarded policy. In essence, he said Zarqawi was ‘disobeying orders’ by targeting Muslims instead of Americans. al Zawahiri’s letter ordered Zarqawi to prioritize attacks on Americans first, and to drive the Americans out of Iraq. Then, to establish the Caliphate after the Americans have been expelled from Iraq, and extend the Caliphate to neighboring countries — like Syria. And finally to “clash with Israel” since Israel was established to defeat an Islamic state. (According to al Zawahiri. Reference: https://irp.fas.org/news/2005/10/letter_in_english.pdf )

The CIA has not released anything about how al Zarqawi reacted to Zawahri’s policy letter of 2005. (If the CIA did release anything, its synopsis would either be incorrect or a lie. -ed.) It is known that Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, successor leader after Zarqawi’s assassination by the US, took exception to the letter. Beyond establishment of the “caliphate”, both Zarqawi and al-Baghdadi largely ignored the demand that al Qaeda in Iraq must prioritize attacks on US troops occupying Iraq, instead of attacks versus local people.

Likewise, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was certainly influenced by George W Bush’s “redirection” policy  too, as documented by Seymour Hersh in his article in the New Yorker.  Essentially this policy led to the split between al Qaeda and what is now called ISIS (sometimes DAESH). To over-simplify, the split set Muslim-versus-Muslim instead of ISIS versus the US and Israel, by funneling money and arms to ISIS with the CIA directly or indirectly supporting the most vocal jihadis, advocating violence versus one sect or another, at the local level.

[Somewhat beyond scope, this policy truly began with the CIA and Elliott Abrams as Deputy National Security Advisor during the Bush 2 regime, which saw the destruction of Nahr el Barad camp (2006)  in Lebanon as the prototype for this redirection policy. Yarmouk Palestinian camp near Damascus followed later, with the US destabilization of Syria from 2011] [1]

Point being that the major split between al Qaeda and ISIS was in part based on ISIS resistance to attacking the US and its proxy Israel, where ISIS instead focused on local attacks versus local people who did not subscribe to the Caliphate, and/or potential rule by ISIS. While such a group may be doomed to fail under most circumstances, ISIS succeeded because it was well-funded and encouraged in its operations by the US, Israel, and Turkiye.

Although Israel is particularly adept at clandestinely funding terror operations, it is believed that US funding to the Ukraine also contributed to keeping ISIS well-heeled in its Idlib and Levant period of dormancy.

For this reason, essentially bribery — and not ideological, unless ISIS’s hatred for the Shi’ites is considered — ISIS has no reason to attack US troops or Israel. And Turkiye discovered that bribery of ISIS to be very useful in keeping these terrorists out of Turkiye, and challenging the PKK (where necessary) instead. Once again, it’s about the ‘benjamins’, and perhaps that is why we hear no more about “the caliphate” now?

Relevance To Today

Somewhat like the US ‘redirection’ policy itself, only the terminal pollution of the western collective media information space could transform Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s protege, ABU MOHAMMED AL-JAWLANI, into being a hero of Syria and a best hope for ‘western democracy’.

ABU MOHAMMED AL-JAWLANI is the understudy of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and
according to the United Nations Security Council

Abu Mohammed al-Jawlani was listed on 24 July 2013 pursuant to paragraphs 2 and 3 of resolution 2083 (2012) as being associated with Al-Qaida and other individuals, groups, undertakings or entities associated with Al-Qaida for “participating in the financing, planning, facilitating, preparing, or perpetrating of acts or activities by, in conjunction with, under the name of, on behalf of, or in support of”, “supplying, selling or transferring arms and related materiel to”, and “Recruiting for” Al-Qaida (QDe.004), Al-Qaida in Iraq (QDe.115), Aiman Muhammed Rabi al-Zawahiri (QDi.006), and Ibrahim Awwad Ibrahim Ali Al-Badri Al-Samarrai (QDi.299).

and:

The formation of Jabhat al-Nusrah, featuring Abu Mohammed al-Jawlani, was announced on 23 January 2012. Abu Mohammed stated that the group consisted of fighters from the Near East.

For the west to rehabilitate such a terrorist leader in Syria is somewhat like CNN claiming that perhaps Charles Manson was not such a bad guy after all, and merely misunderstood. (And maybe CNN did say that?) Well, that’s just what the Empire of Lies says and does.

Right now in Syria, Israel is making hay and doing what it always does: bombing and destroying anything that it can bomb and destroy. With the aid of bombs and weapons given happily to Israel by US MMT and its taxpayers, of course. Will the reformed DEI ISIS gay blades (in the traditional sense) of what was Jabhat al-Nusrah, lift a finger to halt Greater Israel’s advance and the destruction of their country? Of course not.

For one thing, most ISIS fighters from the terror stronghold of Idlib province are not Syrian. Many have been imported by Turkiye, AMAN, and the CIA from Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia. These include Jaish al-Muhajireen wal-Ansar, the Caucasus Emirate, Junud al-Sham and Ajnad al-Kavkaz, or just about any other thoroughly debauched terror group that can be conjured or imagined by the former United States, Israel, and Turkiye.

The question is now: How will al Jawlani organize and contain these western-sponsored terror groups to form a government, and a military? I’ll submit that Syria has ceased to exist as a sovereign state. And now that the US/Israel have achieved their goal to create a failed state in Syria, how will the US and Israel maintain that failure going forward? If past performance in Libya and Iraq may be any indication of future performance, they don’t need to.

Only to turn their ISIS terrorists against Iran now… and there, of course, is the rub.

[1] Elliott Abrams is a senior fellow for Middle Eastern studies at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) in Washington, D.C.

Steve Brown