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Did Al-Qaeda Really Declare War On The Islamic State?
On Thursday evening, Israeli television network Channel Two’s security expert, Ronnie Daniel, reported on the stunning developments in Syria this week where Russia intervened to give a boost to the ailing regime of President Bashar Al-Assad. Daniel said that not only did Russian troops arrive in Syria to participate in the battle against Sunni opposition groups, but Iranian troops did as well.
Until now, regular troops of the Quds Force of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps were not stationed in Syria, but rather advisors who were aligned with Shiite militias, such as Hezbollah and the Syrian Army.
A source in the Israeli Defense Ministry told Daniel that the Iranian troops will help Hezbollah’s forces in the northwest and southwest of Syria in the Al-Zabadani area along the Lebanese border and the northeast of the Golan Heights. Rebel forces such as Jabhat al-Nusra which already control most of the border area with Israel on the Golan Heights have repeatedly tried to push Assad’s army and Hezbollah out of the area of the Druse village Khader on the Golan Heights, but to no avail.
Control of the strategically important area along the Israeli border is contested by various groups fighting in Syria–but especially by Hezbollah, which wants to expand its front with Israel into Syria.
After Daniel’s report about the Iranian troops built up in Syria, Channel Two reported a second scoop when the Channel’s renowned Middle East expert, Ehud Yaari, said that Al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri had called for cooperation with Islamic State in the war against the Russian and Iranian-backed Syrian dictator.
Yari showed a fragment taken from an Al Qaeda video with an audio message from Ayman al-Zawahiri that was released on Wednesday. In the audio message, Al-Zawahiri said that despite his rejection of the caliphate – that was declared by ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi last year – he acknowledged that Islamic State has made an impact ‘despite their many mistakes.’
The al-Qaeda leader then stated that he was interested in “cooperation with ISIS in the war against the crusaders, the apostates, the Alawites (Assad belongs to the Alawite sect) and the Iranians in Syria” despite the fact that he didn’t recognize the Islamic caliphate of al-Baghdadi.
Yaari explained that a coalition of Al Qaeda branch Jabhat al-Nusra and Islamic State would be a game changer that would not only be dangerous to the Assad coalition but to Israel as well. Such a coalition would bring Islamic State on Israel’s border with Syria, he warned.
Ya’ari’s report totally contradicted other media reports about the same audio message that said the Al Qaeda leader had declared war on Islamic State. British and U.S. media omitted the fragment about al-Zawahiri’s proposal for cooperation with Islamic State.
Instead, they focused on the ‘irreconcilable divide’ between the two groups and highlighted the counter-terrorism experts’ hopes that the divide between the two organizations could be an opening to exploit.
Al-Zawahiri’s criticism of Islamic State and its leader al-Baghdadi was portrayed as a declaration of war; but in fact, the al-Qaeda leader only blasted the ISIS leader for establishing the caliphate without consulting with other Muslims.
ISIS was originally the Al Qaeda branch in Iraq but split from al-Zawahiri’s organization two years ago.
Source: http://www.westernjournalism.com/did-al-qaeda-really-declare-war-on-the-islamic-state/
