This week, ISIS (the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria), also known as ISIL, IS, or Daesh, has reappeared in the headlines following the killing of two Iowa National Guardsman—Sgt. Edgar Brian Torres-Tovar and Sgt. William Nathaniel Howard—in an ISIS airstrike in Palmyra, Syria. These two American men are only the latest of the over 40,000 soldiers, from numerous different nations, who have lost their lives in the war against ISIS—a war which America’s supposed greatest ally against terrorism, Israel, has not assisted.
The AIPAC website proudly proclaims that Israel is an “Indispensable Ally” against terrorism; and indeed, the Trump administration has continued funding the Israeli government at massive expense, including a $4 billion dollar military aid package earlier this year.
Just this last week, a Newsweek Opinion author insisted that the United States must continue to support Israel, claiming:
Instability around Israel does not stay local. It affects energy markets, counterterrorism efforts, nuclear proliferation, regional power balances and American credibility worldwide. A weakened Israel would invite wider conflict and embolden adversaries far beyond the region. Supporting Israel is not about subsidizing complacency. It is about preventing dangerous chain reactions in one of the world’s most volatile regions.
A similar opinion piece in the New York Times bemoaned the breakdown of American support for Israel, claiming that Israel and the United States have been natural allies in the fight against “radical Islam.” But is this true? Are these calls by regime media for a closer military relationship with Israel to stop terrorism based in fact? In fact, why does ISIS still have a presence in Syria at all?
Israel: The Greatest Ally of Jihadists
The Israeli government supported al-Qaeda and the notorious al-Qaeda breakoff/ISIS affiliate al-Nusra Front in Syria during the Syrian Civil War—long after both groups had been designated Foreign Terrorist Organizations by the United States. The purpose of this alliance was to counter Iranian influence in the region, which both Israel’s government and the terrorists saw as an enemy.
In spring of 2015, journalists at the Wall Street Journal revealed that Israel had been treating wounded al-Qaeda and al-Nusra fighters. Further investigation revealed that Israel had been clandestinely funding, arming, and providing logistics to these and other Islamist terrorist groups, going as far as to pay the salaries of the terrorist commanders. One of these commanders spoke candidly in an interview to a WSJ reporter:
“Israel stood by our side in a heroic way,” said Moatasem al-Golani, spokesman for the rebel group Fursan al-Joulan, or Knights of the Golan. “We wouldn’t have survived without Israel’s assistance.”
The most infamous group that Israel supported during this era was the al-Nusra Front—a violent ISIS affiliate, provably connected to dozens of mass killings and led by warlord, and new Syria President, Abu Mohammad al-Julani. Julani is not a member of ISIS today, however, the current dispute with ISIS is personal rather than ideological. Julani was close a close friend and ally of ISIS commander Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in the early 2010s and their respective groups shared weapons and supplies and often fought together, including an incident in 2013, where ISIS and al-Nusra forces worked together on a campaign of terror against Kurdish civilians in northern Syria. The two men later had a falling out over personal ambitions leading to a formal split between ISIS and al-Nusra Front.
However, Israel’s relationship to ISIS goes far beyond a strategic military alliance. Israel was—during the height of the ISIS caliphate—the largest buyer of oil from ISIS’s captured oil wells in Syria and Iraq, purchasing billions of dollars’ worth of stolen oil from the terrorist state through a network of oil brokers. Curiously, neither OFAC nor the State Department considered economic sanctions on Israeli oil brokers for funding the most dangerous terrorist group in the region.
But Israeli support for ISIS goes beyond funding and arming. During the mid-2010s, pro-Likud Party Israeli military experts and think tanks downplayed the threat of ISIS and urged the United States to dial back its war against ISIS in Iraq and Syria, all while ISIS militants rampaged around Levant waging a campaign of mass murder against Christians, Shiite Muslims, Druze, Alawites, and Yazidis. This friendly posture towards ISIS was, as before, justified as a way for Israel to combat Iran and Hezbollah.
In 2016, widely-respected Israeli foreign policy analyst Efraim Inbar wrote the following in a shockingly titled whitepaper: “The Destruction of Islamic State is a Strategic Mistake” published by the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies in Tel Aviv :
The West should seek the further weakening of Islamic State, but not its destruction. A weak but functioning IS can undermine the appeal of the caliphate among radical Muslims; keep bad actors focused on one another rather than on Western targets; and hamper Iran’s quest for regional hegemony.
Inbar went on to whitewash the threat of ISIS, writing:
It is true that IS has ignited immense passion among many young and frustrated Muslims all over the world, and the caliphate idea holds great appeal among believers. But the relevant question is what can IS do, particularly in its current situation? The terrorist activities for which it recently took responsibility were perpetrated mostly by lone wolves who declared their allegiance to IS; they were not directed from Raqqa. On its own, IS is capable of only limited damage.
Israel did not participate in the multi-national coalition that temporarily dismantled the ISIS caliphate in Iraq and Syria. The Israeli government’s support for the fight against the Islamic State amounted to reassuring words. The Israeli government did not deploy a single IDF soldier, tank, or aircraft. (There were several Israeli airstrikes during the war in southern Syria. However, these were actually aimed at Iranian targets, not ISIS, despite what reporting at the time claimed).
In late 2016, the former Head of Policy Planning at Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Eran Etzion admitted:
Israel and ISIS have both—perhaps surprisingly—demonstrated high levels of restraint toward one another. Israel is not part of the international coalition fighting ISIS, and the jihadist group has yet to mount any serious attack on Israel-proper. ISIS rhetoric toward Israel is also limited in volume and even less brutal in tone compared to ISIS’ other enemies, mainly Shiite Muslims and Arab regimes.
During the entirety of its existence, ISIS has attacked Israel only once—a brief skirmish in the contested Golan Heights region in 2016—after which ISIS promptly issued an apology to the IDF.
In the years since the ostensible defeat of ISIS and the death by suicide vest of ISIS commander al-Baghdadi in 2019, Israel has continued to support violent ISIS affiliate groups. Recently, Israeli journalists revealed that Netenyahu’s government has been funding and arming the Hamasha Clan—a pro-ISIS drug gang that operates in Egypt and Palestine. When asked about his support for the group, Benjamin Netenyahu replied “What’s wrong with that?”
In short, Israel is not a partner of the United States against terrorism. The Israeli government has cynically used ISIS and its affiliate groups as tools to attack its greatest enemy—Iran—and promote Netanyahu’s vision of territorial expansion into Syria.
