Another Mistake at Israel’s Expense

Secretary of State John Kerry has linked the growth of the Islamic State to Israel’s policy in order to recruit Arab nations to fight the Islamic State group and pressure Jerusalem into reaching a compromise with the Palestinians. This move will actually fortify the authority’s position.

The U.S. State Department’s deputy spokesperson published a denial, according to which Secretary of State John Kerry did not link Israel to the growth of the Islamic State group. It was a routine and required diplomatic step. However, this denial cannot repair the tremendous damage Kerry's words caused last Thursday. While the junior spokesperson made the denial laconically and hastily, Kerry’s words were spoken on record to the cameras, and moreover, they were read out from text, which was worded and thought out in advance.

If Kerry the politician wanted to please the large audience that filled the events hall on the top story of the Department of State building in Washington, then, he succeeded in doing so. This audience was made up of the leaders of the U.S. Muslim public, who were vigorously nodding in agreement as Kerry stood proudly at the podium throughout his speech.

There may have been a political purpose to his words — arousing the sympathy and support of Muslim and Arab nations for more aggressive American military steps against Islamic extremists in the Middle East. So far, U.S.-led coalition forces have failed to stop the expansion of the Islamic State group in the Middle East and the al-Qaida branches deep in Africa. According to American military expert evaluations, it will not be possible to defeat the Islamic State group without the use of ground forces, which will cause an inevitable rise in civilian casualties.

It could be that Secretary of State Kerry, who has cast all of his sights into solving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, actually wanted to increase the pressure on Israel. Kerry is concerned that the Israeli political leadership is exploiting the diversion of the world’s attention to the Islamic State group in order to avoid a peace process with the Palestinians.

Whether he intended to or not, Kerry linked the terrorism of the Islamic State group and Islamic extremism in the Middle East to Israel and the Palestinian issue, and is completely disregarding the main reason for violence and terrorism in the Middle East and beyond, which are a result of extremist Islamic ideology. Islamic terrorist organizations are abusing the despair within Arab society, which has been suffering under faltering dictatorships that do not allow hope for a better future.

Providing publicity for such a distortion of reality is dangerous and harmful with the tailwind it provides for Islamic State group terrorism, and with the excuse it provides for leaders in the area to avoid painful and real reforms. If Kerry meant to pressure Israel into being more flexible with the Palestinians in order to achieve a political breakthrough, then, his words have only served to fortify the Palestinians’ tough and uncompromising positions.

The leaders of the American Muslim public are precisely the audience to whom Kerry ought to have repeated President Obama’s words at the United Nations General Assembly last month: “The situation in Iraq, Syria and Libya should cure anyone of the illusion that this [the Israeli-Arab] conflict is the main source of problems in the region.”