As the threat of Islamic State in Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS) looms large not only in the Middle East, but also in India, an Israeli intelligence assessment has punched holes in the American strategy in containing the terrorist organisation. A 80-page study conducted by the Tel Aviv-based Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorist Information Centre believes that both declared and undeclared political and military objectives of the US against ISIS seem unrealistic and suffers from a series of weaknesses. These comments are yet another sign that relations between the Barack Obama and Benjamin Netanyahu governments have moved toward a full-blown crisis over many issues from the US roping in Iran to fight the ISIS, its stand against new Jewish settlements in Palestine and other issues. Israel happens to be an important partner of Prime Minister Narendra Modi led government to counter threats of terrorist organisations particularly the ISIS.
"There are limits to what military force can achieve against jihadi organisations in general and ISIS in particular, the local forces in Syria and Iraq that America is counting on are weak; and the coalition is heterogeneous, composed of countries with different interests and internal constraints that are liable to make it difficult for them to provide the United States with effective support," says the intelligence assessment.
Israel known for a hard state believing in military arm, surprisingly maintains that an inherent weaknesses in the American strategy was to trust that military actions, limited or even extensive can change societal and political situation in Syria and Iraq. "This is because the ISIS and other Salafirst-jihadi terrorist organisations arose form chaos in security and the societal and political disintegration of Syria and Iraq, and because of the drastic changes caused by the regional upheaval," reports the study. It charges the US taking the impossible task without draining the swamp. "Rooting out ISIS will be impossible until the swamp has been drained, and that is currently not on the horizon," the study laments.
The swamp and the flashpoints, the Israeli strategists believe are the flashpoints including tensions, schisms and hostility amongst various ethnic, religious and tribal groups, especially between the Sunnis and Shi"ites, the political weakness of the nation states created and forced upon the region by the French and British after the First World War, the loss of key states and their inability go govern.
The assessment concludes that only if the US exploits the inherent weaknesses within the ISIS, its campaign may have positive results. But said it doesn't expect President Obama to traverse that path. The campaign, it said, will also depend on the way the US and its allies deal with the foreign fighters who return to their countries of origin. And also how long the America takes military, economic and political campaign with determination. "It may eventually weaken, although not destroy the ISIS and its spread throughout Syria and Iraq may be halted," says the Israeli assessment.
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