While on balance I support air strikes, I feel the biggest weakness in our strategy is our refusal to confront properly the connection between ISIL's ideology and the state-sponsored Wahhabism of Saudi Arabia, one of our principal 'allies' in the region. The honourable member for Henley raised this in Parliament during
Monday night's debate on Britain's role in the Middle East:
To suggest that the existence of Israel is at the root of the entire middle east’s turbulence today is to overlook the sectarian divisions in the region that have existed for centuries. It also ignores the large part played by certain countries, most notably Saudi Arabia, that have spent billions to fund the toxic and destructive spread of Wahabist ideology across Muslim communities worldwide. It is imperative that Britain and the whole civilised world does whatever is necessary to combat that ideology and stop its spread. We need to put pressure on Saudi Arabia to stop exporting its radical ideology worldwide, despite our geopolitical alliances. I ask the Minister perhaps to write to me in reply to the question of what steps the Government will take to ensure that the Wahabist ideology does not spread further across the middle east.
Sadly his comments have not been picked up upon in any significant fashion, and I suspect that the Minister's letter will tell him to STFU lest we lose any juicy arms contracts. I fear that using the term "Da'esh" just serves further to obscure the linkage between ISIL and the religious doctrine being spread around the world with Saudi funding. This is the core issue which will have to be confronted eventually in order to stabilise and secure Western societies, and we will need the public's full understanding as we pay the economic price for doing so. Saying ISIL in Arabic doesn't remove any reference to Islam or statehood - it just tries to hide it from us, as if we are children being shielded from the truth about Santa Claus. I was very disappointed to hear the PM and successive MPs lining up to subscribe to this intellectually-bankrupt practice during this afternoon's debate.
Sam Leith, and more brutally
Rod Liddle have it about right in the Spectator blogs tonight.