By Jamal Kanj

I have read or heard countless of analysts in the last few weeks discussing the war on Islamic State (IS).

Unquestionably, putting an end to IS is a step in the right direction. But if anyone has the delusion that defeating IS militarily is the answer, I suggest they take a look at Afghanistan and Waziristan in Pakistan.

After more than a decade of war and bombardment, the “defeated” Taliban has expanded into Pakistan while Al Qaeda sprouted in Iraq, Libya and now in Syria. The killing of Bin Laden brought us Al Baghdadi, the self-proclaimed new Muslim Caliph.

The powers that helped the Taliban and Al Qaeda to fight the Soviets, and then used Israeli lies to destroy Iraq, are unqualified to put an end to IS.

Instead of air strikes, the international community must first consider drying the swamp that allows IS to flourish.

IS is the product of regional politics and foreign invasions combined with US and Western powers’ unchecked diplomatic and financial support for the “Jewish State” (JS). IS flourishes thanks to Western pandering of JS as an exceptionalist state beyond reproach, defying UN resolutions with complete impunity.

For the majority of people in the Arab and Muslim world, there is no difference between a dagger held to the neck of innocent Westerners by an IS member or a blown-up brain of a six-month-old baby by American-made JS planes.

The JS slaughter of innocents, the continued starvation diet imposed on women and children in Gaza, the appropriation of Muslim and Christian properties in the holy city of Jerusalem and land confiscation in the West Bank to benefit “Jewish only” colonies are lifelines for IS.

IS exploits peoples’ anger to recruit frustrated young men and women, aiming to establish a utopian religious state, just as the Zionists have done.

How could the West accept JS’s claim of a special covenant with a god to displace non-Jews from their homes, but deny IS the right to claim the same with their god? IS and JS are two states proclaiming monopoly over the absolute truth to justify the most abhorrent acts in the name of God.

Western support for JS while it condemns IS must stem from hypocrisy, racism or both.

While almost everyone knows about IS’s crimes and self-righteous interpretation of religion, JS’s crimes are sanitised and very few are exposed to its pretentious monopoly on God.

In the JS, the late chief rabbi Ovadi Yosef, founder of a major Israeli party, proclaimed once that Israel’s god created non-Jews for the sole purpose of serving “the People of Israel”. He went further in a religious sermon to explain that gentiles were like “one’s donkey”, they live to work and plough so a Jew can “sit like an effendi”.

About killing Palestinians, the Israeli chief rabbi said: “It is forbidden to be merciful to them. You must send missiles to them and annihilate them. They are evil and damnable.”

Explaining Hurricane Katrina in the US, Yosef blamed the disaster on African Americans’ lack of “enough Torah study”.

“Black people reside there… (God said) let’s bring a tsunami and drown them,” he said.

This is the philosophy of a highly decorated Jewish authority in JS, Talmudic scholar and a spiritual leader for the closed club of the “effendi” chosen race.

Muslim scholars have joined forces to unequivocally condemn IS acts. But where are the Jewish and Western voices to condemn JS excesses against Christian and Muslim Palestinians?

War might force IS to retreat, but the jihadists’ idea will grow for as long as the US continues supplying oxygen to regenerate bacteria in a cesspool replenished by Western double standards.

IS and JS share the same philosophy, the only difference is their point of reference.

– Jamal Kanj (www.jamalkanj.com) writes regular newspaper column and publishes on several websites on Arab world issues. He is the author of “Children of Catastrophe,” Journey from a Palestinian Refugee Camp to America. A version of this article was first published by the Gulf Daily News newspaper.