If ISIL was hoping that the horrific slaughter of the pilot Maaz Al Kassasbeh would weaken morale in Jordan, then it has vastly underestimated that country’s will. And underestimated Jordan’s allies.
Every day since Thursday, Jordan’s fighter jets have carried out air strikes against ISIL, including in its Syrian stronghold of Raqqa. The Jordanians will now be joined by the UAE’s advanced F-16 fighter jets, after Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, ordered their deployment.
The UAE has been at the forefront of the fight against ISIL since the beginning of the coalition. But the death of the first captured coalition pilot calls for a firm and determined response, both to destroy the cancer of ISIL and to demonstrate that the Arab countries stand together.
The reason for this response is a recognition in the UAE, and in the region, that the fight against ISIL is, first and foremost, a fight for the Arab world. It is in the name of Islam, the religion of most Arabs, that ISIL has attempted to justify its violence. And it is in this region, which has long been a haven of good relations among different religions, that the sectarian strife of ISIL has been spread.
Most of all, ISIL recognises no borders and no interpretations of Islam other than its own warped version. Thus every country in the region is a target. ISIL must be fought and destroyed while its cancer is confined to Syria and Iraq. Otherwise it will, for sure, have to be fought elsewhere.
All of this was apparent before the capture and killing of Al Kassasbeh. But the graphic nature of his death has confirmed that ISIL respects nothing: not the youth and service of the pilot, the fact that he was married, that he was a Muslim. Nor does it even recognise the way that Islamic law and tradition specifies that prisoners of war ought to be treated. If ISIL hoped to sow division, it has instead reaped unity of determined resistance.
The solidarity that the UAE has shown with Jordan is both a recognition of the brotherly ties that bind us and our shared determination to fight the threat that faces both of us. We will face down this threat together.