Obama, allies vow firm response to Islamic State

[Omaha Steve]

Source: AP-Excite

By LARA JAKES

WASHINGTON (AP) — The United States stood firm Wednesday in its fight against Islamic State militants who beheaded a U.S. journalist in Iraq, pledging to continue attacking the group despite its threats to kill another American hostage. President Barack Obama denounced the group as a "cancer" threatening the entire region as the administration weighed sending even more American troops to Iraq.

"We will be vigilant and we will be relentless," Obama said as the U.S. military pressed ahead with more airstrikes on Islamic State targets in Iraq.

The execution of journalist James Foley drew international condemnation, and western nations responded with stepped-up efforts to counter the threat posed by Islamic State. Germany announced it would supply the Kurds with weapons to fight the insurgent. Italy's defense minister said the country hopes to contribute machine guns, ammunition and anti-tank rockets. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said the killing showed the true face of this "caliphate of barbarism."

In capitals across the Middle East, by contrast, the news of Foley's death was met with silence, even in Syria and Iraq — the two countries where the Islamic State is strongest. On social media, people in the region condemned Foley's killing, but stressed that the Islamic State has been committing atrocities against Iraqis and Syrians for years.

FULL story at link.



FILE - In this Friday, May 27, 2011, file photo, journalist James Foley responds to questions during an interview with The Associated Press, in Boston. A video by Islamic State militants that purports to show the killing of Foley by the militant group was released Tuesday, Aug. 19, 2014. Foley, from Rochester, N.H., went missing in 2012 in northern Syria while on assignment for Agence France-Press and the Boston-based media company GlobalPost. (AP Photo/Steven Senne, File)


Read more: http://apnews.excite.com/article/20140820/us--journalist_slain-4dc8c13397.html

[pinto]

1. ISIS poses the greatest risk to Iraq and Syria in the short term. And both are fractured states.

I think supporting the other local player in the region, the Kurds, is worthwhile in the short term. And if a clear money trail from Qatar is evident they should effectively be sanctioned. Whatever that means. States could at least prohibit national/corporate involvement or investment In Qatar's burgeoning tourism industry. And they should get tagged by the UN as assisting in crimes against humanity.

[lark]

2. War is war

and is to be avoided, especially in the Middle East. All this will do is create more folks that hate us. Oh, I forgot the important part - it will make lots of $$$ for the MIC and their paid minions, probably including the president.

Oh Obama, how far you have fallen from the anti-war idealist we all fell in love with many years ago..

[YvonneCa]

3. He was never a pacifist. He WAS...

...against the Iraq War because it took the focus off who really was responsible for 9/11.

[MH1]

4. Speak for yourself. Some of us didn't "fall in love" with an "anti-war idealist".

I supported Obama then as now because he is intelligent and pragmatic and has promoted many values that are generally consistent with my own, while I recognize that he can't achieve miracles in the office of President and at the same time is not in perfect agreement with me regarding certain issues and priorities. (And oh yeah, you must have wholly missed the part before he was elected in 2008 where he said he'd go into Pakistan to get Osama bin Laden and other terrorists. He didn't keep that a secret, at all.)

Which is why, I suspect, I seem to be less disappointed then some.

And oh, as far as ISIS, it might create more folks that hate us, but abandoning erstwhile allies to the tender mercies of these truly vicious bastards will not exactly make us friends, either. We are sort of in a no-win situation that has developed over many more years than Obama's time as Prez. Personally, I'd rather we take these bastards out now than have to deal with them as a larger group later.

[quadrature]

5. setting Libya on fire, was a mistake.

same for Syria