A distinct controversy is whether the al Qaeda styled groups (especially Jabhat al Nusra and ISIS) have been generated as a sort of organic reaction to the repeated US interventions, or whether they are actually paid agents of Washington.<\/p>\n
Certainly, prominent ISIS leaders were held in US prisons. ISIS leader, Ibrahim al-Badri (aka Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi) is said to have been held for between one and two years at Camp Bucca in Iraq. In 2006, as al-Baghdadi and others were released, the Bush administration announced its plan for a \u2018New Middle East\u2019, a plan which would employ sectarian violence as part of a process of \u2018creative destruction\u2019 in the region.<\/p>\n
According to Seymour Hersh\u2019s 2007 article, \u2018The Redirection\u2019, the US would make use of \u2018moderate Sunni states\u2019, not least the Saudis, to \u2018contain\u2019 the Shia gains in Iraq brought about by the 2003 US invasion. These \u2018moderate Sunni\u2019 forces would carry out clandestine operations to weaken Iran and Hezbollah, key enemies of Israel. This brought the Saudis and Israel closer, as both fear Iran.<\/p>\n
While there have been claims that the ISIS \u2018caliph\u2019 al-Baghdadi is a CIA or Mossad trained agent, these have not yet been well backed up. There are certainly grounds for suspicion, but independent evidence is important, in the context of a supposed US \u2018war\u2019 against ISIS . So what is the broader evidence on Washington\u2019s covert links with ISIS?<\/p>\n
Not least are the admissions by senior US officials that key allies support the extremist group. In September 2014 General Martin Dempsey, head of the US military, told a Congressional hearing \u2018I know major Arab allies who fund [ ISIS ]\u2018. Senator Lindsey Graham, of Armed Services Committee, responded with a justification, \u2018They fund them because the Free Syrian Army couldn\u2019t fight [Syrian President] Assad, they were trying to beat Assad\u2019.<\/p>\n