The following by Efraim Inbar is reposted here with the permission of the Middle East Form:

How Dangerous is ISIS to Israel?

by Efraim Inbar
BESA Center Perspectives
September 7, 2015

http://www.meforum.org/5473/israel-isis

Many Arabs are concerned less by the nature of ISIS atrocities than by the fact that they aren't committed primarily against Israelis.

ISIS, a radical Islamist group, has killed thousands of people since it declared an Islamic caliphate in June 2014, with the city of Raqqa as its de facto capital. It captured tremendous international attention by swiftly conquering large swaths of land and by releasing gruesome pictures of beheadings and other means of executions. In Israel, concern is increasing as ISIS nears Israeli borders.

Yet, several analyses of the threat ISIS poses to Israel seem to be unnecessarily alarmist. ISIS is primarily successful where there is a political void. Although the offensives in Syria and Iraq showed the Islamic State's tactical capabilities, they were directed against failed states with weakened militaries. When and where ISIS has met well organized opposition by non-state entities, such as that posed by Kurdish militias, the group's performance has been less convincing.

Kerry Blames ISIS Recruitment on 1948 Refugee Problem -- Not 18 Million From Arab Countries

The following by David P. Goldman is reposted here with permission of the Middle East Forum:

Does Kerry Think that 18 Million Muslim Refugees Are Irrelevant to ISIS?

by David P. Goldman
PJ Media
October 20, 2014

http://www.meforum.org/4862/does-kerry-think-that-18-million-muslim-refugees

There are now nearly 18 million refugees and internally displaced persons in seven Muslim countries (Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Pakistan, Somalia, Syria, and Yemen), up from slightly over 7 million in 2011, according to the UN. That doesn't count more than 2.5 million Afghani refugees from the continuing war in their country. Much of the population of Syria has left their homes, including 3 million who have left the country due to the civil war and an additional 8 million internally displaced.

That is cause for desperation: unprecedented numbers of people have been torn from traditional society and driven from their homes, many with little but the clothes on their backs. There are millions of young men in the Muslim world sitting in refugee camps with nothing to do, nowhere to go back to, and nothing to look forward to. And there are tens of millions more watching their misery with outrage. Never has an extremist movement had so many frustrated and footloose young men in its prospective recruitment pool.

The following by Jonathan Spyer is reposted here with permission of Middle East Forum:

Did ISIS Use Chemical Weapons Against the Kurds in Kobani?

by Jonathan Spyer
Middle East Review of International Affairs
October 12, 2014

http://www.meforum.org/4852/did-isis-use-chemical-weapons-against-the-kurds

^{WARNING: This post contains images which some readers may find disturbing. Caution is advised.}

The fate of Kobani city now hangs in the balance, as around 9000 fighters of the Islamic State organization close in on the Kurdish held area. The current IS assault on the Kobani enclave was not the first attempt by the jihadis to destroy the Kurdish-controlled area.

Raymond Ibrahim: Are Islamic State Atrocities the Product of 'Grievances'?

The following by Raymond Ibrahim is reposted here with permission of Middle East Forum:

Islamic State Atrocities: Products of 'Grievances'?

by Raymond Ibrahim
FrontPage Magazine
September 17, 2014

http://www.meforum.org/4824/islamism-grievances-isis

While many have rightfully criticized U.S. President Obama's recent assertion that the Islamic State "is not Islamic," some of his other equally curious but more subtle comments pronounced in the same speech have been largely ignored.

Consider the president's invocation of the "grievances" meme to explain the Islamic State's success: "At this moment the greatest threats come from the Middle East and North Africa, where radical groups exploit grievances for their own gain. And one of those groups is ISIL—which calls itself the Islamic State."

Obama's logic, of course, is fortified by an entire apparatus of professional apologists who make the same claim. Thus Georgetown professor John Esposito—whose apologetics sometimes morph into boldfaced lies—also recentlydeclared that "The "primary drivers [for the Islamic State's violence] are to be found elsewhere," that is, not in Islam but in a "long list of grievances."

ISIS - Since When Are US Politicians So Expert On Who Is and Isn't Islamic?

The following by Daniel Pipes is reposted with permission:

ISIS Is Not Islamic?

by Daniel Pipes
Sep 10, 2014
Cross-posted from National Review Online, The Corner

http://www.danielpipes.org/blog/2014/09/isis-is-not-islamic

In a televised address this evening, President Barack Obama outlined his ideas on how to defeat the Islamic State. Along the way, he declared the organization variously known as ISIS or ISIL to be "not Islamic."

In making this preposterous claim, Obama joins his two immediate predecessors in pronouncing on what is not Islamic. Bill Clinton called the Taliban treatment of women and children "a terrible perversion of Islam." George W. Bush deemed that 9/11 and other acts of violence against innocents "violate the fundamental tenets of the Islamic faith."

Word magic permits Obama to turn ISIS into a "not Islamic" organization.

None of the three has any basis for such assertions.

Daniel Pipes on the Attempt To Reinstitute A Caliphate Whose Time Has Long Passed

The following by Daniel Pipes is reposted here with permission:

The Caliphate Brings Trauma

by Daniel Pipes
Aydınlık (Turkey)
August 24, 2014

http://www.danielpipes.org/14791/caliphate-trauma

Without warning, the ancient and long powerless institution of the caliphate returned to life on June 29, 2014. What does this event augur?

The classic concept of the caliphate – of a single successor to Muhammad ruling a unified Muslim state – lasted just over a century and expired with the emergence of two caliphs in 750 CE. The power of the caliphate collapsed in about the year 940 CE. After a prolonged, shadowy existence, the institution disappeared altogether in 1924. The only subsequent efforts at revival were trivial, such as the so-called Kalifatsstaat in Cologne, Germany. In other words, the caliphate has been inoperative for about a millennium and absent for about a century.

"The Kaplan Case," a German magazine cover story about the "Caliph of Cologne."