American warplanes on their way to bomb ISIS targets fly over Syrian helicopters dropping barrel bombs on civilians in Aleppo. Russian warplanes on their way to bomb anti-Assad forces in and around Aleppo, killing a large number of civilians in the process, fly next to American warplanes. Now, there are reports that Saudi Arabia is sending warplanes to Turkey to bomb ISIS targets in Syria. Maybe they ran out of targets in Yemen. This leads me to ask the following question: If all of the madness happening in the Middle East is the result of a dastardly Iranian-hatched conspiracy, as the Saudis allege, why aren’t they bombing the positions of Hizbollah and the Quds Brigades? Strange things happen over the skies of Syria!

The American warplanes have been scrambled by the public outcry over ISIS’ savage murder of six westerners. The death of 250,000 Syrians, many of them killed in ways that would make an ISIS snuff film seem mild in comparison, could not elicit a meaningful American response against the Assad regime or ISIS, both of whom slaughter Syrian civilians wholesale.

This current strategy continues to ignore the main cause of the suffering of the Syrian people, namely the obscene violence of the Assad regime. It will push more desperate Syrians towards ISIS, and it will push more innocent people out of the country. May Allah bring relief and peace to all of the innocent victims of this insane violence. May Allah help the people of Syria.