While the eyes of the world are glued to the U.S.-led intervention against the Islamic State, millions of Syrians suffer from a far more serious problem: they fear that they won’t be able to cook their food or keep the cold out of their homes this winter.
The outcome of the battle for Kobane will have significant implications for the fight against the Islamic State and developments in Turkey, Syria, and Iraq moving forward.
If Islamic State militants were to gain control of Syrian Kurdish areas, it would trigger a political earthquake among the Kurdish communities of Turkey and Western Europe.
Turkey hesitates to fully embrace the U.S.-led coalition’s actions against the Islamic State. Ankara’s most crucial hesitation relates to the Kurdish issue which plays such a central role in Turkish policy in the Middle East.
The rapid rise of the Islamic State means core assumptions driving policy on Syria must be rethought.
Turkey’s policy of conditioning its anti–Islamic State engagement on support for an anti-Assad campaign will be at best ineffective and at worst counterproductive.
What can the EU do to prevent its citizens from leaving for Syria and Iraq to join the Islamic State and becoming a domestic threat once they return to European soil?
The Syrian refugee crisis is a major driver of violence and political tension in Lebanon. Tolerance for the refugees is gradually turning into resentment.
While Turkey is likely to lend assistance to the U.S.-led campaign against the Islamic State, the recent parliamentary vote won’t trigger any military action by itself. For Turkey, the top priority is not to join the campaign but to leverage it for other purposes.
The Islamic State is posing an unprecedented type of threat to the West, especially to European states. The European Union must respond by focusing on five key priorities.












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