Iraqi Vice President and Former PM Nouri Al-Maliki Blames Saudi Arabia for the Rise of ISIS

Speaking to the Iranian Press TV channel on November 29, Iraqi Vice President and Former Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki said that ISIS emerged from the extremist, sectarian environment in the region, especially in Saudi Arabia.

Following are excerpts:

Nouri Al-Maliki: ISIS espouses extremist, sectarian, violent ideas, and is rightly characterized as a terrorist organization. It emerged in a certain environment. It did not come out of nowhere. It was born in the extremist, sectarian environment that the region is witnessing.

This is especially true with regard to Saudi Arabia. The Wahhabi belief in the takfir of all Muslims, whether Sunnis or Shiites, has evolved into the environment that gave rise to Al-Qaeda and its extremist ideas.

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Regardless of who founded ISIS, it has been used as a means to topple the regime in Syria, and to spread ideas and political agendas of major countries in the region. Therefore, [ISIS] was embraced by political agendas from the outset.

[The international coalition was formed] after ISIS and Al-Qaeda got out of control, and started threatening certain countries and entities. They even said that they would not be surprised to see ISIS fighting in the streets of Paris and London one day. This gave rise to the international campaign. To this day, there are people who believe that ISIS should not be eliminated, but rather, should be kept in check. In other words, they would rather have crisis management than crisis resolution.

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I have said before that Iraq will be the graveyard of ISIS. There is no doubt in my mind that we will regain every inch of land they took, just as we did in the past.

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