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发帖数: 29846 | 1 by Jammie
The Obama administration was given multiple chances Wednesday to endorse a
long-time ally’s airstrikes on America’s biggest enemy at the moment, the
so-called Islamic State. Over and over again, Obama’s aides declined to
back Egypt’s military operation against ISIS. It’s another sign of the
growing strain between the United States and Egypt, once one of its closest
friends in the Middle East.
This shouldn’t be a complete surprise; Cairo, after all, didn’t tell
Washington about its strikes on the ISIS hotbed of Derna, Libya. Still,
Wednesday’s disconnect was jarring. White House Press Secretary Josh
Earnest passed on a reporter’s question about an endorsement of Egypt’s
growing campaign against ISIS. So did State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki.
“We are neither condemning nor condoning” the Egyptian strikes, is all one
U.S. official would tell The Daily Beast.
In other words, these once-close nations are now fighting separate campaigns
against their mutual foe. And that could prove to be very good news for
ISIS. The rift between U.S. and the region’s most populous country portends
of another division that ISIS could exploit, this time for its expansion
into northern Africa and the broader Middle East. |
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