In the Middle East, our enemy's enemy must be our friend

 Al-Qaeda-type movements are gaining ground, and there's only one way to stop them

 Patrick Cockburn adopts the disastrous justification for the War on Terror wholesale. Never mind it is the dictators that give rise to the extremists, never mind that in Assad's case he has been supporting them directly. Never mind that the people of Idlib feel liberated by Jabhat al-Nusra in a way they do not with Assad or his friends in ISIS. The idea that we should be bombing Idlib to keep Assad in power is flat out crazy, but the logical conclusion of saying the problem is not Assad but American intervention is to whitewash Assad's crimes so you can pretend the alternatives are worse.

 "In Syria, similarly, “the enemy of our enemy” and the strongest military force is the Syrian army, though it shows signs of weakening after four years of war. But if we have decided that US air power is not to be used against Isis or Jabhat al-Nusra when they are fighting the Syrian army because we want to get rid of President Bashar al-Assad, then this is a decision that benefits Isis, Jabhat al-Nusra and extreme jihadis."