The fight against ISIS “has to be unified” and bring “Muslims, Christians, and other religions” together in “a third World War by other means,” said King Abdullah II of Jordan in an interview with CNN’s Fareed Zakaria Sunday.
In response to a question from host Fareed Zakaria, Abdullah said that Obama is right to not label ISIS “Islamic extremists” because “what these people want is to be called the extremists. They take that as a badge of honor.”
No one has accused King Abdullah of using weak language against the terrorists, however – after ISIS burned Jordanian pilot Muath Al Kasasbeh alive in a cage, Abdullah promised a “relentless” war and “earth shattering retaliation," followed by waves of bombers.
As I reported at the time:
Abdullah II quoted Clint Eastwood’s character from the movie “Unforgiven,” where the character says, “Any man I see out there, I'm gonna kill him. Any son of a bitch takes a shot at me, I'm not only going to kill him, I'm going to kill his wife and all his friends and burn his damn house down," Rep. Hunter (R-Calif.) told The Washington Examiner.
“There is going to be retribution like ISIS hasn't seen," said the angry King. 'The only problem we're going to have is running out of fuel and bullets.'"
Zakaria asked Abdullah in yesterday’s interview: “How should the West handle this? Should the response to ISIS be essentially an Arab response, a Muslim response or should the West be in the lead?”
“This has to be unified,” said Jordan’s King. “I've said this to leaders both in the Islamic and Arab world and to the world in general: This is a third World War by other means. This brings Muslims, Christians, other religions together in this generational fight that all of us have to be in this together.”
“So it's not a Western fight,” said Abdullah. “This is a fight inside of Islam where everybody comes together against these outlaws, so to speak, together. And there's a short-term part of this which is the military part of the issue. There is the medium part which is the security element of it. And then there's a long-term element of this, which is obviously the ideological one.”
“President Obama has gotten into a little trouble or at least has received some criticism because he says he doesn’t want to call groups like ISIS Islamic extremists because he doesn’t want to give them the mantle of legitimacy by acknowledging that they are Islamic,” said Zakaria. “Do you think he is right?”
“I think he is right and I think this is something that has to be understood on a much larger platform because they are looking for legitimacy that they don’t have inside of Islam,” said Abdullah. “When we are asked in this debate are you a moderate or an extremist? What these people want is to be called the extremists. They take that as a badge of honor.”
King Abdullah II is the direct descendant of the prophet Mohammed.