Al-Qaeda takes the initiative on Israel’s doorstep

Last night, the Times of Israel newspaper highlighted a riveting but chilling YouTube video of al-Qaeda-affiliated fighters on the Golan Heights border between Syria and Israel.  The al-Furqan jihadists, depicted in front of a heavily-armed vehicle, are seen patrolling and speaking confidently just feet from a barbed-wire fence and an apparent Israeli border structure.

Elsewhere on the Golan Heights this morning, Syrian rebels seized vehicles from a UN convoy and kidnapped 20 Filipino personnel.  They were part of the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF), a contingent of about 1,000 tasked with implementing the ceasefire between Israel and Syria since 1974.  But, like the UNIFIL troops in Lebanon, they are at best impotent and at worst enabling Israel’s enemies.  The Syrian front has been quieter than the Lebanese front, but only because Israel’s massive firepower advantage is more effective against a nationalist regime with a lot to lose (Assad) than a wily and flexible Islamist militia with no state-level responsibilities (Hezbollah).

Now, with al-Qaeda literally peering over the fence from Syria, that calculus has changed.  The Israeli leadership should be preparing for the jihadists in the Golan to join their fellow non-state actors, Hezbollah and Hamas, in creating a third border with Israel where the enemy is exceedingly difficult to deter.   And by now the Israeli leadership should have learned the lesson that no international force, especially from the UN, will be there to protect them from the vanguard of jihad.

In the face of incontrovertible evidence that enabling the jihadist opposition in Syria will create a new nest for international terror, will the western powers change their tacit (and occasionally overt) support for the Syrian opposition?

Not likely.  The UK government announced the same day that it would be sending armored vehicles to the rebels.