Arab states on Sunday agreed to take the “necessary measures” and were prepared to cooperate internationally to confront Islamic State militants, Arab League Secretary-General Nabil al-Arabi said.
At the start of a foreign ministers’ meeting in Cairo, al-Arabi had called for a political and military confrontation with the jihadists and other militants who he said threatened the existence of Arab states.
He later stopped short of explicitly backing US air strikes in Iraq and Syria targeting the Islamic State, formerly known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.
“The Arab foreign ministers have agreed to take the necessary measures to confront terrorist groups including” the Islamic State, Arabi said at a news conference.
“International cooperation is included; international cooperation on all fronts,” he said.
The ministers agreed to “take all measures to counter terrorism: political, security and ideological,” he added, without spelling out what these measures would be.
His remarks came as the US expanded air strikes against the militants and sought wider regional backing for its campaign.
Arabi had earlier urged the foreign ministers to take “a clear decision for a comprehensive confrontation, militarily and politically.”
Iraq had welcomed US President Barack Obama’s plan for an international coalition against jihadists as a “strong message of support,” after repeatedly calling for aid against the militants.
Obama outlined the plan at a NATO summit on Friday for a broad coalition to defeat the Islamic State, which led an offensive that overran parts of Iraq in June and also holds significant territory in neighboring Syria.
He said he will make a speech to lay out his “game plan” to deal with and ultimately defeat the Islamic State, but warned he would not wage another ground war in Iraq.
The Islamic State, originally an al-Qaeda affiliate in Iraq that expanded in the Syrian conflict, claims its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, is the rightful leader, or caliph, of all Muslims.
The group’s astonishing rise in Syria and Iraq caught the government in Baghdad, and much of the region, off guard.
Arabi said the Islamic State posed a threat to the entire region.
“What is happening in Iraq is that the terrorist organization not only threatens a state’s authority, but threatens its very existence and the existence of other states,” he said.
Arab countries have participated in Western-led military campaigns in the past, including the first Gulf War and the aerial campaign against former Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi.
The US expanded its month-long air campaign against the militants in Iraq’s Sunni Arab heartland, hitting Islamic State fighters west of Baghdad as Iraq troops launched a ground assault.
Aside from fighting in Iraq, Arab states are concerned that Islamic State is coordinating with domestic extremists and that militants who traveled to join the group might conduct attacks on their return home.
In Egypt, several militants who have carried out attacks on security forces since the army overthrew former Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi last year had traveled to fight in Syria.
Egypt’s main militant group, Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, has not publicly pledged its loyalty to the Islamic State, but has referred to the jihadists as “brothers.”
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