Dr. Walid Phares, a National Defense University professor

Posted: Nov 16, 2015

on issues in the Middle East, said on Fox News when asked why can't we take out ISIS... "Walid, why can't we take them out?" "Actually we can and actually we should, but the president has a different strategy. He's getting a lot of pressure by the Iranians. Otherwise he should have long time ago allied himself, partnered with Arab moderate forces such as Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt, UAE, they are fighting terrorism very much and very well in Yemen, in Sinai, in Libya, elsewhere, but the reason that he's not going to these moderate Arab forces and asking them on the ground to be boots on the ground is because the Iranians are pressuring him because the Syrian Regime is pressuring him. They don't want those areas, those Sunni areas to be liberated by Sunni moderates because they won't have access to them. That's the bottom line of it." "In other words, the reason we don't take ISIS out is because the Syrian Regime doesn't want them taken out. Obama has aligned himself with Iran and Syria. Iran and Syria do not want moderate Sunni Arab, like Mosul and other places, they do not want these Sunni areas to be liberated by Sunni moderates because then the Iranians won't control them, the Iranians won't have access to them." Fox News ;