Manama: Bahrain has confirmed that its air force joined the US-led air strikes against Daesh militants in Syria early on Tuesday.
“A group of fighter jets from the Royal Bahrain Air Force (RBAF) carried out earlier this morning, along with the air forces of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states and those of allied and friendly countries, air strikes against a number of selected targets of terrorist groups and organisations, and destroyed them,” an official Bahrain Defence Force (BDF) source said, quoted by the Bahrain News Agency (BNA).
“The strikes are part of the international efforts to protect regional security and global peace,” the source added.
Bahrain’s active commitment to the war on terror was reiterated hours later by King Hamad Bin Eisa Al Khalifa who stressed, during a visit to the Royal Bahrain Air Force (RBAF) premises, the kingdom’s “readiness to assume its important and vital role, alongside brotherly and friendly countries, in the battle against terrorism in the region in order to eliminate all its forms and sources.”
Bahrain’s constant keenness to safeguard regional security and global peace was in continuation of the crucial role it has always played as a civilised country, a status that is internationally recognised, he said.
King Hamad cited Bahrain’s participation in combating terrorism in Afghanistan, countering piracy in the Indian Ocean, UN-led monitoring operations, securing the flow of oil to the whole world, preventing the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and promoting global stability and peace.
He also cited the kingdom’s honourable and historical role in the liberation of Kuwait in 1991 which the RBAF also played an important role.
The king said that Bahrain would continue to uphold the noble principles of justice and peace and would support the existing military cooperation between the BDF and the armed forces of the Gulf Cooperation Council and friendly states for the sake of ensuring regional security and development.
In his statement, he stressed that terrorists were hiding behind religious masks, but indeed had nothing to do with the Islamic precepts and values.
Prime Minister Prince Khalifa Bin Salman Al Khalifa in a separate statement emphasised the need to stand firm against terrorism and insisted that the future of the region required more collective international efforts in order to achieve lasting security and peace.
Prince Khalifa said that Bahrain was ready to play an active role in constructive cooperation aimed at serving common interests.
‘Deviated cult’
In an interview with CNN aired on Tuesday evening, Shaikh Khalid Bin Ahmad Al Khalifa, the foreign minister, said that Daesh must not be tolerated in the region and urged “every cleric and every place of scholarship in the Muslim religion to really stand out and say clear words, and very clear terms, that this is not Islam, and they are not Muslims — this is a very deviated cult.”
Shaikh Khalid, in New York for the United Nations General Assembly, said that Bahrain would continue to be part of the coalition for “as long as it takes” and that it would soon host an international conference on combating the funding of terrorism.
He added that cutting off their financing was half of the work and that “You have not to allow one dollar to go into their pockets.”
“We know that this is a threat to sovereignty and integrity of countries. There is a declared state that transcends borders. We know that this is something that has targeted civilians, and displaced them in their hundreds of thousands — attacked mosques, churches, people of different sects and religions — Yazidis, Christians, Muslims, Shiites, Sunnis,” he told CNN.
Shaikh Khalid stressed that fighting Daesh was only one battle and that the fight against terrorism should include other terrorist groups, such as Al Qaida affiliates and Lebanon’s Hezbollah, who are terrorising civilian populations.
