ICC Note: According to human rights activist and senior editor of WORLD magazine, Turkey is aiding and embedding the Islamic State and other terrorist groups in Syria through aerial cover and “safe haven.” Mindy Belz visited the region last year and met with man displaced religious minorities, including Christians, to hear about their experiences. Through these interviews and other investigative work, she has determined that Turkey is both blocking humanitarian aid to Syria as providing aerial cover for IS groups.

05/06/2016 Turkey (Christian Post): United States ally and NATO member Turkey is aiding and embedding the Islamic State and other terrorist groups in Syria that kill Christians by providing aerial cover and “safe haven,” human rights activist and author Mindy Belz said Wednesday.

Belz, the senior editor of WORLD magazine and author of the new book, They Say We Are Infidels: On the Run from ISIS with Persecuted Christians in the Middle East, was a featured guest at the Heritage Foundation and spoke about the plight of minorities from Iraq and Syria who have been forced from their homes due to the ongoing Syrian civil conflict and the rise of IS (also known as ISIS or ISIL).

Belz traveled to the region about a year ago and talked with displaced religious minorities about their situations and experiences.

Although Turkey is considered an U.S. ally, refugees told Belz that Turkey has obstructed progress in the fight against IS and has also hindered the delivery of vital humanitarian aid to those suffering in Iraq and Syria.

Along with blocking humanitarian aid shipments at its border with Syria, Belz said she was told that there is clear evidence Turkey has also provided aerial cover for IS and other Islamic terrorist groups in Syria, such as the al-Qaeda linked Al-Nusra Front.

“We have to have a new approach to our ally, Turkey. Turkey is a country that is in transition and is becoming more and more radicalized,” Belz warned. “There is strong evidence, as I interviewed people at the border who had escaped to Lebanon. I sat down with them in Beirut. They were up at the border when Turkey shot down the Syrian jet that crossed the border [in 2015]. … The people who witnessed it said, ‘Turkey is providing air cover for these Islamic militant groups.”

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