Former ISIS Member Claims Turkey Is Allied with the Jihadist Group

A former member of the Islamic State told Newsweek that Turkey cooperates with the brutal Islamic State in Syria.

The former Islamic State (ISIS, ISIL) communications technician, now using the pseudonym “Sherko Omer,” said the Turkish army allows foreign fighters and other ISIS members to cross into Syria through Turkey to reinforce the terrorist group.    

“ISIS saw the Turkish army as its ally especially when it came to attacking the Kurds in Syria. The Kurds were the common enemy for both ISIS and Turkey,” Omer told Newsweek. “Also, ISIS had to be a Turkish ally because only through Turkey they were able to deploy ISIS fighters to northern parts of the Kurdish cities and towns in Syria.”

“ISIS and Turkey cooperate together on the ground on the basis that they have a common enemy to destroy, the Kurds,” he added.

Newsweek was unable to independently verify Omer’s claims. However, the magazine pointed out that “anecdotal evidence of Turkish forces turning a blind eye to ISIS activity has been mounting over the past month.”

Omer, the son of an Iraqi Kurd businessman, worked at the ISIS communications bureau in Raqqa, the jihadist group’s stronghold in Syria, across the Turkish border.

“I have connected ISIS field captains and commanders from Syria with people in Turkey on innumerable occasions,” the former ISIS member told Newsweek.

“ISIS commanders told us to fear nothing at all because there was full cooperation with the Turks,” Omer added, describing crossing the border into Turkey.

Initially, Omer traveled to Syria with the intentions of joining the Free Syrian Army’s battle against Bashar al-Assad, “but [he] found himself sucked in to ISIS, unable to leave,” reported Newsweek on Nov. 7.

Until last month, NATO member and U.S. ally Turkey had prevented Iraqi Kurdish fighters from using its territory to cross into Syria to aid their counterparts in defending the Syrian border town of Kobani. 

Kurds in Kobani told Newsweek “that people attempting to carry supplies across the border were often shot at.”

Kobani is located on the Turkey-Syria border.