Paul Iddon
Here in Iraq’s Kurdish autonomous region, a friend recently overheard some of his countrymen discussing the prospect of an independent Iraqi Kurdistan coming under attack from Baghdad or its neighbors. They dismissed this prospect out of hand, very matter-of-factly, by insisting that the Israeli Air Force would come to defend the region.
The idea of an outside power coming in to rescue the Kurds from predatory powers is not unprecedented. Kurds fled their homes en masse to neighboring countries in the immediate aftermath of the 1991 Persian Gulf War, when Saddam Hussein’s helicopter gunships targeted civilians in the region. This was only a few years after the Iraqi military murdered 50,000-100,000 Kurds during the Anfal genocide.
Only the imposition of a U.S.-led no-fly zone enabled Kurds to return home, less fearful that Saddam’s air force would massacre them again.
Given this history, and Israel’s soft backing of Kurdish independence, it’s understandable why some Kurds are hopeful that Israeli warplanes would fly to the rescue if the region came under attack.
http://warisboring.com/the-israeli-air-force-wont-race-to-iraqi-kurdistans-rescue/
