Al-Nusra Front says airstrike nations are targets

Foreign air strikes on Syria constitute a "war against Islam" and participating nations will be the target of jihadist attacks, the al-Nusra Front says.

Al-Nusra Front fighters

Al-Nusra Front fighters near the front line with Syrian government solders in Yarmuk Palestinian refugee camp, south of Damascus on September 22, 2014.

Al-Nusra Front, al-Qaeda's Syrian franchise, says foreign air strikes on the country constitute a "war against Islam" and it has threatened to attack the worldwide interests of participating nations.

"These states have committed a horrible act that is going to put them on the list of jihadist targets throughout the world," said spokesman Abu Firas al-Suri in a video posted online on Saturday.

"This is not a war against Al-Nusra, but a war against Islam."

In August, the United States began bombing targets in Iraq of the Islamic State group.

This week, the operation was widened to Syria and to al-Qaeda, as well as IS targets, with warplanes not only from the United States, but also Bahrain, Jordan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

Suri singled out those Arab countries, saying they had lined up "on the side of oppression and of the infidels" and that "this will have consequences".

"We are engaged in a long war... that war will not end in months, or a year, or in years, but could last decades," Suri said, adding that "we are capable of holding out".


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