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This week it was revealed that Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait are discussing the creation of a military pact to take on Islamic militants, with the possibility of a joint force to intervene around the Middle East. The discussions reflect a new assertiveness among the Middle East's powerhouses, whose governments - after three years of post-Arab spring turmoil in the region - have increasingly come to see Islamic militants and Islamist political movements as a threat.

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This is not the first time that Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates are coming together to forge an alliance to intervene in other Arab countries. Egypt and the UAE cooperated in carrying out airstrikes against Islamic militants in Libya during the summer, according to US officials, and last month Egypt carried out strikes of its own. Separately, Saudi and UAE fighter planes have already carried out attacks against militants in Iraq. However, what is noteworthy about the recent announcement is that there are now plans to create a permanent Arab military intervention force to fight Islam. The military dimension of the partnership between these countries is to supplement the ideological fight against political Islam. This fight will be waged on two fronts: ideological and military.

On the ideological front, Saudi Arabia is eager to fight political Islam worldwide and has donated $100 million for the United Nations Counter-Terrorism Centre (UNCTC) in August 2014. "The goal is to help provide the tools, technologies and methods to confront and eliminate the threat of terrorism," Adel al-Jubeir, the Saudi ambassador to the United States, said in presenting a cheque to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon. In October 2014, the UAE Emirates Policy Centre (EPC) organized a two-day conference to discuss measures to fight Islam under the guise of terrorism. Dr Anwar Gargash, UAE Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, told the conference, "The UAE has repeatedly warned about the growing threat that extremist actors and ideologies pose to our region. We need to acknowledge that these actors and their radical ideologies by their nature cannot be moderated, manipulated, or contained. They are fundamentally opposed to the tolerant values and moderate agenda that unite us in the UAE with many of our international partners." He said that combating extremism requires a broad range of tools and a sustained effort by the international community.

The alliance comes at a time, when Western powers most notably America and Britain are suffering from military defeat from wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and popular dissent at home means that further interventions are problematic. Subsequently, it is not surprising to find Arab countries stepping up efforts to do the West's dirty work to fight political Islam. Additionally, several other observations can be made about these developments:

1. Egypt and the GCC have been at odds with each other for several decades, however the rise of political Islam has galvanized their patrons America and Britain to press Egypt and the GCC countries to actively fight political Islam. Political Islam is now viewed as an existential threat by both the Arab regimes as well as their colonial masters-America and Britain.

2. The West will no longer oppose the political system of secular autocracies such the military dictatorship in Egypt or the monarchies of the Gulf countries. On the contrary the West will buttress these political systems to become a bulwark against militants and political activists who seek to overthrow these regimes and re-establish the Khilafah "Caliphate".

3. The military alliance between these countries is only directed at thwarting the rise of political Islam, and there is no mention of removing Assad from power. Clearly then, the West, especially America is seeking to keep Assad's regime intact, even though it has repeatedly violated the red lines set by Obama.

4. The alliance is also intended to check the rise of Iran's influence, which extends from Yemen to Lebanon and is increasingly taking on a strong military shape. In this way, the West is preparing the grounds for several years of war between Sunnis and Shias to produce a new map of the Middle East.

Thus it is imperative for the Muslim Ummah to seriously think about changing their situation from being slaves of the West under the present colonial systems guarded by watchmen loyal to their colonial masters to becoming full slaves of Allah through the re-establishment of the rightly guided Khilafah "Caliphate" state. Allah Almighty says in the Quran,

((...إِنَّ اللَّهَ لَا يُغَيِّرُ مَا بِقَوْمٍ حَتَّى يُغَيِّرُوا مَا بِأَنْفُسِهِمْ وَإِذَا أَرَادَ اللَّهُ بِقَوْمٍ سُوءًا فَلَا مَرَدَّ لَهُ وَمَا لَهُمْ مِنْ دُونِهِ مِنْ وَالٍ))

"Indeed, Allah will not change the condition of a people until they change what is in themselves. And when Allah intends for a people ill, there is no repelling it. And there is not for them besides Him any patron." [TMQ: Surah Al-Raad: 11]

Written for The Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir by
Abu Hashim