Nureddin Sabir, Editor, Redress Information & Analysis, writes:

The false distinction between so-called “moderate” and extremist Islamists is about to be exposed for the fraud that it is.

According to the London-based Al-Sharq al-Awsat newspaper, senior leaders of Islamic State group, Al-Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood in Libya are planning to join forces under a joint umbrella.

The Muslim Brotherhood is seen by many deluded liberals and leftists in the West as a “moderate” Islamist group.

The paper cited “confidential documents”, which it says it has seen, showing that the three groups are planning to integrate into a unified shura, or consultative, council.

It said that a leader of one of Al-Qaeda’s affiliates in Libya, the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, had told his Islamist colleagues in Tripoli that Al-Qaeda’s and the Muslim Brotherhood’s loss of “prestige” to the Islamic State cutthroats meant that these two groups, which are key parts of the Islamist coalition running Tripoli, must now come together under the leadership of Islamic State.

Al-Sharq al-Awsat said that, according to intelligence sources, the Muslim Brotherhood, the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group and Islamic State agreed at the end of December 2015 to beef up their terrorist operations in the countries neighbouring Libya, in collaboration with Islamist cutthroats in Egypt.