Journal slams Paul for ISIS comments

The Wall Street Journal has slapped Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, a 2016 Republican presidential candidate, for suggesting members of his own party helped the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) grow in the Middle East.

“Speaking of gall, and a word of political advice, an aide might want to remind Senator Paul which party’s nomination he is seeking,” the newspaper said in a Thursday editorial.

{mosads}”Republicans who begin their campaigns assailing other Republicans rarely succeed — especially when the accusation is culpability for a would-be caliphate that uses executions, slavery, extortion, rape and general terror to enforce oppression in the Middle East and North Africa, and whose ideology inspires jihadists world-wide,” they added.

Other declared and potential 2016 GOP hopefuls, including Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, have criticized Paul over his remark from early Wednesday that Republican hawks “created” ISIS and other groups.

“ISIS exists and grew stronger because of the hawks in our party, who gave arms indiscriminately, and most of those arms were snatched up by ISIS,” he said on MSNBC.

Paul also dinged Republicans who advocated bombing Syrian President Bashar Assad, who also views ISIS as an enemy, which the Journal criticized as a hypothetical.

The newspaper attributed the rise of ISIS to remnants of al Qaeda that grew after the withdrawal of U.S. forces in Iraq.

The Journal suggested Paul would be “better off focusing on his domestic agenda.”

Last week, The New York Times editorial board praised Paul for his “takedown of the Patriot Act” after he stole the spotlight on the Senate floor protesting the National Security Agency’s bulk collection of Americans’ phone data.