After coming close to war earlier this year over the Sunni-Shiite Islamic civil war in Syria, Russia and Turkey became friends over their mutual hostility for the West. It was an oddball arrangement which was very clearly motivated by Turkey's Islamic tyrant trying to show Europe that he had other options after his bloody domestic crackdown and Russia trying to stick a thumb in NATO's eye.
The fundamental issues though hadn't been resolved.
Turkey was backing Sunni Islamic terrorists in Syria and Russia was backing Shiite Islamists. Both sides were killing each other. And whatever Turkey and Russia's leaders were playing at in public, they were pouring fuel on the fire by backing Islamic terrorists.
And now that violence exploded into the murder of the Russian ambassador to Turkey at an art gallery, allegedly by a member of Turkey's riot police, a particularly interesting group considering its role in Turkish politics recently following Erdogan's massive domestic purge of law enforcement, the military and the judiciary. There are any number of possible explanations, but the obvious issue is that Turkey and Russia's continued backing for Islamic terrorists could not be safely "contained" in Syria. And Russia's notion that it could back Islamic terrorists without being affected has also proven to be false.
Not much can be expected from Turkey, which is an Islamic country drunk on fantasies of rebuilding the Ottoman Empire. But Russia isn't a Muslim country and it ought to know better. Its backing for Islamic terror during the Cold War hit home when the Jihadists turned their attention to Russia in later decades. Its current backing for Shiite Islamic terror, particularly in Iran, is bound to ricochet because of Iran's own territorial ambitions. Russia took sides in an Islamic civil war. Much like Benghazi and the murder of an ambassador in a country whose government we had overthrown and replaced with Islamic terrorists, consequences should have been expected.
No country, Muslim or non-Muslim, should ever assume that it can back Islamic terrorists without the violence hitting home.
Jihadists have no friends. And trying to back any bunch of Islamic terrorists can only backfire. It's a good thing that we aren't doubling down on Syria, as many hysterical voices insist that we do. Nothing good can come of it. The murder of the Russian ambassador is a reminder that not even as cold a player as Putin can manage the consequences of playing with Islamic terrorists.
If you play with the Jihad, eventually you get burned.