Reuters reported today that Germany’s development minister, Gerd Müller, accused Qatar of financing the brutal Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), which is currently terrorizing the region.

“This kind of conflict, this kind of a crisis always has a history … The ISIS troops, the weapons – these are lost sons, with some of them from Iraq,” Müller told German public broadcaster ZDF.

“You have to ask who is arming, who is financing ISIS troops. The keyword there is Qatar – and how do we deal with these people and states politically?” said Müller, a member of the Christian Social Union (CSU), the center-right Bavarian sister party of Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats.

While Reuters notes that Müller didn’t provide proof for his accusation, it did note that David Cohen, the U.S. Treasury Department’s Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence made the same charge earlier this year.

Most notably, Qatar, a longtime U.S. ally, has for many years openly financed Hamas, a group that continues to undermine regional stability. Press reports indicate that the Qatari government is also supporting extremist groups operating in Syria. To say the least, this threatens to aggravate an already volatile situation in a particularly dangerous and unwelcome manner.

As he prepared to leave office last month, outgoing President of Israel Shimon Peres singled out Qatar as a funder of Hamas in a conversation with United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon. Former Israeli national security advisor Maj. Gen. (res.) Yaakov Amidror also leveled this charge.

Influential politicians are increasingly taking note of Qatar’s support of ISIS, Hamas, and the Muslim Brotherhood. Jonathan Spyer reports in Qatar’s Rise and America’s Tortured Middle East Policy, which was published in the August 2014 issue of The Tower Magazine, that “U.S. legislators are circulating a letter questioning Qatar’s behavior, beginning to voice deep objections to their dangerous and unacceptable actions.”

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