[sam88]

The chart is over simplification and lacks any depth for such relationships, for example, Jordan and Saudi, both friendly with Israel and have been funding ISIS, yet there is no mention of Jordan, Qatar too, too tiny yet playing a very big role in this mess, not there at all. The main player in all relationship in the middle east is the US and Israel, the rest is not much.

[sam88]

I think the best thing that has been written on the Middle East is Walid Khalidi, ed., From Haven to Conquest. But as a rule of thumb,"When governments are loyal to the US (Israel, Ukraine, etc), the US calls for disarming of all militias and groups that are opposed to those governments. But in the cases of governments that are opposed to the US (Syria, Iran, Cuba, etc) the US funds and arms militias against those governments."

[jqm]

Exactly.

The lack of note of some of the original funding sources for ISIS makes me regard the chart as bogus and maybe even misleading.

There are groups who don't want to see Iran (nor Russia for that matter) grow any more powerful in the region, and these are defiantly somewhat happy about the emergence of ISIS if not also surreptitiously supporting them. Putting these countries as frowny on the chart is not really very accurate even if they profess disdain in public (which they politically have to for an outlaw group like this). I hope the US is not in this group but wouldn't swear they are not. At minimum, some of the "friends" of the US are in this group.

The absence of Russia on the chart is another reason not to take it very seriously. Overall.... this is like a 4'th grade view of alliances in the mid-east. Not really very useful.