Israeli diplomatic sources disclosed to Al-Monitor that during a meeting in Paris between Israeli and French foreign ministers in mid-February, Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman thanked his French colleague, not for the first time, for France’s action in Mali and the Central African Republic. Were it not for the involvement of the French military, he said, radical Islam would have already reached “Israel’s doorstep.”

Once this meeting at the French Foreign Ministry was concluded, the two ministers came out to greet the photographers. They didn’t hold a real news conference, and only granted statements to the media. Liberman usually spares his words when making public appearances of this sort outside of Israel. This time, however, beyond the banal declarations regarding the good relations between the two countries, Liberman added that in his conversation with his French counterpart, Laurent Fabius, he raised the topic of cooperation between Jerusalem and Paris on Africa. Liberman's declaration adds to a previous statement he made in January at the annual conference of Israeli heads of mission in Jerusalem regarding the importance of Africa to Israel’s foreign relations.

Liberman's short reference to Africa provoked no reaction in the Israeli press. The ongoing conflict in the Central African Republic between Christian militias and Muslim insurgents raises little interest in Israel. But at the top ranks of the Foreign Ministry and Israeli defense agencies, calls are increasing for a deeper examination of the civil war in the Central African Republic, as well as those in other regions in Africa. Israel, so it is claimed, must thoroughly study the strengthening of radical Islam throughout Africa — from Sudan in the East, through Chad, Niger and Nigeria in the middle of the continent, to Mali and Mauritania in the West.

In certain respects, it could be said that radical Islamic terrorism in Africa is already knocking on Israel’s southern doors — at the border with Egypt and along the Gaza Strip. The international media have reported in the past about the flow of weapons from Libya to other African nations during the revolution there three years ago. Large amounts of weapons were accumulated by radical Muslim fighters cultivated by Moammar Gadhafi. When they lost their livelihood in Libya, these fighters returned to their homelands in Mauritania, Mali, Chad and other nations in the Sahel. The war in Mali was to a great extent a direct continuation of the revolution in Libya. The Tuareg tribe and other radical Muslim fighters escaped or returned to Mali, having been trained, organized and, above all, armed to the teeth. Now it turns out that part of the Gadhafi regime’s weaponry also crossed Libya’s border to the east, to Egypt, and from there to terror cells operating in Sinai. These cells operate essentially against the new Egyptian regime, but this does not exclude terror attacks on Israel's border.