On Monday, Hadi al-Bahra, President of the Syrian National Coalition, the organization that serves as the leadership and diplomatic arm of the Syrian opposition, went on the Daily Show and made a major claim: That the Syrian government is supporting ISIS. Al-Bahra makes this claim based on ISIS’ campaign against rebel groups and the fact that the Syrian government has taken no action against ISIS as it has carved out a state in rebel held territory. This is a major accusation, and deserves scrutiny.

The logical case that Mr. al-Bahra’s makes is that the Assad government wants to paint the Syrian opposition as terrorists, and having a terrorist armada moving in the rebels’ ranks would turn the West against them. Now, there is reason to this assessment: Assad has long insisted that the rebels are terrorists who he is rightfully putting down, and ISIS’ official entrance into the war in April 2013 roughly coincides with the end of the European Union’s full arms embargo of the Syrian conflict, allowing for the sale of arms to rebel groups. April 2013 was also the start of a major counter-offensive by the regime and its allies in Iran and Hezbollah, and ISIS’ presence in the war opened up a second front in the war, which has strained the rebels’ severely. Even if not coordinated, the entrance of ISIS was certainly fortuitous for the regime, and could warrant suspicion.

The claim is not being made by al-Bahra alone. Many observers have claimed that ISIS has been covertly making oil deals with the government, and that the regime is at least tacitly accepting the group’s presence in the region, with some agreeing with the conclusion that Assad is backing the group.

There is some logical backing to al-Bahra’s claims, and the presence of ISIS in Syria has certainly helped the Assad regime by weakening the rebels. However, there are several factors that make the claim that Assad is working with ISIS seem suspicious.

First of all, there is the basic religious issue to consider. Assad’s government is made up of Alawites, a Shia sect of Islam, and has allied himself with other Shia-run nations and terrorist groups. It has funded various Shia terrorist organizations over several decades, and some of its main allies in this war, Iran and Hezbollah, have aided the regime because they fear what the future government of this majority Sunni nation could mean for their interests. Most of the opposition, secular or not, is Sunni, and the fundamentalist groups fighting in the opposition are Sunni extremists. On the surface, it seems to go against the interests of Assad to fund ISIS when they are a Sunni extremist group. However, this alone is not evidence. It could easily be argued that they could only use a Sunni group for this purpose, as a Shia group would be immediately ostracized by the opposition while a Sunni group could move within their ranks and gather supporters to undermine them from within. So while the religious opposition between the regime and ISIS seems suspicious, it does not serve as strong evidence against the claim.

What does serve as evidence is that al-Bahra’s claim that ISIS and the regime have not come into conflict are false. While the groups have engaged in notably little direct fighting, ISIS has performed suicide bombings against the government and beheaded their soldiers (WARNING: GRAPHIC VIDEO). And while the government took little action against ISIS within their borders before June 2014, after the ISIS invasion of Iraq, the regime began a major bombing offensive against the group coordinated with the Baghdad government. So while the groups may not have fought extensively during 2013, they have certainly come to blows, and President al-Bahra’s claims of non-conflict between the groups are false.

What makes the claim seem more suspect is the history of the organization. While ISIS did announce their new organizational structure and their campaign in Syria in April 2013, they did not emerge overnight. As I pointed out in my last article, ISIS had been operating in Iraq for nearly a decade, and had been regaining power in that country since 2010 with their “Breaking Walls” campaign, with observers suggesting that the power of Islamist networks in Syria’s east and the freedom of movement the civil war gave those groups being major factors in ISIS’ resurgence.

Furthermore, ISIS did not start its campaign for an Islamic state in a vacuum. Mere days before ISIS’ rebranding and attempted merger with al-Nusra, Al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri urged the creation of an Islamic state in Syria. al-Zawahiri later rejected the attempted merger and banished the group from Al-Qaeda, but the call for an Islamic State was made.

The presence of al-Nusra in the war casts severe doubt on the opposition leader’s assertions of a regime hand in the rise of ISIS. While ISIS only began its campaign in Syria in April 2013, al-Nusra had been operating in the region for over a year. While no ties between the groups were acknowledged by any party before April 2013 – and al-Nusra Front leaders have denied al-Baghdadi’s claim that he created the organization – many observers have reported ties between the groups, and many al-Nusra fighters were believed to be veterans from the Al-Qaeda campaign in Iraq. Al-Nusra shares the ideology of ISIS, and reportedly lost many members in the schism due to ISIS’ more immediate commitment to the establishment of an Islamic state, which was and is the long-term goal of al-Nusra. So when you acknowledge that people with the same ideology and long-term goal as ISIS were operating in the region already, possibly with existing ties to that organization, it becomes hard to say that the support of the Assad government is necessary for their rise to power.

Additionally, Assad didn’t need to prop up ISIS in order to make the Syrian opposition look like terrorists – al-Nusra was already doing that. Al-Nusra had been performing suicide bombings against regime targets and enforcing Islamic law in the territories they controlled since their entrance into the war. Opposition leaders were worried about al-Nusra degrading support among the populace before the arrival of ISIS made al-Nusra look sane by comparison.

So why is this claim being made? Well, a cynical interpretation of events suggests that the answer lies again with al-Nusra. While the opposition worries about what the group’s harsh ideology will mean to them in the future, al-Nusra is still one of the most effective fighting forces that the rebels have. The National Coalition has called on the US to remove their designation of al-Nusra as a terrorist group due to their ongoing commitment to the overthrow of the regime. And now, as the US begins strikes on the al-Nusra linked Khorasan group, the rebels face the prospect of losing al-Nusra to ISIS as the group plans reconciliation with their ideological brother against the common enemy of the West.

It certainly would be convenient for the rebels, then, for ISIS to be a regime ploy. It would mean they wouldn’t risk losing one their most valuable players to their regional adversaries, as al-Nusra remains committed to bringing down Assad. It is in this context that Mr. al-Bahra claims that ISIS is backed by the Syrian government, and while there is no evidence that this issue motivated President al-Bahra’s remarks, there is about as much evidence that ISIS is backed by the regime.

The claim that the Assad government supports ISIS has some logic to it, but the arguments that support it overlook the history of ISIS in Syria, and the claim seems very conveniently timed given the difficulties facing the opposition. It is difficult to make definite determinations of allegiance in a situation as chaotic as this, but given the conflicting evidence on the ground, the claim should remain suspect.