Key US allies, Turkey and Jordan, are thought to backing away from US calls for a ‘bomb ISIS’ coalition.

Ankara is a notable absentee among the nations that signed a joint communiqué at a Thursday meeting in Saudi Arabia, where US Secretary of State John Kerry was drumming up support for the US anti-Islamist effort. Turkey refused to join 10 Arab nations, who vowed to contribute “as appropriate” to the fight against the Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS) militants, who have taken over swathes of Syria and Iraq in a bid to create a fundamentalist Islamist caliphate.