Your one stop shop for all of your preparedness needs and proud sponsor of Truth FrequencyLibya 2.0 – Updates on Syria
By Chris Geo on Aug 12, 2012 with Comments
Syria crisis: US, Turkey consider no-fly zones
Damascus, August 13, 2012
Hillary Clinton says the United States and Turkey are looking at all measures to help bring and end to the violence in Syria. The United States and Turkey are considering imposing no-fly zones and other steps on Syria to help rebel forces, Hillary Clinton has announced.
The US secretary of state said she and the Turkish foreign minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, agreed to examine the possibility of imposing a flying ban, while Turkish media reported that they were also considering creating safe havens in Syria.
“It is one thing to talk about all kinds of potential actions, but you cannot make reasoned decisions without doing intense analysis and operational planning,” Clinton said. “Our intelligence services, our military have very important responsibilities and roles to play so we are going to be setting up a working group to do that.”
The imposition of no-fly zones by foreign powers were crucial in helping Libyan rebels overthrow Muammar Gaddafi. Until recently the international community has been reluctant to take an overt military role in 17-month-old conflict.
Davutoglu said it was time for outside powers to take decisive steps to resolve the humanitarian crisis in cities such as Aleppo, which is under daily Syrian government bombardment. Clinton was scheduled to hold talks with the Turkish prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and President Abdullah Gul. GNS
UN Designates “Free Syrian Army” Affiliates as Al Qaeda
US, UK, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Turkey stand accused of state sponsorship of terrorism. UN failure to enforce their own resolutions will resign their legitimacy, necessitate their expedient removal and replacement with multipolar system.
Tony Cartalucci, Contributor
Activist Post
The Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) currently arming, funding, and commanding entire brigades of the so-called “Free Syrian Army” (FSA), is designated an Al Qaeda affiliate by the United Nations pursuant to resolutions 1267 (1999) and 1989 (2011), in addition to being listed by both the US State Department and the UK Home Office (page 5, .pdf) as a foreign terrorist organization and a proscribed terrorist organization respectively.
Image: From UN.org – LIFG, who is now leading, arming, and funding (via Qatari, Saudi, Turkish, US, and British cash) entire brigades of the so-called “Free Syrian Army,” is clearly listed as an integral part of Al Qaeda, with the UN noting several prominent LIFG terrorists occupying the highest echelons of Al Qaeda’s command structure. These resolutions reflects other reports previously covered, including the US Army West Point Combating Terrorism Center report, “”Al-Qa’ida’s Foreign Fighters in Iraq” (summary here).
This means that the United States, the UK, NATO, and the Gulf State despots of Saudi Arabia and Qatar are knowingly and willfully funding, arming, and politically backing designated affiliates of Al Qaeda contrary not only to US and British anti-terror legislation, but contrary to numerous UN resolutions as well. Western and Gulf State support of the FSA constitutes state sponsorship of terrorism.
Image: In Libya – starting with the blue flak-jacketed Paul Conroy of the British press, standing to his left with a rifle slung across his chest is LIFG terrorist Mahdi al-Harati, now leading FSA brigades in Syria, to his left wearing green camouflage fatigues is Abdul Hakim Belhaj, LIFG commander who had visited the Turkish-Syrian border pledging weapons, cash, and fighters to FSA militants in November 2011. That same month, some 600 LIFG terrorists from Libya would enter Syria and begin militant operations. Al Qaeda was a creation of Western geopolitical interests, and to this day continues to serve these interests. The “War on Terror” is a fraud.
Should the UN fail to enforce its own resolutions, while playing host to further sanctions and considerations for military intervention against the Syrian government who is in fact resisting an international terrorist organization, it will have entirely resigned its legitimacy and authority as nothing more than a tool of Western corporate-financier interests. It will also highlight the necessity to expediently remove and replace it – ideally with a system that represents a multipolar balance of global power maintained by sovereign nation-states rather than untenable supranational governance.
The “Free Syrian Army”is Al Qaeda, led, armed, funded by Western-backed LIFG terrorists.
As previously reported (and here), both British and American journalists have clearly identified and documented the presence of foreign fighters with militant extremist ties pouring over the Turkish-Syrian border, most recently in an attempt to overrun the northern Syrian city of Aleppo. CNN, whose Ivan Watson accompanied FSA terrorists over the Turkish-Syrian border and into Aleppo revealed that indeed foreign fighters were amongst the militants. It was admitted that:
Meanwhile, residents of the village where the Syrian Falcons were headquartered said there were fighters of several North African nationalities also serving with the brigade’s ranks.
A volunteer Libyan fighter has also told CNN he intends to travel from Turkey to Syria within days to add a ‘platoon’ of Libyan fighters to armed movement.
On Wednesday, CNN’s crew met a Libyan fighter who had crossed into Syria from Turkey with four other Libyans. The fighter wore full camouflage and was carrying a Kalashnikov rifle. He said more Libyan fighters were on the way.
The foreign fighters, some of them are clearly drawn because they see this as … a jihad. So this is a magnet for jihadists who see this as a fight for Sunni Muslims.
Image: From BBC’s Ian Pannell who also accompanied terrorists across the Turkish-Syrian border and into Aleppo, he reported young men “suspected” of being “Shabiha” being rounded up as the FSA “seeks revenge.” BBC fails categorically to explain how NATO-backed terrorists can “liberate”a city that is admittedly pro-government – but it appears it will be done through terrorism, brutality, mass murder, and intimidation.
Foreign Policy magazine in an article titled, “The Syrian Rebels’ Libyan Weapon,” has gone as far as writing a two page profile on Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) commander Mahdi al-Harati and his role in leading the so-called “Free Syrian Army.” Also recently, the Council on Foreign Relations, a premier Fortune 500-funded US think-tank, wrote in their article, “Al-Qaeda’s Specter in Syria,” that:
The Syrian rebels would be immeasurably weaker today without al-Qaeda in their ranks. By and large, Free Syrian Army (FSA) battalions are tired, divided, chaotic, and ineffective. Feeling abandoned by the West, rebel forces are increasingly demoralized as they square off with the Assad regime’s superior weaponry and professional army. Al-Qaeda fighters, however, may help improve morale. The influx of jihadis brings discipline, religious fervor, battle experience from Iraq, funding from Sunni sympathizers in the Gulf, and most importantly, deadly results. In short, the FSA needs al-Qaeda now
Clearly then, US, British, NATO, and Gulf State aid is being sent to the FSA whose ranks are admittedly filled by Al Qaeda.
Also, to be clear, the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) is in fact an affiliate of Al Qaeda with its commanders having occupied the highest echelons of Al Qaeda’s command structure and having participated in every combat engagement Al Qaeda has conducted since its inception via US-Saudi cash and arms in the mountains of Afghanistan in the 1980s. This was documented meticulously in the US Army’s West Point Combating Terrorism Center report, “Al-Qa’ida’s Foreign Fighters in Iraq.”
LIFG is also listed by both the US State Department and the UK Home Office (page 5, .pdf) as a foreign terrorist organization and a proscribed terrorist organization respectively.
Foreign Policy’s admission of al-Harati’s role in organizing and leading the FSA in Syria, and the inclusion of Libyan terrorists in his brigade are by no means the only role LIFG is playing in the Syrian violence. LIFG commander Abdul Hakim Belhaj had visited the Turkish-Syrian border in late 2011 pledging Libyan arms, cash, and fighters to the FSA – with the nation of Libya itself having already become a NATO-created terrorist safe-haven.
It is clear that LIFG, and by implication Al Qaeda, is playing a significant role in the violence in Syria, not only undermining the narrative of the unrest being an “indigenous” “pro-democracy uprising,” but also implicating foreign nations who are funding and arming militants as state sponsors of terrorism.
Included amongst these state sponsors of international terrorism are Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the Hariri faction in northern Lebanon, as well as the NATO-installed government of Libya. This also includes both the United States, who is admittedly providing cash and equipment for the FSA as well as coordinating efforts to arm militants, and now the UK once again with their latest announcement.
A similar scenario unfolded in Libya, where LIFG terrorists were likewise carrying out a campaign of nationwide genocide with NATO providing air support. Similarly, by funding, arming, and coordinating acts of violence with LIFG fighters, NATO, and in particular, France, England, and the United States, were guilty of violating both their own respective anti-terrorism legislation, as well as international provisions against terrorism.
Syrian Soldiers Battle Rebel Forces as U.S. Warns of Terrorism
By Nayla Razzouk and Selcuk Gokoluk on August 12, 2012
Syrian forces battled rebel fighters in cities including Homs and Aleppo as the U.S. warned of the growing tide of refugees from the conflict and the rising threat of terrorism.
Fifty-three people were killed in clashes throughout the country, including 24 in Homs, the Local Coordination Committee, an opposition group, said in an e-mailed statement. Rebel fighters also battled government troops in Aleppo, Syria’s largest city, the group said.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met yesterday with Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu and said the number of refugees will keep increasing. The two announced the creation of a working group to deal with threats emanating from the deteriorating regime of Syria’s Bashar Al-Assad including terrorism.
More than 21,000 people have been killed in the conflict, according to the opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, as fighting becomes increasingly sectarian. Another 1.5 million have been displaced. The rebels are largely members of the majority Sunni Muslim community while Assad is a representative of the minority Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shiite Islam.
A planned “urgent meeting” of Arab foreign ministers in Saudi Arabia’s Jeddah today to discuss the conflict was postponed, Egypt’s Middle East News Agency reported, citing Arab League Assistant Secretary-General Ahmed Ben Helli. It didn’t provide the reasons or a new date or time for the meeting.
Syrian Activists: Communications Down in Flashpoint City of Aleppo
VOA News
August 12, 2012
Syrian activists say all communications are down in large parts of the countryside and in the flashpoint city of Aleppo, where government forces reportedly have been pushing rebel forces out of position since last week.
It is unclear what caused the cut in communications since early Sunday. Despite this, the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said it had reports that the army was continuing to shell rebel-held districts in the country’s largest city. There also were reports of violence elsewhere in the country.
The Arab League has postponed a meeting of foreign ministers that had been scheduled for Sunday in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, to discuss the Syrian situation and a replacement for peace envoy Kofi Annan, who resigned earlier this month.
An Arab League official did not give a reason for the delay and did not say when the meeting might be rescheduled. The announcement came while U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is in Istanbul to discuss Syria with Turkish leaders.
Officials say Clinton is meeting with President Abdullah Gul, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and other Turkish officials to discuss how to deal with neighboring Syria. Turkey is hosting tens of thousands of Syrians who have fled the violence in their home country.
Genesis of US-Saudi “Al Qaeda Frankenstein” in Syria
by Tony Cartalucci
August 11, 2012 – “To undermine Iran, which is predominantly Shiite, the Bush
Administration has decided, in effect, to reconfigure its priorities in
the Middle East. In Lebanon, the Administration has coöperated with
Saudi Arabia’s government, which is Sunni, in clandestine operations
that are intended to weaken Hezbollah, the Shiite organization that is
backed by Iran. The U.S. has also taken part in clandestine operations
aimed at Iran and its ally Syria. A by-product of these activities has
been the bolstering of Sunni extremist groups that espouse a militant
vision of Islam and are hostile to America and sympathetic to Al Qaeda.”
-The Redirection, Seymour Hersh March 5, 2007
“In the nineteen-eighties and the early nineties, the Saudi government
offered to subsidize the covert American C.I.A. proxy war against the
Soviet Union in Afghanistan. Hundreds of young Saudis were sent into the
border areas of Pakistan, where they set up religious schools, training
bases, and recruiting facilities. Then, as now, many of the operatives
who were paid with Saudi money were Salafis. Among them, of course, were
Osama bin Laden and his associates, who founded Al Qaeda, in 1988.
This time, the U.S. government consultant told me, Bandar [bin Sultan] and other
Saudis have assured the White House that “they will keep a very close
eye on the religious fundamentalists. Their message to us was ‘We’ve
created this movement, and we can control it.’ It’s not that we don’t
want the Salafis to throw bombs; it’s who they throw them at—Hezbollah, Moqtada al-Sadr, Iran, and at the Syrians, if they continue to work with Hezbollah and Iran.”
-The Redirection, Seymour Hersh March 5, 2007
America’s Implausible Deniability
Quite clearly, since 2007, the US and its allies were knowingly arraying sectarian extremists with direct ties to Al Qaeda against Lebanon, Syria, and Iran. Likewise in 2011, the US while leading NATO operations in Libya, armed, trained, funded, and provided air support for Libya Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) militants – also with direct ties to Al Qaeda.
Al Qaeda, by all accounts, is a joint US-Saudi creation, led by a Saudi (Osama bin Laden), and armed and funded by Western arms and cash laundered through Saudi Arabia to maintain both “plausible deniability” for the US, and to maintain a semblance of credibility for Al Qaeda militants across the Muslim World.
The now feigned, preposterous “fears” the US is expressing as the monster they’ve created becomes known to global public opinion, constitutes a new depth of depravity in regards to Western foreign policy, ultimately and irrevocably undermining the legitimacy of the West’s collective institutions and its status as a “stabilizing force” in global geopolitics.
The Associated Press joins Western governments in resigning its legitimacy and credibility with their recent report titled, “U.S. fears extremists could highjack goals of anti-Assad rebels,” which claims:
Al-Qaida has advanced beyond isolated pockets of activity in Syria and
now is building a network of well-organized cells, according to U.S.
intelligence officials, who fear that the terrorists could be
establishing a foothold that would be hard to defeat if rebels
eventually oust President Bashar Assad.
AP also claims:
At least a couple hundred al-Qaida-linked militants already are
operating in Syria, and their ranks are growing as foreign fighters
stream into the country daily, current and former U.S. intelligence
officials say. The units are spreading from city to city, with veterans
of the Iraq insurgency employing their expertise in bomb-building to
carry out more than two dozen attacks so far. Others are using their
experience in coordinating small units of fighters in Afghanistan to win
new followers.
While AP attempts to claim this is a disturbing trend that “US officials” are worried about, other representatives of the corporate-financier interests driving Western foreign policy are attempting to repackage Al Qaeda as “necessary” and shifting to a benign ally.
Image: As more photos depicting Syria’s so-called “Free Syrian Army” as fighting under the banner of Al Qaeda emerge, hiding Al Qaeda’s presence becomes more difficult for the Western press and the corporate-financier interests they represent. Therefore a simultaneous campaign is being waged to spin Al Qaeda’s presence as “recent” and “unexpected,” while attempts are made to repackage the militant group as “heroes.”
Recently, the Council on Foreign Relations, a premier Fortune 500-funded US think-tank, wrote in their article, “Al-Qaeda’s Specter in Syria,” that:
“The Syrian rebels would be immeasurably weaker today without al-Qaeda in
their ranks. By and large, Free Syrian Army (FSA) battalions are tired,
divided, chaotic, and ineffective. Feeling abandoned by the West, rebel
forces are increasingly demoralized as they square off with the Assad
regime’s superior weaponry and professional army. Al-Qaeda fighters,
however, may help improve morale. The influx of jihadis brings
discipline, religious fervor, battle experience from Iraq, funding from
Sunni sympathizers in the Gulf, and most importantly, deadly results. In
short, the FSA needs al-Qaeda now.”
Also, while AP attempts to portray this disturbing trend as recent, Reuters had reported in their article, “Outgunned Syria rebels make shift to bombs” that months ago that militants operating in Syria had already begun deploying terrorist bombings utilizing skills honed by extremist militants who fought in Iraq over the last decade.
The Telegraph reported even earlier, in November 2011, that Al Qaeda’s LIFG commander Abdul Hakim Belhaj had personally visited the Turkish-Syrian border to pledge cash, weapons, and fighters toward efforts in subverting Syria. Also in late 2011, reports that Libyan fighters, at least 600 of them, had already made their way to Syria began surfacing. As early as April 2011, the role of Al Qaeda in violence playing out all across the US-engineered “Arab Spring” was covered in Dr. Webster Tarpley’s “Al Qaeda: Pawns of CIA Insurrection from Libya to Yemen,” where Syria was specifically mentioned as targeted by the West’s supra-regional campaign.
If the alternative media knew in 2011 that Al Qaeda was on the ground in both Libya and Syria (and elsewhere), and if the New Yorker already reported, point for point exactly who and how events would play out in Syria, as far back as 2007, how is it then that the US only now “fears” extremists of their own creation “hijacking” the goals of the so-called opposition?
The answer of course is the US knew from the very beginning, in fact, long before the beginning. The use of militant extremists to undermine and overrun Syria in an orgy of sectarian driven violence was the chosen method of operation since at least 2007. The US decided to deploy a proxy force, the same one in fact the West had deployed in the mountains of Afghanistan in the 1980′s. Al Qaeda was a creation of US-Saudi machinations. It is a continuing manifestation of their collective machinations to this day.
Like Weapons of Mass Destruction, Strict Conventions Must Be Arrayed Against “Proxy Wars.”
Sarin nerve gas, anthrax, and nuclear weapons are considered weapons of such indiscriminate mass destruction, that their use is not only prohibited by both national and international laws and conventions around the world, but have entered civilization’s collective conscience as untenable and inexcusable to use on the battlefield.
Image: Nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons are considered weapons of mass destruction, and because of their indiscriminate nature, are banned by both national and international conventions. Proxy terrorists and mercenaries deployed into foreign countries (such as Libyans deploying to fight in Syria with US-Saudi backing) are not only indiscriminate, creating mass destruction and carrying out egregious atrocities, but do so for months, even years. Likewise their use should be banned by national/international conventions and nations caught employing them should have sanctions, severe penalties, and at the very least international condemnation leveled against them.
And just as Sarin nerve gas indiscriminately causes vast swaths of death, or a nuclear weapon kills all within its effective radius, so too do roving proxy armies, fanatically indoctrinated, monetarily motivated, armed, and funded by foreign interests, indiscriminately killing any and all that oppose them. While the West has used the possession and potential use of “weapons of mass destruction” as an excuse to violate the sovereignty of independent nation-states, it itself is deploying indiscriminate tactics leaving tens of thousands dead in nations like Libya, Somalia, Yemen, Sudan, Mali, and Syria.
If deploying weapons of mass destruction against a population is considered a grievous war crime because of the indiscriminate, unsparing effects of such implements, then surely deploying armed proxies consisting of fanatical killers is likewise a grievous war crime – perhaps more so because of the extended sustainability of such operations, and the capacity to keep on killing and terrorizing for months, even years.
And while we will continue to protest the machinations of the West, we must identify, boycott and replace the very corporate-financier interests underwriting this abhorrent agenda. The process of protesting is moot if it is not done in tandem with an appropriate application of real, tangible activism. To protest Western policy, but then patronize the very corporate-financier interests driving it, is self-defeating and ultimately futile.
Source: http://landdestroyer.blogspot.com/2012/08/western-media-covers-spins-up-al-qaeda.html
Clinton: Chemical warfare is planned for. Rebels get first anti-air Stingers
DEBKAfile Exclusive Report August 11, 2012, 5:36 PM (GMT+02:00)
Turkey has sent the Syrian rebels fighting in Aleppo their first shipment of shoulder-carried, anti-air FIM-92 Stingers, debkafile’s military sources report. More are on the way to insurgent groups battling government forces around Damascus and other parts of Syria.
In Istanbul, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton held talks Saturday, Aug. 11, with Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan and Syrian opposition figures, after which she announced US and Turkish intelligence services and military would set up a joint working team to plan for “many contingencies including the very horrible scenario of the use of chemical weapons.”
debkafile’s US, Turkish and Israeli intelligence sources are taking into account that Bashar Assad will view the supply of Stingers to the rebels as a game changer that threatens to tip the balance of the war against him and respond with chemical warfare against the rebels, Turkey, Israel and Jordan.
In consideration of this menace, France last week flew a medical field hospital specializing in treating chemical poisoning from its medical base at Istres to northern Jordan and set it up close to the Syrian border.
Our sources also disclose that Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan’s decision to put Stingers in Syrian rebel hands came after Assad’s forces shot down a Turkish Air Force F-4 with Russian-made Pantsyr-1 air defense missiles over Latakia on June 22.
He was also paying Bashar Assad back for allowing Turkish Kurdish rebel PKK forces to transfer 2,500 fighters to the Syrian-Turkish border.
Turkey manufactures the Stingers under American license and is obliged by contract to obtain US permission for their transfer to a third party. It was granted by Washington on the quiet. This made it possible for Ankara to supply the rebel Syrian Free Army with the weapon needed to shoot down government assault helicopters, while the Obama administration continued to assert that America was providing the revolt with nothing more than “nonlethal assistance.”
By the same token, British Foreign Secretary William Hague was able to claim Friday, Aug. 10, that his government had granted Syrian rebels $8 million of “non-military support.”
Our military sources report that Washington and Ankara briefed Britain, Saudi Arabia and Qatar on the Stingers delivery after the oil states offered to fund them and also pay for the courses run by American, British and Turkish instructors for training the rebels in their use.
Washington is taking care to keep control over the Stingers’ supplies and make sure they reach the right hands and are used in the right measure.
While the Obama administration wants to see the back of Bashar Assad and his clique, it has no wish to see rebel tactics powerful enough to break the back of the Syrian army and air force, because that would plunge the country into unbridled civil strife and chaos for years to come. The US wants the army preserved as a cohesive operational entity, capable of safeguarding an alternative administration when it takes Assad’s place in Damascus or possibly Aleppo, Syria’s largest city and its commercial hub.
To defeat Assad’s military offensive, debkafile’s military sources estimate the rebels will need 300-400 Stingers. They have received the first 20-30 for tipping the scales of battle in Aleppo. The next shipment will most likely help them assert control over a “corridor” from Aleppo to the Turkish border as a potential future safe haven, another topic highlighted in Clinton’s talks in Istanbul.
Asked about this after those talks, she said it was a possible option.
The missiles are therefore being handed out in careful doses. At the same time, our military sources report that the rebels using the Stingers in Aleppo against Syrian gunships and fighter jets since Tuesday, Aug. 7, have not managed to hit anything. There may be two possible reasons for their consistent misses:
1. Inexperience: They may need more instruction and practice;
2. Assad’s air force may have been equipped by Moscow with decoy devices developed by the Russian arms industry for muddling the American Stingers.
The Stinger is a heat-seeking missile, which sticks to its target in all conditions. The microprocessor in its warhead is designed to ignore decoys and hold it on course. It should take no more than a few days to determine whether the Russians have developed new countermeasures to defeat the Stinger and given them to the Damascus.
The Russians have a long score to settle with the Stinger. It was the weapon in the hands of American-backed Muslim forces in Afghanistan which more than any other forced the Red Army to quit the country in 1985 by knocking out the Russian troops’ air cover.
Reps From Half the World’s Population Meet to Resist Foreign Destabilization in Syria
Tony Cartalucci, Contributor
Activist Post
Iran has recently hosted 30 nationsincluding Russia, China, India, Pakistan, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Ecuador, Afghanistan, Algeria, Iraq, Oman, Turkmenistan, Venezuela, Cuba, Jordan, Tunisia, Palestine, and many others in Tehran this week in efforts to support the Syrian government against foreign destabilization. Upon the agenda were calls to end foreign arms currently flowing into terrorist hands inside Syria, proposals to broker a meaningful ceasefire, the coordination of humanitarian aid, and supporting the Syrian people’s right to reform without foreign interference.The unique conference featured representatives of over half of the world’s population, and signals that indeed, Syria’s government is not as “isolated” as portrayed by Western neo-imperialists.
Image: An impressive counter to the so-called “Friends of Syria” confabs held by Wall Street and London corporate-financier interests in an attempt to sway global opinion toward a repeat of Libya’s destruction at NATO’s hands, the International Consultative Conference hosed by Iran seeks to end the flow of foreign arms into militant hands and resolve political differences through more civilized means.
The meeting comes as revelations emerge that the United States, United Kingdom, NATO-member Turkey, and members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) are supplying weapons, cash, and other assistance to foreign militants with direct links to Al Qaeda. These include Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) militants who are in fact listed by both the US State Department and the UK Home Office (page 5, .pdf) as a foreign terrorist organization and a proscribed terrorist organization respectively.
As foreign militants continue to flow over Syria’s borders bolstered with an increase in foreign aid, sectarian violence has spiraled out of control. The UN has categorically failed to condemn the West’s state sponsorship of international terrorism now ravaging Syria. It appears that nations around the world, including shareholders in the Anglo-American establishment, may be having second thoughts about the increasingly untenable enterprise the West has chosen to pursue.
Earlier this month, during a Saudi-Qatari sponsored, US-UK-backed UN resolution, a large number of nations either voted no, abstained, or failed to attend the vote, indicating slipping support for what is sometimes called the “Washington consensus.”
US, GCC, and NATO actions in Libya in support of sectarian militants to install a stable of Western-created proxies into power has stripped away much of the “primacy” of “international law” and left the willfully abused geopolitical tenant of “responsibility to protect” (R2P) irrevocably in tatters. With the West’s attempted destabilization of Syria stalled, global public opinion has grown aware of the true nature of Syria’s so-called “rebels,” and that many are foreign fighters committing an array of abhorrent atrocities. The UN’s failure to act, or even worse, its role in facilitating what equates to military aggression couched in “humanitarian” pretenses, jeopardizes international law all together.
The West has ungracefully faced this quandary of its own creation by simultaneously attempting to use the presence of Al Qaeda terrorists as a causus belli to militarily intervene while also rebranding Al Qaeda as champions of freedom in Syria.
One breathtaking account was given by the Fortune 500-funded Council on Foreign Relations in their article, “Al-Qaeda’s Specter in Syria,” claiming:
The Syrian rebels would be immeasurably weaker today without al-Qaeda in their ranks. By and large, Free Syrian Army (FSA) battalions are tired, divided, chaotic, and ineffective. Feeling abandoned by the West, rebel forces are increasingly demoralized as they square off with the Assad regime’s superior weaponry and professional army. Al-Qaeda fighters, however, may help improve morale. The influx of jihadis brings discipline, religious fervor, battle experience from Iraq, funding from Sunni sympathizers in the Gulf, and most importantly, deadly results. In short, the FSA needs al-Qaeda now.
Clearly, no nation in good conscience, or at least interested in self-preservation, could condone the overt destabilization of Syria by foreign powers with disingenuous motives, using listed-terrorist organizations to do so. The potential of this same ploy then being turned against other nations including members of Iran’s 30 nation conference, or even the US and UK’s “Friends of Syria” confabs, becomes increasingly more likely if such tactics are not condemned and altogether balked.
While US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton talks of “no-fly zones” with NATO-member Turkey this week, the successful conference in Tehran illustrates that any such act of aggression will be carried out unilaterally, further undermining the West’s own contrived “international order” with a growing number of nations standing in direct opposition, not in support of, Wall Street and London’s next move.
Iran plans to hold another such conference later this month.
UK Sends £5 Million to Listed Terrorists in Syria
US-UK listed terror organization Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) fighters and commanders are clearly amongst militants underwritten by latest UK funding.
Tony Cartalucci, Contributor
Activist Post
In direct violation of both American and British anti-terrorism legislation, particularly provisions regarding providing material support for listed or proscribed terrorist organizations, the United Kingdom has just announced that it will provide armed militants that include listed terror organizations with a £5 million tranche of what it calls “non-lethal practical assistance.”
Image: Little else could accentuate the hypocrisy and unhinged madness of US and British foreign policy more than Foreign Secretary William Hague announcing his government’s decision to fund genocidal sectarian extremists murdering under the flag of Al Qaeda in Syria.
Both British and American journalists have clearly identified and documented the presence of foreign fighters with militant extremist ties pouring over the Turkish-Syrian border, most recently in an attempt to overrun the northern Syrian city of Aleppo. CNN, whose Ivan Watson accompanied FSA terrorists over the Turkish-Syrian border and into Aleppo revealed that indeed foreign fighters were amongst the militants.
Meanwhile, residents of the village where the Syrian Falcons were headquartered said there were fighters of several North African nationalities also serving with the brigade’s ranks.
A volunteer Libyan fighter has also told CNN he intends to travel from Turkey to Syria within days to add a “platoon” of Libyan fighters to armed movement.
On Wednesday, CNN’s crew met a Libyan fighter who had crossed into Syria from Turkey with four other Libyans. The fighter wore full camouflage and was carrying a Kalashnikov rifle. He said more Libyan fighters were on the way.
The foreign fighters, some of them are clearly drawn because they see this as … a jihad. So this is a magnet for jihadists who see this as a fight for Sunni Muslims. Foreign Policy magazine in an article titled, “The Syrian Rebels’ Libyan Weapon,” has gone as far as writing a two-page profile on Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) commander Mahdi al-Harati and his role in leading the so-called “Free Syrian Army.” Also recently, the Council on Foreign Relations, a premier Fortune 500-funded US think-tank, wrote in their article, “Al-Qaeda’s Specter in Syria,” that:
The Syrian rebels would be immeasurably weaker today without al-Qaeda in their ranks. By and large, Free Syrian Army (FSA) battalions are tired, divided, chaotic, and ineffective. Feeling abandoned by the West, rebel forces are increasingly demoralized as they square off with the Assad regime’s superior weaponry and professional army. Al-Qaeda fighters, however, may help improve morale. The influx of jihadis brings discipline, religious fervor, battle experience from Iraq, funding from Sunni sympathizers in the Gulf, and most importantly, deadly results. In short, the FSA needs al-Qaeda now.
Clearly then, British aid is being sent to the FSA whose ranks are admittedly filled by Al Qaeda.
Also, to be clear, the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) is in fact an affiliate of Al Qaeda with its commanders having occupied the highest echelons of Al Qaeda’s command structure and having participated in every combat engagement Al Qaeda has conducted since its inception via US-Saudi cash and arms in the mountains of Afghanistan in the 1980s. This was documented meticulously in the US Army’s West Point Combating Terrorism Center report, “Al-Qa’ida’s Foreign Fighters in Iraq.”
LIFG is also listed by both the US State Department and the UK Home Office (page 5, .pdf) as a foreign terrorist organization and a proscribed terrorist organization respectively.
Foreign Policy’s admission of al-Harati’s role in organizing and leading the FSA in Syria, and the inclusion of Libyan terrorists in his brigade are by no means the only role LIFG is playing in the Syrian violence. LIFG commander Abdul Hakim Belhaj had visited the Turkish-Syrian border in late 2011 pledging Libyan arms, cash, and fighters to the FSA – with the nation of Libya itself having already become a NATO-created terrorist safe-haven.
It is clear that LIFG, and by implication Al Qaeda, is playing a significant role in the violence in Syria, not only undermining the narrative of the unrest being an “indigenous” “pro-democracy uprising,” but also implicating foreign nations who are funding and arming militants as state sponsors of terrorism.
Included amongst these state sponsors of international terrorism are Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the Hariri faction in northern Lebanon, as well as the NATO-installed government of Libya. This also includes both the United States, who is admittedly providing cash and equipment for the FSA as well as coordinating efforts to arm militants, and now the UK once again with their latest announcement.
With an increasing number of overt atrocities being carried out by the FSA and its ranks of extremist sectarian militants, including kidnappings, abuses, and massacres observed recently in Aleppo, it is unconscionable for the West to even rhetorically back what is clearly a sectarian-driven conflict, let alone provide equipment, cash, and arms. However, British Foreign Secretary William Hague calls it, “the right thing to do.”
Image: The Western media is covering – or more accurately, “spinning” – an unfolding sectarian genocide in Syria’s largest city Aleppo. In the alleys of seized streets, FSA terrorists are detaining, torturing, and killing anyone suspected of supporting the government. Such suspicions coincidentally run along sectarian divisions. By using the label “Shabiha” for all of FSA’s victims, the Western press has given a carte blanche to genocidal sectarian extremists and by doing so, has become complicit in war crimes themselves. For the British, or any other nation for that matter, to provide the FSA with even rhetorical, let alone material support, is an egregious act of international terrorism.
It is unclear whether Hague means – violating the laws of his own nation to provide material support for known, proscribed terrorists is “the right thing to do” – or if he means it is “right” to perpetuate the bloodbath in Syria as prescribed by the US Fortune 500-funded think-tank, Brookings Institution in their “Middle East Memo #21,” which suggested the West “pin down the Asad regime and bleed it, keeping a regional adversary weak, while avoiding the costs of direct intervention.” Either way, the unhinged, morally bankrupted foreign policy of the Anglo-American establishment is on full display, undermining and irrevocably damaging the legitimacy of their collective institutions in the process.
A similar scenario unfolded in Libya, where LIFG terrorists were likewise carrying out a campaign of nationwide genocide with NATO providing air support. Similarly, by funding, arming, and coordinating acts of violence with LIFG fighters, NATO, and in particular, France, England, and the United States, were guilty of violating both their own respective anti-terrorism legislation, as well as international provisions against terrorism.
The brazen illegitimacy of NATO’s actions against Libya surely played a role in hobbling, perhaps permanently, the contrived geopolitical ploy of “Responsibility to Protect” (R2P) while simultaneously undermining the “primacy of international law.”
The protracted difficulty of the West to repeat their success in Syria can be perhaps owed in part to the unhinged policy and agenda pursued and exposed in Libya.
U.S. slaps new sanctions on Syria, extends those against Hezbollah
CNN
August 10, 2012
The United States announced new sanctions Friday against Syria and its supporters, focusing on Hezbollah’s support for the regime and a Syrian oil company for violating U.S. sanctions on Iran.
The U.S. State Department sanctioned the refiner Sytrol for selling $36 million of gasoline to Iran in April.
Earlier Friday, the U.S. Treasury Department announced an extension of sanctions against Hezbollah, a Lebanon-based Shiite militant group, for its support of the Syrian government.
Webster Tarpley: Turkish & Saudi Officers Running Death Squads in Syria
(INFOWARS) Webster Tarpley talks about the latest developments in Syria as the push to depose Assad intensifies. Webster also addresses the Petraeus issue.
High Iranian official in Beirut for urgent talks with Hizballah on Syria, Israel
DEBKAfile Exclusive Report August 7, 2012, 1:40 PM (GMT+02:00)
Monday, Aug. 6, the head of Iran’s National Security Council Saeed Jalili touched down in Beirut ran’s shortly after Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani declared: “The fire that has been ignited in Syria will take the fearful (Israelis) with it. Jalili (not Larijani as misreported earlier) came for urgent on-the-spot coordination with Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah before continuing Tuesday to Damascus.
One of Iranian leader Ali Khamenei’s most trusted advisers, Jalilee’s first action on arriving in the Lebanese capital was to pay homage at the tomb of Imad Moughniye, HIzballah’s late military commander. He said: “The resistance against Israel had many stars, but Moughniye was the moon.”
His movements were closely guarded by a bevy of Hizballah security forces and Al Qods Brigades heavies in civvies.
Since the dead arch-terrorist Moughniye spent his latter years devising innovative clandestine operations against Israel, including the kidnap of soldiers (His earlier years were marked by spectacular outrages against Americans), Israel clearly dominated his meeting with Nasrallah.
Nasrallah set the tone by his speech Monday marking iftar (the nightly meal breaking the Ramadan fast): “All Muslim sects do not accept the approach of slaughtering and killing over differences with each other. This is among the biggest threats our societies are facing and I say there are two threats: Israel and Takfiri, who [have the] minds of murderers.”
Neither therefore concealed the object of their concern. Jalilee, who is also Iran’s senior nuclear negotiator with the world polwers, was present.
According to debkafile’s military sources, their discussion turned on military action against Israel in the context of the next stage ahead of the Syrian crisis.
That stage was already marked by the rumors circulating in Syria and Lebanon. They claimed that Bashar Assad had died in mysterious circumstances, and his wife Basma, children and close family, including his brother Gen. Maher Assad, were at Latakia port awaiting vessels or aircraft to lift them to safety.
debkafile’s sources say those rumors are without foundation. At the same time, the visible crumbling of the top Syrian leadership is making wild scenarios believable. Sunni figures who had cast in their lot with the Alawite-dominated Assad regime have begun heading for the exits, depriving it of a major prop.
Assad’s grip on power is further shaken by the spreading conviction among his enemies and friends alike that he and his family have made plans for their getaway and are bound to carry them out sooner or later.
The defections to Jordan of Riad Hijab Monday, two months after he was appointed Syrian prime minister, and three members of his cabinet, were not in themselves a direct blow to the regime. In Damascus, where the president reigns supreme, the prime minister is a technocrat rather than a political figure and easily replaced. However, they did contribute dramatically to the general sense of a government cracking fast under the pressures of the revolt against Assad rule.
It must therefore be taken fore granted that Jalilee and Nasrallah, both shrewd operators, will have realized their ally in Damascus is going down. Instead of lamenting his impending undoing, they will have got down to brass tacks for asserting their command and control after his departure – before it is too late. Military plans for Israel are no doubt part of their schemes.
Jalili in Damascus underscores Iran’s commitment to Assad
DEBKAfile Special Report August 7, 2012, 9:20 PM (GMT+02:00)
Tehran gave Bashar Assad its strongest avowal of support Tuesday, Aug. 7, while heaping threats on the heads of his enemies. Saeed Jalili, head of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, stood alongside the Syrian ruler in Damascus at the end of their talks and vowed not to let Iran’s “close partnership with the Syrian leadership to be shaken by the uprising or external foes” or the “axis of resistance (Iran, Syria, Hizballah) be broken in any way.” Assad then affirmed his determination to purge Syria of violence and bring his forces to victory.
debkafile: When Iranian and Syrian leaders refer to “external foes,” they mean the US, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Israel.
Jalilii was sent to Damascus to publicly and unambiguously display Iran’s commitment to save Assad from being overthrown either by internal or external forces. He arrived from Beirut after a conference Monday with Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah. The Iranian official most likely laid before the Syrian ruler plans for the responses of the three allies to coming events in the Syrian conflict.
debkafile reported earlier Tuesday:
Tehran is not done with threats after shaking its fist at Israel: Tuesday, Aug. 7, Iranian Armed Forces Chief Gen. Hassan Firuzabadi pointed at Ankara and other Middle East capitals when he declared: “Turkey will be next in line for violence after Syria if it continues to work on behalf of Western interests.”
He went on to assert that “Ankara is toeing the Western (American) line in the region, like Saudi Arabia and Qatar. They are therefore accountable for the bloodshed in the Arab Republic [Syria]”
The Iranian army chief warned: “If those nations carry on this way, they should realize that Turkey is the next in line.” He was in fact holding them all responsible for a potential outbreak of war with Turkey.
Spreading around responsibility for violence with accompanying threats appears to be Iran’s latest diplomatic ploy.
Earlier Tuesday, Tehran passed a message to Washington in which the United States was held responsible for the lives of the 48 Iranians nabbed by Syrian rebels in Damascus last week. The message was dropped off at the Swiss embassy in Tehran which handles US interests in the absence of diplomatic ties. It denied that the hostages were Revolutionary Guardsmen and insisted they were pilgrims to Shiite shrines in Syria. All the countries “supporting current events in Syria, starting with the US,” would be held responsible for their safety by Tehran.
The rebel Free Syrian Army‘s Al-Baraa Brigade has threatened to execute its Iranian “prisoners” if Syrian army shelling continues against Aleppo. Three were reported already dead as a result of that shelling.
Gen. Firuzabadi addressed his threat to Turkey shortly before the arrival in Ankara of Iran’s foreign minister, Ali-Akbar Salehi, in the hope of galvanizing the Turks into forcing the Syrian rebels to let go of their Iranian hostages.
Tehran now holds at least three nations, the US, Turkey and Israel, in peril of military action in the context of the Syrian conflict. Israel was the object of the first threat of engulfment by the “Syrian fire.”
Director of Iran’s National Security Council Saeed Jalili arrived Monday in Beirut for urgent talks with Hizballah leaders, as disclosed by debkafile in an earlier report.
Wartime tasks split: US to smash Iran’s missiles, Israel tackle Syria, Hizballah
DEBKAfile Exclusive Report August 5, 2012, 1:38 PM (GMT+02:00)
An authoritative US military source told debkafile Sunday, Aug. 5 that the American armed forces are standing ready for war with Iran. Without going into the thorny question of who should lead the operation to dismantle Iran’s nuclear program, the US or Israel, it is understood that one of the US Air Force’s tasks will be to destroy Iran’s Shehab-3 ballistic missile batteries which have Israel and Saudi Arabia within range.
This task is not as formidable as Iranian spokesmen would have the world believe. Tehran’s entire stock of those missiles is no more than 30-40. That quantity is not nearly enough to take on the entire gamut of potential wartime foes, the United States Middle East bases, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Jordan and Turkey. They would quckly be picked off by American Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense Systems and Israeli Arrow guided interceptor rockets, which are synchronized through the advanced US X-Band radar systems installed in the Israeli Negev and southeast Turkey.
In any case, it is hard to believe that Iran would empty its entire ballistic missile arsenal in a single blazing assault at the start of war. “They are too canny to leave themselves without some Shehabs in reserve for crises even more acute than the outbreak of war,” said the US military source.
He went on to explain that by wiping out the Shehabs, the US high command would leave the Israeli Air Force free to take on the thousands of rockets Syria, the Lebanese Hizballah and the Palestinian Hamas and Jihad Islami have stored ready for shooting in support of an Iranian missile offensive – not just against Israel, but Turkey and Jordan as well.
Saturday, the Iranian Defense Minister, Gen. Ahmad Vahidi, announced that his ministry’s aerospace industries had successfully test-fired the fourth generation of high-precision Fateh-110 missiles with a range of over 300km.
He said that the new missiles can hit and destroy both land and sea targets, enemy concentration points, command centers, missile sites, ammunition dumps, radars and other targets with 100 percent precision.
debkafile’s military sources add that the Fateh-110 is the core weapon Syria and Hizballah have stocked for destroying strategic targets in Israel, Jordan and Turkey.
Sunday, Aug. 5, a senior Israeli defense official reported that Israel is upgrading its Arrow II ballistic missile shield, designed to intercept medium range rockets and fill the gaps left by Iron Dome. The announcement in Tehran was taken in Israel as a threat and an indication that the improved Fatah-110 had already been dispatched to its Damascus and Beirut destinations, so exacerbating the perils of Syria’s Scud missiles and chemical weapons which its government has threatened to use against external enemies.
Filed Under: FALSE FLAGS / FAKE TERROR • WORLD NEWS
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