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Syria: Clinton Admits US On Same Side As Al Qaeda To Destabilise Assad Government
by Michel Chossudovsky and Finian Cunningham
27 February, 2012
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has acknowledged that Al Qaeda and other organizations on the US “terror list” are supporting the Syrian opposition.
Clinton said: “We have a very dangerous set of actors in the region, al-Qaida [sic], Hamas, and those who are on our terrorist list, to be sure, supporting – claiming to support the opposition [in Syria].” [1] (Click here to watch video)
Yet at the same time, in the above BBC interview the US Secretary of State repeats the threadbare Western claim that the situation in Syria is one of a defenceless population coming under “relentless attack” from Syrian government forces.
There is ample evidence that teams of snipers who have been killing civilians over the past year in Syria belong to the terrorist formations to which Clinton is referring to.
As Michel Chossudovsky points out in a recent article: “Since the middle of March 2011, Islamist armed groups – covertly supported by Western and Israeli intelligence – have conducted terrorist attacks directed against government buildings, including acts of arson. Amply documented, trained gunmen and snipers, including mercenaries, have targeted the police, armed forces as well as innocent civilians. There is ample evidence, as outlined in the Arab League Observer Mission report, that these armed groups of mercenaries are responsible for killing civilians.
While the Syrian government and military bear a heavy burden of responsibility, it is important to underscore the fact that these terrorist acts – including the indiscriminate killing of men, women and children – are part of a US-NATO-Israeli initiative, which consists is supporting, training and financing ‘an armed entity’ operating inside Syria.” [2]
The admission at the weekend by Hillary Clinton corroborates the finding that armed groups are attacking civilians and these groups are terroristic, according to US own definitions, and that the situation in Syria is not one of unilateral state violence against its population but rather is one of a shadowy armed insurrection.
Clinton’s admission retrospectively justifies the stance taken by Russia and China, both of which vetoed the proposed UN Security Council Resolution on 4 February, precisely because that proposal was predicated on a spurious notion that the violence in Syria was solely the responsibility of the Al Assad government.
Clinton also acknowledges in the BBC interview that there is “a very strong opposition to foreign intervention from inside Syria, from outside Syria” – which tacitly concedes the fact that the Syrian population is aware that the so-called oppositionists within their country are Al Qaeda-affiliated mercenaries.
Meanwhile, the US Gulf allies, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, have separately issued statements that they are willing to send arms to Syria to support the insurrection against the Damascus government. Given the still substantial popular support for the government of Bashir Al Assad, such a declaration by Saudi Arabia and Qatar towards a fellow Arab League member state signifies an unprecedented interference in the internal affairs of a sovereign state. Indeed, legal opinion could argue that it constitutes a self-indicting act of international aggression.
Besides, such a declaration by Saudi Arabia and Qatar of being willing to arm Syrian insurrectionists, can be seen as a cynical cover for what is already taking place. It is known that the Gulf monarchical states are already supplying weapons illicitly to the self-styled Syrian Free Army, along with Turkey and Israel.
So far, the US is officially maintaining the fiction that it is not involved in supplying arms to Syria even though Washington has demanded “regime change” and in spite of evidence that Western covert forces, including American, British and French operatives, are actively engaged with the opposition groups.
It is richly ironic that the unelected fundamentalist Sunni regimes of the Persian Gulf are supporting Al Qaeda affiliated groups within Syria purportedly to “bring about democratic reforms”. This is the same dynamic that prevailed in Libya where the overthrow of that country’s government by Western and Gulf Arab powers has now led to a collapse in human rights and social conditions.
Once again, Syria is indicating the same alignment of allies: Washington, London and other NATO powers comfortably in bed with Sunni/Salafist tyrants and terrorists, claiming to be supporting democratic freedom and human rights.
Of course, the real agenda has nothing to do with either democratic freedoms or human rights – as the awry alignment of allies clearly indicates. Rather, this is about Washington and its proxy powers trying to engineer regime change throughout the Arab World and beyond to conform to geopolitical objectives, principally the control of raw energy. Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and now Syria are but a sequence of stops on a global roadmap of permanent war that also swings through Iran. Russia and China are the terminal targets.
Washington is evidently prepared to use any means necessary to assert this agenda: illegal wars, death on a massive scale, possibly triggering global war and the use of nuclear weapons. But surely the most preposterous mask is the “war on terror”, when it is seen – from the words of US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton – that Washington is now openly collaborating with the supposed “terrorist enemy” to bring about regime change in desired countries.
If somehow the weasel words from Washington could be taken at face value, then if it were serious about wanting regime change to facilitate democracy, human rights and world peace, the first regime that pre-eminently qualifies for such change is Washington itself.
Notes
[1] Transcript of Clinton interview on BBC, 26 February, 2012:
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