The West Doesn't Want to End the Syrian Crisis

Western Leaders Feign Sympathy for a Crisis They Instigated & Intensified:

Obama in 2014 stated “we must… [pursue] the political solution necessary to solve Syria’s crisis once and for all,” Senator McCain as well recently said “But what haunts me even more than the horror unfolding before our eyes in Syria is the thought that we will continue to do nothing meaningful about it.”  However it is helpful to ask, are our leaders at all serious in their remarks?

Ever since at least as far back as 2005 the US has been financing and training anti-government oppositions in Syria with a view toward regime-change.  When members of these US-funded groups complain about their connections to America, concerned over serving foreign interests rather than the national cause, evidence from Egypt shows that they are quickly ousted from membership. (1) 

The ostensible justification for this funding is ‘democracy promotion,’ however we should remember what International Relations scholar John J. Mearsheimer said about Washington’s democracy promotion activities abroad, referring to the crisis in Ukraine he stated “and when you talk about promoting democracy, what you’re really talking about is putting in power leaders who are pro-Western and anti-Russian… promoting democracy, which was all about putting in power pro-Western leaders.”

However, Syria was in the crosshairs of the empire long before 2005.  In a speech given in 2007, General Wesley Clark recounts a conversation he had with then Undersecretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz in 1991 regarding Operation Desert Storm.  He quotes Wolfowitz as saying “one thing that we learned is that we can use our military in the Middle East and the Soviets won’t stop us, and we got about 5 or 10 years to clean up those old Soviet client regimes, Syria, Iran, Iraq, before the next great superpower comes on to challenge us.”

In the same speech Clark recounts another conversation he had 6 weeks after 9/11 with an officer of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, in which the officer quotes a classified memo received from the Secretary of Defense’s office which stated that it was US policy to attack and destroy the governments of 7 different countries in the next 5 years, starting with Iraq, then Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and finishing off with Iran.

Long before any outrage was spurned at Assad’s crackdown of protesters, and long before any pretexts or justifications were concocted, it was already decided that the US would attack and topple the Syrian government, going at least as far back as 1991.  The intention of regime change came first, propaganda and pretexts came later.

Further adding to this evidence is the testimony of former French Foreign Minister Roland Dumas, who stated on television that roughly 2 years before hostilities began in Syria British officials admitted to him that they were ‘preparing something’ in the country.  “England was preparing the invasion of the rebels in Syria,” he said, stating that the officials had asked him to participate, to which he refused. “This is to say that this operation comes from far away.  It was prepared, conceived, and organized… in the simple purpose of removing the Syrian government, because, in the region, it is important to know that this Syrian regime has anti-Israel remarks…  I’m judging the confidence of the Israeli Prime Minister who had told me a while ago: “We will try to get along with the neighboring states, and those who don’t get along, we will take them down.”  It is a policy.  It is a conception of history.”

Eventually this policy, this conception of history, coupled with the financing of regime-change opposition groups, deteriorating social conditions, and the legitimate need for reforms, culminated in very minor, small-scale and sporadic anti-government demonstrations in Syria in early 2011.  The real unrest began in mid-March when clashes between protesters and police occurred in the southern city of Daraa.  From that point the conflict began to escalate.  Media reports in the West became flooded with news of Assad’s violent crackdown of protesters, and the Syrian government is in no way justified for violent suppression of peaceful demonstrations and brutal military crackdowns, however little attention was paid to the fact that at this time the protesters had as well been armed, and had been attacking the security forces, or the fact that significant pro-government demonstrations also occurred.

In Daraa the unrest began when demonstrators destroyed governmental buildings which prompted a response from the government. (2)  It should be noted however that those protesting in Daraa were largely motivated by genuine desires for change and to oppose abuses of power, much like our own Occupy and Black Lives Matter movements in the West, and the courage shown by these individuals to demonstrate in a state where doing so meant harsh and brutal repressions deserves to be honored and commended.  However the possibility of foreign involvement threatened to exploit the unrest and usurp the population’s hardships for non-domestic interests, to use the Syrians blood, sweat, and tears to achieve their own self-interested geopolitical goals.  Thus while facing government repression another more daunting challenge faced the local demonstrators as well…

Amidst reports of violent crackdowns, Israeli National News on March 21^st would report that “Seven police and at least four demonstrators in Syria have been killed in continuing violent clashes that erupted in the southern town of Daraa last Thursday.” The report indicates that although the government’s response had been brutal, the opposition was not altogether peaceful, but instead were armed and firing at police.  There were more police killed than protesters in this incident.  (emphasis mine)

On March 29^th Reuters would report that tens of thousands of Syrians gathered for a pro-government rally, signifying that many in the country continued to support the government, corroborating later polls organized by Qatar which found that the majority of Syrians (55%) wanted Assad to stay in power.

Tens of thousands of Syrians gather for a pro-government rally at the central bank square in Damascus March 29, 2011.  CREDIT: REUTERS/WAEL HMEDAN

By August 1^st, Israel’s Debkafile intelligence news source, awarded Forbe’s “Best of the Web” award, would report that “[Syrian forces] are now running into heavy resistance: Awaiting them are anti-tank traps and fortified barriers manned by protesters armed with heavy machine guns… Syrian troops encountered armed resistance… there is no shortage of arms.” (emphasis mine)

These were no typical protests, armed with anti-tank machinery and heavy machine guns.  How did they accomplish this without significant foreign assistance?

Debkafile would report on August 15^th “NATO headquarters in Brussels and the Turkish high command are meanwhile drawing up plans for their first military step in Syria, which is to arm the rebels with weapons for combating the tanks and helicopters spearheading the Assad regime’s crackdown on dissent. Instead of repeating the Libyan model of air strikes, NATO strategists are thinking more in terms of pouring large quantities of anti-tank and anti-air rockets, mortars and heavy machine guns into the protest centers for beating back the government armored forces… the arms would be trucked into Syria under Turkish military guard and transferred to rebel leaders at pre-arranged rendezvous…

Given Debka’s previous report, these heavy machine guns and anti-tank equipment seem to already have entered Syria.  This report would go on to state “Also discussed in Brussels and Ankara, our sources report, is a campaign to enlist thousands of Muslim volunteers in Middle East countries and the Muslim world to fight alongside the Syrian rebels. The Turkish army would house these volunteers, train them and secure their passage into Syria.” (emphasis mine)

This have since been verified.

It has been an open secret that there has been a steady supply line of arms and fighters from Turkey into Syria, Vice President Joe Biden even admitting as much, and recently Turkish Intelligence Agency (MIT) veteran Önder Sığırcıkoğlu has stated that all weapons supplies and militant incursions into Syria from Turkey were organized by MIT.  Estimates as well attest to the fact that not only thousands, but tens of thousands of foreign fighters hailing from over 80 different countries have made their way into Syria to fight for the opposition.  Reports surfacing later would as well detail the kinds of ‘Muslim volunteers’ that were being recruited and supported, Christian rights groups would document attacks on Christians amidst the chants “Alawites to the grave and Christians to Beirut!”, the New York Times would report that the flow of arms was going “largely to hard-line Islamists,” and other reports detailed how the rebels recruited and trained by the US were largely going on to join extremist elements like ISIS.

This all tells us that from the beginning of clashes in March the protesters were armed, and that by August they bore the resemblance of a full-on insurgency incorporated with extremist elements, yet how could this be possible without foreign sponsorship?

The reports also demonstrate that at least by August the West was drawing plans for an insurgency, however further evidence attests to the fact that this foreign intervention actually began much sooner.

In a series of reports in November and December, former FBI translator Sibel Edmonds, described as credible by the Justice Department’s Office of the Inspector General, would break the story that US and NATO, accompanied by hundreds of soldiers, were operating a secret training camp in Turkey to “organize and expand the dissident base in Syria,” since April-May of 2011, where operations were conducted to smuggle US weapons into Syria, conduct psychological and information warfare, and to help funnel intelligence and military operators across the border.  Sibel quotes high-level, insider governmental sources from both the US and Turkey, as well as journalists and eye-witnesses on the ground, who had first contacted main-stream news outlets who had refused to cover the story, one BBC reporter even being detained and barred from reporting on the matter.  It would be picked up by Turkish and Iranian media. (3)

These accounts, verified by high-level sources and foreign media outlets, further corroborate Debkafile’s reports of NATO arming and facilitating fighters to the opposition, though revealing that this had already begun long before Debka learned of it, and helps to explain the violent nature of the conflicts beginnings, a time when Western media was only reporting on the violence of government crackdowns, refusing to cover this story, and refusing to cover the violence of the protesters, all of this further suggesting that the violent nature of the opposition was largely a product of foreign involvement and that the Western press would not cover this fact.

A month before these revelations in September, WikiLeaks cables of Stratfor communications would attest to the violent nature of the protests “The opposition remains largely nonviolent,” and would go on to verify that the protests movements were incapable of large armed resistance, the kind that Debkafile had reported was already present, without substantial foreign involvement “the opposition is very unlikely to overwhelm and topple the regime without substantial foreign military and financial backing… Without foreign backing, the opposition movement is unlikely to acquire enough money or gain enough traction to acquire large quantities of weaponry, let alone achieve regime change. The movement is simply too small and too ill equipped.” (emphasis mine)

Sibel’s revelations of foreign aid beginning in April, corroborated by reports of armed protesters beginning at the end of March, Stratfor’s assessment that that a viable armed resistance was only possible through substantial foreign backing, and Debkafile’s reports of a heavily armed opposition by August, further verify the foreign hand in instigating and facilitating the beginning of the crisis; without substantial foreign backing the relatively small-scale protests would never have been able to spawn into the armed resistance that they did; the ‘civil war’ was a product of foreign intervention.

Further corroborating these assertions is a PressTV article quoted by Sibel in her reports, which cites Syrian state media detailing confessions made by captured rebels about receiving foreign aid “Confessions by a number of Syrian rebels about foreign-sponsored plans to carry out armed operations and killing ordinary people as well as security forces prove that recent developments in the country are part of an attempt to incite a revolt in the strategic country neighboring the Israeli regime, aiming to overthrow the current government and replace it with a US-backed regime... Damascus blames the violence on foreign-sponsored terrorist groups, with the Syrian state TV broadcasting reports showing seized weapons caches and confessions by terrorists describing how they obtained arms from foreign sources.”

A month after these reports in December another WikiLeaks cable would prove this foreign involvement. 

The cable accounts a December 2011 meeting at the Pentagon between Stratfor personnel and United States Air Force (USAF) officers at the Lieutenant Colonel level, who would detail how Special Operations Forces, presumably from the US, UK, France, Jordan, and Turkey, were “already on the ground focused on recce [reconnaissance] missions and training opposition forces.”  The USAF officials would state that “there isn't much of a Free Syrian Army to train right now,” further validating the claim that the armed resistance was not domestic but instead was a product of foreign intervention. 

The officials would detail the nature of their mission “the idea 'hypothetically' is to commit guerrilla attacks, assassination campaigns, try to break the back of the Alawite forces, elicit collapse from within,” no mention of freedom or democracy mind you, the goal was regime-change, the same goal behind the financing of opposition since 2005, and they were willing to use violence to do it. (emphasis mine)

That same month Philip Giraldi, a former CIA officer, would corroborate this information citing CIA sources “NATO is already clandestinely engaged in the Syrian conflict, with Turkey taking the lead as U.S. proxy… The intervention would be based on humanitarian principles, to defend the civilian population based on the “responsibility to protect” doctrine that was invoked to justify Libya…

“Unmarked NATO warplanes are arriving at Turkish military bases close to Iskenderum [sic] on the Syrian border, delivering weapons from the late Muammar Gaddafi’s arsenals as well as volunteers from the Libyan Transitional National Council... French and British special forces trainers are on the ground, assisting the Syrian rebels while the CIA and U.S. Spec Ops are providing communications equipment and intelligence to assist the rebel cause…

“CIA analysts are skeptical regarding the march to war. The frequently cited United Nations report that more than 3,500 civilians have been killed by Assad’s soldiers is based largely on rebel sources and is uncorroborated. The [Central Intelligence] Agency has refused to sign off on the claims. Likewise, accounts of mass defections from the Syrian Army and pitched battles between deserters and loyal soldiers appear to be a fabrication, with few defections being confirmed independently. Syrian government claims that it is being assaulted by rebels who are armed, trained, and financed by foreign governments are more true than false.” (emphasis mine)

Another enlightening revelation is gleaned from the previous WikiLeaks cable, especially in light of the pretexts used to justify the US bombing campaigns.  The Lt. Col. USAF officials were acutely aware that bombing was only possible if there was enough media attention on a massacre committed by Assad (read- the false claims that, now debunked, Assad had used chemical weapons in 2013) “They dont [sic] believe air intervention would happen unless there was enough media attention on a massacre, like the Ghadafi move against Benghazi. They think the US would have a high tolerance for killings as long as it doesn't reach that very public stage.”  Thus we see that there was an intention to bomb long before any ‘red-lines’ were crossed, long before any ISIL was present, and they needed perceived massacres by Assad to do it.  One need only look at Western media headlines to see this playing out in the supreme, laser-like focus that is given to Assad’s bombings, with nowhere near comparable attention given to massacres committed by US-backed rebels, even though death-toll figures indicate that the rebels are responsible for the majority of the deaths overall, and not Assad’s forces. (emphasis mine)

This intention of utilizing mass killings to justify military intervention is well known.  In 1997 Zbigniew Brzezinski, former National Security Advisor to Jimmy Carter, co-founder of the Trilateral Commission, and current un-official aid and mentor to President Obama, wrote that “[America] may find it more difficult to fashion a consensus on foreign policy issues, except in the circumstances of a truly massive and widely perceived direct external threat…  It [a consensus on foreign policy issues during WWII] was rooted, however, not only in deeply shared democratic values, which the public sensed were being threatened, but also in a cultural and ethnic affinity for the predominantly European victims of hostile totalitarianism.” (4) (emphasis mine)

Surely the consensus fashioned from perceived victims of Assad’s government is not the product of a shared affinity with other Europeans, however we can see how the same kind of consensus against hostile totalitarianism has been formed in the case of the Syrian crisis, and further how a US bombing campaign, and overt US military involvement more generally, necessitated this kind of perception amongst the public, something that is well known to high-level policy planners.

Without the hyper-focus on Assad’s crimes, and the complete media black-out of the nature of the armed insurgency, their presence as well as their aggressive actions, a foreign policy consensus for overt foreign involvement in the Syrian crisis would not have been possible.

Following these developments reports started to openly admit the foreign nature of the conflict, however while still portraying it as a domestic ‘civil war’ and not a proxy insurgency.  Yet we can see that this representation is not at all the reality, and that this conflict was instigated and started by the very same Western leaders who claim to want to see it end, erroneously blaming Assad for starting a conflict that their actions actually facilitated.  Remember that a violent and armed opposition was not possible without foreign intervention, that there was not ‘much of a Free Syrian Army’ present until NATO arrived, that Syria was in the crosshairs of the empire long before any ‘red-lines’ were crossed, and that as soon as Western involvement began throwing money, guns, and foreign fighters into the mix, the clashes between an armed opposition and the Syrian security forces began, and all blame was placed upon Assad because an affinity for ‘victims of hostile totalitarianism’ was needed to ‘fashion a consensus on foreign policy issues,’ and justify Western involvement in the eyes of the public.

How are we then to believe that our leaders are honestly seeking an end to the hostilities, when those very same leaders are the ones who began them?  When they as well continually insist on escalating the violence and bloodshed by pouring more money and weaponry into the country? 

The truth is they have never wanted to see it end, lest Assad was ousted and they themselves gained power over Syrian policy-making.  The recent calls by John Kerry for a negotiated settlement, if serious, represent a concession from the West that they have failed in their military goals, and are resorting to a political solution as a final resort.  Their real intent from the very beginning was always to foment unrest with a view toward regime-change, and then to highlight Assad’s inevitable crackdowns while supporting an armed insurgency against him, obfuscating the fact that there was an armed insurgency of their own making directed against government forces, and to use the violence of the government as justification for further attacks, thus making their attacks appear defensive rather than an offensive, which of course they were not.

Therefore, what occurred in Daraa was not simply an authoritarian regime violently cracking down on peaceful protesters but instead was a situation whereby the violent clashes involved significant foreign involvement.  The protest movement was hijacked by foreign powers who would seek to exploit the unrest for their own ends, and therefore the ‘revolution’ was actually anything but, and was instead the result of a proxy insurrection and attack upon the Syrian state by foreign powers which displaced the sincere protest base and eliminated any prospects for actual reforms, reforms which could have been possible had the Syrian people been left free from foreign intervention to determine their own affairs.  This is corroborated by the Syrian opposition activist Dr. Haytham Manna who was involved in the uprising since its inception “The first negative result of the use of arms was to undermine the broad popular support necessary to transform the uprising into a democratic revolution… the pumping of arms to Syria, supported by Saudi Arabia and Qatar, the phenomenon of the Free Syrian Army, and the entry of more than 200 jihadi foreigners into Syria in the past six months have all led to a decline in the mobilisation of large segments of the population… and in the activists' peaceful civil movement. The political discourse has become sectarian; there has been a Salafisation of religiously conservative sectors.”

The media would then walk in lock-step with the narrative that suited the US establishment’s interests, even going so far as to detain journalists and block reporting when credible insider information came to light, thus obscuring the true nature of the situation in the eyes of the Western public, which made it possible to fashion a consensus for this specific foreign policy issue.

Surely the small scale and sporadic protests that began before March in 2011 were met with violent repression from the Syrian state, and none of these findings absolve the Assad government from blame for this, however it is also true that these opposition movements were financed, trained, and advised by the US through ‘democracy promotion’ endeavors, that evidence shows that when members of these groups complain about their connections to Washington they are subsequently ousted from membership.  The goal of financing these groups is regime-change, intended in Syria for 2 decades, and from the very beginning the US was arming and training the opposition to attack the state.  Money, weaponry, and foreign fighters flowed in and were facilitated by the US special forces from the onset with a view towards targeted assassinations and eliciting a collapse from within.  The government needed justification for this which was accomplished by the media’s refusal to report on information that ran counter to the official narrative. 

Open-source information detailed in this report demonstrates that what is commonly referred to as the Syrian “civil war” is more accurately described as a proxy insurgency that exploited the social unrest in the country to go about achieving a long-standing policy goal of regime-change in Damascus.  This further belies the stated claims of Western officials that they are at all serious about ending a crisis which they themselves instigated and escalated, and suggests that the only way the crisis will end is if the West achieves its stated goal of regime-change or if they are forced to accept a political settlement in the face of a military defeat or stalemate.

Recent developments suggest that they have failed in their attempts to oust Assad; the pro-government forces are too well equipped and the government maintains too large of a domestic support base.  Impediments to the West accepting the inevitable political solution consist of the intent to further inflame the conflict as a means to keep Syria weak and unstable, using that as leverage to force concessions from Damascus and weaken the resistance bloc of Syria, Iran, and Russia, the fears from US allies that the jihadi’s they have been backing for years would turn against their own regimes in light of a cessation of hostilities in Syria, and the US and its allies insistence on molding Syrian policy-making to conform to their own interests, shown in their persistence that Assad must step down.  Until these impediments are overcome, or until domestic populations force their leaders to stop committing these crimes, atrocities, and aggressions, the best we can hope for is to watch Syria’s secular society deteriorate until it falls victim to the fate of countless other recipients of Western ‘freedom’ and ‘democracy.’

The hope is that domestic populations overcome the propaganda narrative propagated by the main-stream media and the ideological supporters of state-terror and expose the Syrian crisis for what it really is, and demand to hold those guilty accountable for their crimes.

The Syrian population is strong and resilient in the face of imperial aggression, we in the West who are privileged enough to not be suffering a similar fate thus have a great responsibility to use all of our resources and democratic freedoms to reverse the tide of the unjust policies committed in our names by our governments, which constitute nothing less than crimes against humanity.  This is by no means impossible, and we in the West have the unique ability to oppose state policy with a great degree of freedom.  We should use this opportunity to combat imperialism, to give the Syrians back the sovereignty they deserve, and to restore back to America the values and ideals that are actually worthy of the people who inhabit it, those that we were taught our country represented in school, yet that since we have learned were mere ideological cover for something much worse. 

But we can change that.

We should be as strong as the Syrians who face with courage untold terror committed against them on a daily basis by our governments, and never let ourselves forget that “It does not take a majority to prevail... but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brushfires of freedom in the minds of men.”

And perhaps most absent from analysis on Syria are the voices of the Syrian people themselves, their thoughts, desires, feelings, and pronouncements.  Their experiences, the ones aggressor nations claim to represent, unfortunately fall upon deaf ears in the West.

To counter this, here I have quoted a lost voice from Lattakia, Afrona, a Syrian born architect, as she recounts her experience under the ‘freedom’ and ‘democracy’ that Washington had brought to her country, and the foreign involvement they had attempted to hide from the prying eyes of their domestic civilian populations:

“It was 2011 , the year of the color revolution , arab spring , the real color was black , and the real season was without features ,Obama and the global society never feel shy to announce it as it is a freedom revolution! 

 syrian people was worried of what was going on  in Egypt at that time , total mess , also was sad for Libya and the war crime against people there by the NATO.  

we recognized there is something planned for us , it is our turn ,as in domino game  

Here it is they started in my city, savage groups was rushing in streets with shameful slogan repeating it non stop (christian should displace to Beruit ,alawit will be in cemetery ) , they trained them to look like civil war , And the mainstream media started to talk about peaceful protests in Syria  

one of their first victims was a person in his way to his work , those gangs caught him , gathered as wolves around him and slaughtered him , his guilt was his religion , they want it to be real civil war , they want people to take revenge and kill each other by the name of religion  

at that time our government issued , that it is allowed to everyone to join demonstration , and it is not allowed to any police man to bother them , the result was those gangs killed young police man they shot him ,, they were armed gangs  

we realized more and more that we are under dirty war , not revolution at all , Then that scene we used to see in Afghanistan and those countries under terror  groups as Al-Qaeda which is  ,CIA” made , that scene of suicide bombers , car bombs , took place in Syria , not important for the world if the victims were kids students and innocent civilians , the western media turned blind eyes , and instead of reporting the truth , they were spreading lies  

later  the horrible crimes  started  by cannibals’ Free Syrian Army , Al-Nusra front , start to beheaded , eat livers , rape women , burn people alive …that was by FSA under the slogan Allaho Akbar, not by what they call now ISIS or Daesh , countries which r under FSA control suddenly ended up to ISIS ,  USA now invades  my country to fight ISIS ! , but they still arming financing and funding FSA  . 

who is ISIS , who is FSA who is Moderate rebels ? they are their doll here to invade Syria , clever plan , don’t forget The Creative Chaos of Condoleezza Rice  , and her preaching of new middle east ! ,  please keep Syria safe ,”

Given the fact that polls consistently show that the majority of Syrians support the government, this is not an isolated viewpoint.

For more on Afrona’s story, watch interviews here and here.  For further accounts of voices from Syria that the main-stream-media won’t report upon, follow Eva Bartlett at www.ingaza.wordpress.com, who regularly travels to Syria to account the voices of the voiceless.

“Please, keep Syria safe…"

Notes:

1.)    Craig Whitlock, Washington Post, “U.S. secretly backed Syrian opposition groups, cables released by WikiLeaks show”, April 17, 2011. “The London-based satellite channel, Barada TV, began broadcasting in April 2009 but has ramped up operations to cover the mass protests in Syria as part of a long-standing campaign to overthrow the country’s autocratic leader, Bashar al-Assad… Classified U.S. diplomatic cables show that the State Department has funneled as much as $6 million to the group since 2006 to operate the satellite channel and finance other activities inside Syria… The U.S. money for Syrian opposition figures began flowing under President George W. Bush after he effectively froze political ties with Damascus in 2005.”; AFP, “US trains activists to evade security forces”, April 8, 2011. “The US government, Posner said, has budgeted $50 million in the last two years… And it has organized training sessions for 5,000 activists in different parts of the world.”; Ron Nixon, New York Times, “U.S. Groups Helped Nurture Arab Uprisings”, April 14, 2011. “American government-financed organizations were promoting democracy in authoritarian Arab states…  But as American officials and others look back at the uprisings of the Arab Spring, they are seeing that the United States’ democracy-building campaigns played a bigger role in fomenting protests than was previously known, with key leaders of the movements having been trained by the Americans in campaigning, organizing through new media tools and monitoring elections… Affiliating themselves with the American organizations may have tainted leaders within their own groups… some members of the group had accused… leaders of “treason”… the group ousted the members who were complaining…”

2.)   Joseph Holliday, Institute for the Study of War, “The Struggle for Syria in 2011”, December 2011.

3.)   Sibel Edmonds, BoilingFrogsPost, “BFP Exclusive: Syria- Secret US-NATO Training & Support Camp to Oust Current Syrian President”, November 21, 2011.  Sibel breaks the story on the secret US-NATO base in Turkey, and further explains its operations, to organize and expand the dissident base, smuggle in weapons, psychological operations and information warfare, and to funnel intelligence and military operators across the border;  Sibel Edmonds, BoilingFrogsPost, “US Media: Distorters of Reality & Gravediggers of Truth”, December 3, 2011.  Sibel follows up to her first story, citing insiders in Turkey and government insiders in the US.  She notes how Iranian media has picked up her story, but not the Western press.  She asks one of her inside sources why they hadn’t taken their information to the main-stream-media outlets first, to which they replied that they had tried but the Western press wouldn’t touch the story without State Department approval;  Sibel Edmonds, BoilingFrogsPost, “War on Syria Cover-Up Update: Who is Breaking the Blackout?”, December 9, 2011. Sibel recounts how Turkish and Iranian media have picked up her story, noting that US media did not have the guts to run the story even though it was backed by credible military sources in the US and abroad.  She states that she has further been contacted by additional credible sources, including a high-level military official in Syria;  Sibel Edmonds, BoilingFrogsPost, “BFP Exclusive- Developing Story: Hundreds of US-NATO Soldiers Arrive & Begin Operations on the Jordan-Syria Border”, December 11, 2011.  Sibel details how estimates of hundreds of foreign military personnel were seen amassing near the Jordan-Syrian border, that US forces had left Iraq and were re-routed to Jordan at a NATO Command Center there, and that according to Jordanian reports Western officials had requested the Jordanian King to establish a spy station near the border for the purpose of contacting Syrian officers to convince them to instigate a military coup;  James Corbett, CorbettReport, “BREAKING: US Troops Deploying on Jordan-Syria Border”, December 11, 2011. James Corbett reports on the developments from the BoilingFrogsPost story, conducting an interview with former Syrian journalist Nizar Nayouf, previously imprisoned for 10 years for speaking out against the Syrian government, who accounts how hundreds of foreign soldiers were seen moving back and forth near the Jordanian-Syrian border; Sibel Edmonds, BoilingFrogsPost, “Syria Coverage Update: BBC Reporter was detained & Prevented from Covering US-NATO- Syrian Operations in Turkey!”, December 15, 2011. Sibel details how a BBC reporter who went to Turkey to follow up on her story was placed under surveillance, prevented from following the story, stopped from interviewing key personnel, and how BBC subsequently excused the scandal.

4.)   Zbigniew Brzezinski, “Conclusion,” The Grand Chessboard: American Primacy And It’s Geostrategic Imperatives (New York, 1997), pg. 211.

            Additional sources:

• Raven Clabough, The New American, “Possible U.S. Involvement in Covert Warfare in Syria”, March 7, 2012.
• Michel Chossudovsky, Centre for Research on Globalization, “SYRIA: Who is Behind The Protest Movement?  Fabricating a Pretext for a US-NATO “Humanitarian Intervention””, May 3, 2011.
• Tony Cartalucci, Land Destroyer, “Syrian Conflict Escalates”; “It’s Official: “Arab Spring” Subversion is US Funded”; and “Syria: Intervention Inevitable”.
•  Zafar Bangash, Crescent International, “ISIS takfirist: McCain-Obama’s offspring”, March 2015.

Iraq Sidelines US in Tikrit Offensive Amidst Accusations US is Arming ISIL

Iraqi Success in Tikrit, Leaves Washington on the Sidelines

A mostly successful offensive has been waged to drive out ISIL from the Iraqi city of Tikrit, spearheaded by the Iraqi army and Iranian backed militias, representing a bright spot in the campaign to eradicate the ISIL insurgency from Iraq. 

“Iraqi forces raised the national flag over a number of landmarks in Tikrit, working with Iran-backed Shiite militias to chip away at Islamic State’s once firm grip on the strategically important Sunni city” (WSJ, 3/12/15)

According to US chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Martin Dempsey, there were present in the offensive “approximately 1,000 Sunni tribal fighters, 3,000 Iraqi Security Force members and 20,000 Shiite militiamen-whom he described as “Iranian-trained and somewhat Iranian-equipped.””

Gen. Dempsey went on to state that “he was certain the Iraqi security forces and allied militias would be able to retake Tikrit,” however there is something that the General, and the United States in general, is worried about, “[Dempsey] added that the U.S. was concerned about how Iran and the Shiite militias would use their influence in the aftermath.”

The truth is that Gen. Dempsey and the US are actually concerned over the fact that Baghdad had not asked US support for the offensive, instead relying on their own forces and help from neighboring Iran. 

“The United States says Baghdad did not seek aerial backup from the coalition in the Tikrit campaign. Instead, support on the ground has come from neighboring Iran, Washington's long-time rival in the region. Tehran has sent an elite Revolutionary Guard commander to oversee part of the battle.” (Reuters, 3/11/15)

The growing influence of Iran and the increased cooperation between Iran and Iraq worries the United States, as well as does the joint Sunni-Shiite cooperation in a country whose sectarian divides are a result of the US-led invasion and subsequent policies; further Sunni-Shia and Iranian-Iraqi cooperation are anathema to the US which seeks to limit Iranian influence in the region while increasing its own.  If continued successes are made by the Iraqi army and Iranian-backed militias without the aid of the US aerial bombings the US could see itself fully pushed out from the subsequent offensive to retake Mosul, likely to occur after Tikrit and surrounding cities are fully cleared of ISIL forces.

This rejection of US inclusion by Iraq represents the growing mistrust that senior Iraqi officials have towards the US-led efforts against the ISIL militants, concerns they have been voicing for quite some time now.

Iraqi Authorities Claim US is Arming ISIL

In October of 2014, a video was uploaded to YouTube which showed an airdrop of US weapons in the hands of ISIL militants.  The Pentagon would claim that “one of those bundles drifted off course,” saying that the weapons ending up in ISIL hands was a blunder. 

In November of 2014, the head of Iraq’s security and defense committee claimed that “Some countries are delivering weapons to ISIS by using airplanes in Tel Afar airport, near Mosul,” without naming which countries. 

Later that month, Asia News Agency and Fars News Agency reported that Iraqi intelligence was claiming the US was supplying ISIL forces “The Iraqi intelligence sources reiterated that the US military planes have airdropped several aid cargoes for ISIL terrorists to help them resist the siege laid by the Iraqi army, security and popular forces,” the report quoted an Iraqi security source who stated that “What is important is that the US sends these weapons to only those that cooperate with the Pentagon and this indicates that the US plays a role in arming the ISIL.”

In January of this year Iraqi MP Majid al-Ghraoui said “The information that has reached us in the security and defense committee indicates that an American aircraft dropped a load of weapons and equipment to the ISIS group militants at the area of al-Dour in the province of Salahuddin.”  The MP also noted that this was not an isolated occurrence, “This incident is continuously happening and has also occurred in some other regions.”  Providing a reasoning behind this US assistance to ISIL Ghraoui added, “The U.S. is trying to obtain more benefits and privileges from the government to set military bases in Iraq.”

Commenting on this incident, Professor Tim Anderson of the University of Sydney noted “Photos were published of ISIS retrieving the weapons. The US admitted the seizure but said this was a ‘mistake’.”

In February of this year Iraqi MP Hakem al-Zameli said that Iraq’s army had shot down two British planes that were carrying weapons for ISIL, “The Iraqi Parliament's National Security and Defense Committee has access to the photos of both planes that are British and have crashed while they were carrying weapons for the ISIL… There are proofs and evidence for the US-led coalition's military aid to ISIL terrorists through air(dropped cargoes)… The US drops weapons for the ISIL on the excuse of not knowing about the whereabouts of the ISIL positions and it is trying to distort the reality with its allegations,” al-Zameli said.

Another member of the Iraqi parliament Jome Divan stated that “The international coalition is only an excuse for protecting the ISIL and helping the terrorist group with equipment and weapons,” adding that “The coalition has not targeted ISIL's main positions in Iraq.”

MP Majid al-Gharawi said that the coalition led by the US is “not serious in fighting against the ISIL organization, because they have the technological power to determine the presence of ISIL gunmen and destroy them in one month."  Iraqi lawmaker Nahlah al-Hababi also stated “The international coalition is not serious about air strikes on ISIL terrorists and is even seeking to take out the popular (voluntary) forces from the battlefield against the Takfiris so that the problem with ISIL remains unsolved in the near future.  The ISIL terrorists are still receiving aids from unidentified fighter jets in Iraq and Syria.”

Also in February, an Iraqi militia called Al-Hashad Al-Shabi shot down a US Army helicopter they claimed was carrying weapons for ISIL in parts of Al-Anbar province.  Photos were again published of the downed aircraft.

In March, Iraqi news agencies published reports which stated that the Iraqi army had arrested four ISIL military advisors, three of them having American and Israeli passports, the fourth being from a Persian Gulf Arab state.

Iran-Iraq Relations at a High Point

Given this, it is not hard to see why Iraq had not asked for US assistance in their push into Tikrit, and instead have employed the help of Iran.  This skepticism towards US sincerity in fighting ISIL and subsequent closer coordination with Iran is what Gen. Dempsey was concerned about when he said the US was worried over “how Iran and the Shiite militias would use their influence in the aftermath.”

As Professor Tim Anderson has pointed out “The head of the US military, General Martin Dempsey, has been sitting in Baghdad twiddling his thumbs. If this [Tikrit] operation is successful, Iraq with Iranian support can do the same for Mosul. Dempsey and John Kerry are trying to put a brave face on not being needed, but the Saudis and Washington pundits are having anxiety attacks. Expect a lot more finger wagging about Baghdad ‘inflaming sectarian tensions’, and accusations of Iranian hegemony. All rubbish. Remember this comes from the main instigators of sectarian bloodbaths and the worst of all hegemons. For the peoples of the Middle East a more independent Iraq and good neighbourly relations between Iran, Iraq and Syria is a light in the darkness.”

Elucidating further on these developments, the Professor adds in a recent article that “Closer cooperation between Iran, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon’s Hezbollah is anathema to Israel, the Saudis and Washington, yet it is happening. This is not a sectarian divide but rather based on some clear mutual interests, not least putting an end to sectarian (takfiri) terrorism.

“It was only logical that, in the Iraqi military’s recent offensive on ISIS-held Tikrit, the Iranian military emerged as Iraq’s main partner. Washington has been sidelined, causing consternation in the US media. General Qasem Suleimani, head of Iran’s Quds Force is a leading player in the Tikrit operation.  A decade after Washington’s ‘creative destruction’ plans, designed to reduce Iranian influence in Iraq, an article in Foreign Policy magazine complains that Iran’s influence is ‘at its highest point in almost four centuries’.”

If the Americans had wanted to increase their influence in the region, perhaps they should have thought about employing mutually beneficial policies towards Iraq rather than inciting sectarian hatred, and as well should have listened to their own citizens who have been speaking out against the long-standing US policy of arming Sunni-jihadi-extremists as a geopolitical weapon against their enemies.

[UPDATE 3/13/15]

Updates on the recent offensive described above, which according to reports has continued successfully with the Iraqi-led coalition liberating several other key areas since the publication of this report, suggest that forecasts for victory in the effort to push ISIL out of Tikrit entirely remain very positive.  However, on par with Iraqi parliamentarian skepticism regarding US sincerity in fighting ISIL in the region, also described above, a new development has come that adds more fuel to that fire.

Iraqi MP Hanan al-Fatlawi has claimed that an airstrike conducted by the US-led coalition has indiscriminately killed Iraqi soldiers.  Iraqi News has quoted Fatlawi as stating that as many as 50 Iraqi soldiers were killed in the US-led strike in Anbar province, while Alalam has quoted Fatlawi as stating that 26 soldiers were killed, and Haidar al-Fuadi as saying that 50 soldiers have been killed.  The US coalition spokesman has denied these reports, saying that none of their strikes has resulted in friendly casualties.

The airstrike occurred near Anbar's provincial capital city Ramadi, which is a ways away from the Tikrit offensive where the Iraqi army is making significant gains.  However, as Iraqi forces, absent the participation of US airstrikes, continue to succeed in their offensive in Tikrit, one wonders if this US-led airstrike in Anbar was either deliberate or a mistaken act of 'collateral damage'.

MP al-Fatlawi is quoted as saying that "This was not the first time, other bombings by the coalitions have occurred in many areas and targeted the Army and the Volunteer Fighters elements." (emphasis mine)  Fatlawi has demanding the government and Parliament “take a stand on the bombing,” urging them to “make up for the dead and wounded’s families,” and has called for a full investigation into the incident.

Fatlawi is thus directly implicating the US-coalition in targeting the Iraqi army, just as the Iraqi's, with the help of Iranian-backed forces, are making significant progress against ISIL in areas like Tikrit.  Given the evidence and widespread accusations by senior Iraqi officials that US-coalition airplanes have been directly aiding the ISIL militants for some time now, also described in the above report, it would be wise to not outright dismiss MP Fatlawi's accusations, and instead  to take his claims very seriously.

The "Threat" of Iran? Or the Threat of Deterrence to Washington?

There is much discussion in Western political discourse of the “threat” of Iran, spoken of as though it is a self-evident truth, an assumption that underlies the entire spectrum of debate.  To question such an obvious truism is something that disciplined intellectuals understand is not proper of them to do.  Most likely the thought doesn't even cross their minds, thanks to dignified university education and the values instilled from it; there are some things not suitable for a respectable intellectual to discuss, after all.

Senator John McCain recently stated that Iran will pose “a direct threat to the existence of the state of Israel” if it is allowed to acquire nuclear weapons, warning further that “The Iranians are on the march.”  House Speaker John Boehner recently said that “There needs to be a more serious conversation in America about... the threat posted by Iran,” further stating that Iran poses a “grave threat” to our “security and way of life.”  Israel’s US ambassador Ron Dermer stated that the proposed nuclear agreement with Iran “could endanger the very existence of the State of Israel,” going on to say that Iran is “the greatest sponsor of terrorism in the world.”  Former US Army Lt. Col. Ralph Peters went so far as to say that “Iran is building a new Persian Empire.”  Furthermore, in order to slow down Iran’s progress towards a bomb, Netanyahu has threatened to launch an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities.  Threats which are credible, according to officials from the Obama administration.  Obama, over the years, has also used such threats by telling other world leaders that toughening sanctions on Iran is the only way to forestall an Israeli attack.  Obama himself has argued that a nuclear Iran poses a “profound” national security threat to the US.

Given this ubiquitous rhetoric, there is an obvious question that arises, one which is seldom asked: what exactly is this “threat” that a nuclear Iran poses?  What exactly is such a grave and existential threat that Western leaders would risk escalation and military confrontation by threatening the Iranian republic with an attack?  Fortunately, we have an authoritative answer to this.

Each year the Department of Defense produces an unclassified, congressionally mandated report detailing the Pentagon’s assessment of the military power of Iran, which it is required to submit to lawmakers.  An effort of intelligence evaluation which utilizes thousands of dollars to get accomplished ($22,000 in 2012.)  It is reported on sparingly in the media.

The 2014 report opens by stating that “Iran has not substantially changed its national security and military strategies over the past year,” virtually the same opening line as previous reports, except for the addition: “however, Tehran has adjusted some of its tactics to achieve its enduring objectives.  President Hasan Ruhani’s international message of moderation and pragmatism is intended to support these objectives.”

It goes on to state that “Iran’s military doctrine is defensive.  It is designed to deter an attack, survive an initial strike, retaliate against an aggressor, and force a diplomatic solution to hostilities while avoiding any concessions that challenge its core interests.”  Thus, Iranian military strategy is to attack only in the event that it is aggressed upon, and still then only long enough to force a diplomatic solution; its doctrine is defensive.

In the context of its ballistic missile development, the report states “Since the Iran-Iraq War, Tehran has placed significant emphasis on developing and fielding ballistic missiles to counter perceived threats from Israel and coalition forces in the Middle East and to project its power in the region.”  Iran is developing weapons stockpiles specifically to counter the threats from Israel and the West, of which I have documented above.  This falls in line with the defensive assessment of Tehran’s military; its buildup is a defensive response, not an offensive one.

In terms of its nuclear capabilities, the Pentagon admits that “Iran continues to develop technological capabilities that could be applicable to nuclear weapons and long-range missiles, which could be adapted to deliver nuclear weapons,” although at present no nuclear weapons exist.  (emphasis added)

Therefore, the “threat” of Iran, of which we are constantly told to fear, the “grave threat” to our “security and way of life”, this “new Persian Empire” that “could endanger the very existence of Israel” that Obama warns is a “profound” national security threat to the US, is simply the threat that scares Western policymakers the most: the threat of deterrence and defense.

Worrying still is the fact that those who are most adamant about warning us of this “threat” know perfectly well that their words are not true.  John McCain, who is quoted above as saying that a nuclear Iran will pose “a direct threat to the existence of Israel” previously employed a national security aide named Anthony Cordesman.  In 2013 Cordesman published a research paper for the Center for Strategic and International Studies of which he concluded that it is Iran, and not Israel, that faces a direct existential threat, “Israel now poses a more serious existential threat to Iran than Iran can pose to Israel in the near term… It seems likely that Israel can deliver an ‘existential’ nuclear strike on Iran, and will have far more capability to damage Iran than Iran is likely to have against Israel for the next decade.”  And as the DoD report states, if and when Iran does acquire nuclear weapons capabilities, they will be deterrents used to defend against an attack.

Further confirmation of this is available from the February 2014 Annual Threat Assessment given before the Senate Armed Services Committee by the Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) Lt. Gen. Michael T. Flynn.  Detailing Iran’s threat assessment, Flynn notes “Iran has threatened to temporarily impede international ship traffic transiting through the Strait of Hormuz if it is attacked or in response to further sanctions on its oil exports.  Additionally, Iran has threatened to launch missiles against U.S. targets and our regional allies in response to an attack.  Tehran could also employ its terrorist surrogates.  However, it is unlikely to initiate or intentionally provoke a conflict or launch a preemptive attack.”  (emphasis added)

Therefore, the threat of Iran is one of deterrence, of defending itself in the event of an attack, and there exists no evidence that it seeks to provoke or attack its adversaries. 

Given this, it is hard not to wonder why there is so much paranoia, fear, and thus belligerent and punitive rhetoric employed against Iran.  If the threat is deterrence, then why all the hostility?

The characterization of Iran as a rogue, aggressive, and hostile state has become a sort of dogma in Western discourse, sharing similar characteristics with a fundamentalist religious belief.  A main reason for this is simply the intention of the United States to punish Iran; after all it does not follow orders.  However, as is seen with the example of Cuba, in order to be hostile and punitive towards a recalcitrant state there is a necessity to portray that state as the unreasonable aggressor or a despotic terrorist, thereby making your actions against it appear to be defensive and reactionary, rather than offensive and aggressive; people are much more likely to approve of defensive actions rather than offensive ones. 

In Cuba, the impetus for the aggression against it stemmed from the fall of the US-supported dictator Batista to Fidel Castro and Che Guevara, who subsequently expelled US corporations and nationalized the land and resources they had been exploiting.  They didn’t like that much, and the US reacted in kind by immediately launching military attacks and decades of terrorism against Cuba, along with historic amounts of assassination and regime-change attempts.  The reasons were explained by the State Departments Policy Planning Council, which warned that “the primary danger we face in Castro is... in the impact the very existence of his regime has upon the leftist movement in many Latin American countries… The simple fact is that Castro represents a successful defiance of the U.S., a negation of our whole hemispheric policy of almost a century and a half,” referring to the Monroe Doctrine of 1823, in which the US declared its intention of dominating the hemisphere.

The Iran case is similar.  After the 1953 CIA-run coup that overthrew the parliamentary government and installed the brutal regime of the Shah, a day hasn't gone by that the US hasn't been torturing Iran.  After the Shah’s overthrow in 1979, the US immediately turned to supporting Saddam Hussein’s vicious invasion.  The punitive measures exist to this day, including crippling economic sanctions, threats of attack, and attacks against allies such as Syria.  The reasons for this, as well, are similar: Iran too represents a successful defiance of US power, and refuses to obey orders emanating from Washington.  If your goal is world hegemony, and you feel you have the right to use force freely wherever you want, then you simply cannot tolerate such a deterrent.

There is another element to this as well, and that is of a truism that should be evident to knowledgeable analysts of statecraft.  US leaders take for granted the indelible presumption that we, as a nation, are good, and therefore by extension it follows that whatever we do, is also good.  In contrast, of course the actions of our enemies are bad.  So when we invade Afghanistan, we are liberating Afghanistan.  When Russia invades Afghanistan, they are conquering Afghanistan.  Similarly when we invade Vietnam or Iraq, we are not conquering, we are bringing freedom and democracy.  Applying the logic to Iran, given that Iran represents an opposition to US policy and hegemony, which is of course benevolent, they must then be evil.  So when we install a brutal dictator in their country, that is good, and when they expel that dictator and pursue an independent policy of self-determination, that of course is very bad.  When we threaten to attack Iran, it is out of a munificent desire to stop a grave threat to the world, and so on.  This is the essence of the fanatical religion that exists in the West.

Another reason for portraying Iran as a hostile threat is that it provides a useful scapegoat for the problems in the region, and provides an excuse for Western offensive actions.  It is well known to policy planners that intervention and aggression are not goals shared by the populous, and therefore a threat or enemy is needed to justify such actions.  Former National Security Advisor to Jimmy Carter and current Obama advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski expressed this notion in 1997 when he wrote that “Never before has a populist democracy attained international supremacy.  But the pursuit of power is not a goal that commands popular passion, except in conditions of a sudden threat or challenge to the public’s sense of domestic well-being.”⁽¹⁾  And thus you have the Iranian “threat.” 

This is of course not to say that the Iranian government is righteous or beyond reproach, far from it, there is much authoritarianism and internal repression to admonish, however that is a threat to their domestic population, not the US and the West.

Coming back now to the actual “threat”, the one of nuclear deterrence capabilities, there are ways to prevent against this.  One way would be to institute a nuclear weapons free zone in the region.  That would effectively eliminate any problems or threats, and further foster peace and stability in the Middle East.  That proposal is strongly supported by Egypt and the Arab states, and has overwhelming support in general worldwide, except that the United States and Israel won’t allow it.  They insist on a precondition: that Israel be exempt.  Obviously, because of this the proposal won’t get anywhere.  And this very perfectly exemplifies the true picture of the situation: that because of the United States and Israel’s aggression, hostility, and unilateral insistence on not only maintaining their weapons capabilities, but assiduously enhancing them forward, Iran is working towards preventive capabilities to defend itself and deter a potential attack. 

Ironically, it is then Israel’s insistence on maintaining its power and ability to existentially threaten Iran that is in turn pushing Iran towards pursuing nuclear capabilities and further military power.

These conclusions were as well echoed by a prominent Israeli historian and professor, Martin van Creveld, who stated succinctly back in 2004 that given the unilateral aggression shown by the West, Iran is forced into a position of deterrence “The world has witnessed how the United States attacked Iraq for, as it turned out, no reason at all. Had the Iranians not tried to build nuclear weapons, they would be crazy.”     

Sources:

1.)    Zbigniew Brzezinski, “The Eurasian Chessboard,” The Grand Chessboard: American Primacy And It’s Geostrategic Imperatives (New York, 1997), pg. 35-36.

Terrorism is a Result of US Policy #CharlieHebdo

The Narrative

The official narrative has been produced, ready for mass consumption.  Two men brandishing balaclavas, military fatigues, armed with AK-47’s, a shotgun, and an RPG launcher, walked into the wrong address first before finding the proper Charlie Hebdo building, and then subsequently proceeded to brutally murder a total of 12 people, including 2 police officers, one allegedly shot at point-blank range.  Despite these missteps, the fact that they had timed their meeting to coincide with the publications editorial meeting, their calm demeanors even as police arrived, the apparent rehearsed nature of the attacks, followed by their successful getaway all point towards professionalism and military training.

The attackers were heard shouting “Allahu Akbar,” “The Prophet is avenged,” and “We have killed Charlie Hebdo,” as they conducted their lethal campaign.  Witnesses have stated they spoke perfect French while proclaiming to be affiliated with Al-Qaeda in Yemen, or Al-Qaeda in the Arab Peninsula (AQAP).  American intelligence told France that the 2 brothers, Said and Cherif Kouachi, had traveled to Yemen in 2011 to receive training from AQAP.  A source within AQAP reportedly released a statement to The Intercept stating that, “The leadership of #AQAP directed the operation,” although no official claim of responsibility has been made from the organization.  Before his death, Cherif Kouachi claimed in an interview with BFM TV that he had been to Yemen and received funding from Anwar al-Awlaki, the infamous Muslim preacher and American citizen who US officials say is responsible for encouraging terrorist attacks against Western countries and who was extra-judiciously murdered by a US drone strike in 2011.  Yemeni officials confirmed to Reuters that Said had met with Awlaki in Yemen.

Initially the police had stated that the Kouachi brothers had another accomplice, but have remained silent on the account ever since 18-year old Hamyd Mourad turned himself in late Wednesday with an ironclad alibi. 

Fleeing the scene the brothers evaded several police cars, and in what has now become a suspicious trademark of alleged al-Qaeda-linked terror attacks, one of the perpetrators left his ID card conveniently for the police to find.

The day after this incident a policewoman was killed in the suburb of Montrouge, the police identifying the killer as Amedy Coulibaly after having recovered his DNA from an abandoned balaclava.  Coulibaly claimed responsibility for the killing and said that he had synchronized the move with the Kouachi brothers.  The massive police search operation eventually culminated when police cornered the two brothers in a printing facility near the Charles De Gaulle Airport.  Mr. Coulibaly meanwhile held shopper’s hostage across town in a kosher grocery store.  The police conducted simultaneous operations at the two locations, killing the two Kouachi brothers as well as Mr. Coulibaly.  It was reported that Coulibably had killed four hostages and injured five others before the police had shot him, however it is possible that they were killed as a result of the raid.

Terrorism is a Result of US Policy in Syria

French intelligence is understandably under pressure after the terrorist attack; how could such an attack be carried out amidst the overbearing police-state and surveillance apparatus that has been propped up now for over a decade since 9/11?

France’s surveillance policies are as well some of the most extreme in the Europe.  A controversial article in a 2013 defense bill, referred to as the “French Patriot Act,” permits widespread monitoring and collection of internet user data in real time without judicial oversight, requiring ISP’s as well as content hosting companies like YouTube to give over its user’s data upon request from government agencies.  La Quadrature Du Net, a French civil liberties NGO, said of the bill, “Considering the recently uncovered evidence of massive and generalised spying on citizens, the maneuvers of the President and of the government deceive no one. This bill sets up a generalised surveillance regime and risks to destroy once and for all the limited trust between citizens and agencies responsible for security.”  The Wall Street Journal reports that France last just year passed, “new laws that allow prosecutors to detain and prosecute people for the mere act of traveling to Iraq or Syria.”

Despite all of this, the mainstream media has the answer: intelligence failure.  It was a blunder, the brothers had been under surveillance after their 2011 trip to Yemen but subsequently were dropped from monitoring last spring after no suspicious activity was recorded.  French intelligence were forced to allocate resources elsewhere, because, “By 2013, France was struggling to monitor a flood of citizens suspected of traveling-or planning to travel-to Syria and Iraq.”⁽¹⁾  This statement, or perhaps better termed ‘this excuse’, coupled as well with reports that the Kouachi brothers were part of the ‘flood of citizens’ who traveled to Syria⁽²⁾, exposes the hypocritical nature of the “War on Terror” and the theft of our freedoms that it supposedly justifies.

Far from making us safer we have seen how this “War on Terror” has systematically supported and empowered Islamic jihadists as a geopolitical tools against the West’s enemies.  Graham Fuller, the former Deputy Director of the National Council on Intelligence and former CIA station chief, stated that, “The policy of guiding the evolution of Islam and of helping them against our adversaries worked marvellously well in Afghanistan against the Red Army. The same doctrines can still be used to destabilize what remains of Russian power, and especially to counter the Chinese influence in Central Asia.”⁽³⁾   In 2007 Seymour Hersh reported on the Bush administration’s policy of supporting radical Islam, “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 cooperated 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.” 

This policy has continued under the Obama administration.  The US, apart from army training of rebels who go on to join jihadist extremists, has been active in the coordination of financing and shipping of arms to Syrian rebels through Saudi Arabia and Qatar, shipments which according to mainstream news reports have been “largely going to hard-line Islamists.”  In addition to this the CIA, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Qatar and other allies, in bases located in Turkey⁽⁴⁾ and Jordan⁽⁵⁾, have been aided ‘vetted’ rebel groups who have admitted to both working with and funneling US supplied weapons to al-Nusra and ISIS.^{(6)(7)(8)(9)(10)} 

In the 2007 Seymour Hersh report, Hersh quotes a US government consultant as stating that Saudi Arabian Prince Bandar, the former Saudi ambassador to the US and former director of the Saudi Intelligence Agency, has 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.”  Back in August of 2013, Prince Bandar allegedly threatened Putin if he did not change his position regarding Assad and Syria, “I can give you a guarantee to protect the Winter Olympics in the city of Sochi on the Black Sea next year. The Chechen groups that threaten the security of the games are controlled by us, and they will not move in the Syrian territory’s direction without coordinating with us. These groups do not scare us. We use them in the face of the Syrian regime but they will have no role or influence in Syria’s political future,” the Prince was quoted as saying. 

Given this, it is easy to see why the covert operations against Syria by the US and Saud have led to the rise of ISIS, al-Nusra, and the CIA-vetted groups like the FSA and SRF who admittedly have been fighting alongside and funneling US weapons to al-Qaeda.  Therefore, when US intelligence officials warn of the terrorist threat emanating from Syria, they are discussing the direct result of a US policy of fomenting Islamic extremism.  Seen in this light, the recent attacks on Charlie Hebdo cannot be separated from the policy of arming, funding, and training jihadists to attack the Syrian population and weaken the Syrian state.  If it is true that French intelligence were preoccupied with monitoring terrorists threats emanating from Syria, then this threat as well is a direct result of the Western policy, which includes the participation of France⁽¹¹⁾, of fomenting terrorism in Syria.

Holes in the Narrative

Problems arise when further analysis is laid upon the official narrative of events, described above. 

Firstly, reasonable questions have been raised regarding the video of the officer shot at point blank range.  When inspecting the video we find that when slowed down it seems as though the shot fired did not hit the police officer, evidenced by the plume of dust created on the ground in front of him from the impact of the bullet.  This is further confirmed by the fact that after the shot was fired the officer’s head wasn’t rocked at all by the blast, no movement is perceived; if the officer was hit his head would have recoiled from the impact of the blast.⁽¹²⁾  Although it is plausible that the officer was shot perhaps in the neck or upper abdomen, questions arise given that all news sources report that he died from a shot to the head.  It would be wrong to suggest that Ahmed Merabet has not been killed, however there is reason to suspect that the cause of his death has not been truthfully reported on.

Secondly, the claims that police had recovered an ID card confirming the identity of their suspect strains belief and further sheds doubt upon claims of the suspects identities.  These claims could easily be false; we are forced to take the authorities at their word, without further proof being available.

Thirdly, a police officer assigned to investigate the Charlie Hebdo murder committed suicide on the night of the attacks, prompting questions relating to the nature of his suicide, and whether or not it represents an interest in silencing information that he had uncovered.

Furthermore, the assailants all had histories of terrorism that was known to French and American intelligence.  Cherif Kouachi and Coulibaly had been imprisoned for terrorist charges, and reports indicate that Coulibady had become radicalized in prison.  The Washington Post reports that both men had become devoted followers of Djamel Beghal, described as having ties to al-Qaeda and being convicted of plotting to blow up the US Embassy in Paris in 2001.  After his prison sentence Coulibaly met with then French President Sarkozy, and 10 months after this visit police found weapons caches in Coulibably’s apartment.  Coulibaly then was convicted and sentenced to 5 years in prison relating to an attempt to break another militant Islamist out of prison, yet he was released early from this sentence.  These facts of intensive intelligence related to these men’s ties to jihadi extremism, as well as their connections to French authorities, coupled with reports of the Kouachi brothers traveling to Syria ostensibly to participate in militant jihadism there, produce worrying questions about the conduct of French authorities, and further lay doubt on the practice of widespread surveillance which collects data on the entire haystack and thus leaves the needles to fall through the cracks.

Julien Assange asks these important questions in a recent post, “So conspicuous is the failure in the Charlie Hebdo killings that serious questions must be asked. Cherif Kouachi had previously been involved in furthering the Sunni insurgency in the Levant. Were the brothers protected by the French services as part of French adventurism in Syria, Libya and elsewhere—as a conduit to funnel money, guns and militants into Africa and the Middle East? Were the brothers protected because they were witting or unwitting informers? Were the brothers protected in order to conduct a mediagenic, budget-boosting arrest seconds before the attack began — but the attack was moved forward? Why was the security architecture of the Charlie Hebdo building so poor? How is it that semi-automatic weapons found their way into France and into the hands of known jihadis? And most of all why has France’s crazed Sunni adventurism in Syria, Libya and other parts of Africa been tolerated despite the inevitable destabalization, radicalization and blowback?”

I am Charlie?

The wave of support associated with the #IAmCharlie meme should avoid the trap of conflating support for the freedom of speech with support of the bigoted and racist Charlie Hebdo cartoons, which include mocking the sex slaves of Boko Haram as welfare queens.  There exist extreme double standards in the West in regards to free speech; one would be hard pressed to see people showing the same amount of support if Charlie Hebdo’s cartoons had been as anti-Semetic or anti-black as they were anti-Muslim.  Instead, we should not associate our defense of free-speech, even when one finds that speech repugnant, with vindication of the speech itself.  “The reaction should be completely independent of what [one] thinks about this journal and what it produces.  The passionate and ubiquitous chants “I am Charlie,” and the like, should not be meant to indicate, even hint at, any association with the journal, at least in the context of defense of freedom of speech.  Rather, they should express defense of the right of free expression whatever one thinks of the contents, even if they are regarded as hateful and depraved,” Noam Chomsky writes in a recent post.

We should also avoid the divisive mindset set forth that seeks to explain the situation as a “clash of civilizations,” or one that portrays the events as the Righteous West versus the depraved Muslim terrorists; these arguments are not plausible.  One should remember that the majority of Muslims do not support Islamic extremism, which is not surprising given that those most affected by this extremism is not the West, the recent attacks being only a very small portion of the overall terrorism committed, but are instead Muslim and Arab populations in Arab countries. 

It should be noted that the outcry against anti-Muslim sentiments also stems from major Western aggressions against Arab nations and populations.  These include the destruction of Afghanistan, the war in Iraq which is the greatest criminal act of the 21^st century, the transformation of Libya into a failed state governed by extremism, the constant droning of Pakistan, Yemen, Afghanistan, Somalia, and others in Obamas illegal drone operations which is the greatest campaign of terrorism present today, as well as the allied support of the brutal dictatorships of Jordan, Egypt, the regimes of the UAE, Qatar, and the medieval-like monarchy of Saudi Arabia, support for Israel’s wanton aggression and colonization of the Palestinians, etc., etc. 

The demonization of Islam, and racism against Arabs in general, is thus not solely a matter of cartoons and words, but is instead a widespread phenomenon that is proliferated, tolerated, and encouraged because it is beneficial to the dominant power-structures interest in controlling Middle Eastern oil.  The demonization of an entire people is a useful tool when you have an interest in invading their lands and controlling their resources; it creates an outlook about the world that garners support amongst the populations of the states that seek to endeavor in these aggressive actions, and legitimizes atrocities that would otherwise never have been accepted had the victims not been reduced to ‘the Other’.  (A telling example of this is the Nazi’s use of media and propaganda that helped to reduce perception of Jews to little more than hated monsters that were to be feared, leading ultimately to the Holocaust.)

Also ignored is the fact that the biggest perpetrator of jihadi extremism in the world is the West and its allies, as described above, which uses these militant ideologies as geopolitical weapons against nations it deems as enemies.  In official documents leaked by WikiLeaks, then US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton wrote in 2009 of our close ally Saudi Arabia, stating that, “donors in Saudi Arabia constitute the most significant source of funding to Sunni terrorist groups worldwide… Saudi Arabia remains a critical financial support base for al-Qa'ida, the Taliban, LeT, and other terrorist groups.”  Middle East specialist Patrick Cockburn further reports on Clinton’s statements, “in so far as Saudi Arabia did act against al-Qa'ida, it was as a domestic threat and not because of its activities abroad.”

Anti-Muslim arguments also ignore the fact that the police officer killed attempting to protect the Charlie Hebdo offices, despite their virulent anti-Muslim sentiments, was himself a Muslim, prompting the hashtags #IAmAhmed and #JesuisAhmed.

Following terror attacks such as these, the public is understandably concerned with safety, however the answer is not to further give up our freedoms to our governments, which weakens our safety given that we then have to worry of the threat posed by government oppression as well as non-state terrorists (highlighted by the fact that the police-state apparatus, while accomplishing the theft of our rights and freedoms, has not stopped any terrorist plots against the West)^(13)(14)(15), but instead if we honestly want to stop terror we must firstly seek to understand the legitimate grievances that inspire these acts^(16)(17), and secondly we must stop our governments from utilizing terrorists against foreign countries as geopolitical tools of imperialism as well as from engaging in wars of aggression and resource domination; the world would overnight be massively rid of the threat of terrorism if the US and its allies would simply stop participating in it.

Sources:

1.)    The Wall Street Journal reports that French intelligence was struggling to monitor its citizens traveling to Iraq and Syria, a number that has surpassed 1,000, according to officials.  Meichtry, Stacy et al.  Overburdened French Dropped Surveillance of Brothers.  January 10, 2015.  The Wall Street Journal.  http://www.wsj.com/articles/kouachis-links-to-yemen-overlooked-by-french-intelligence-1420837677.  (Accessed on 1/11/2015).

2.)   Bloomberg reports, citing the French outlet Le Point, that Cherif Kouachi disappeared after being detained by French police in 2010, only to return from Syria with his brother Said last summer.  Fouquet, Helene.  Patel, Tara.  Paris Attack Suspect Had History of Terror-Charge Arrests.  January 8, 2015.  Bloomberg.  http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2015-01-08/paris-attack-suspect-had-history-of-terror-charge-arrests.html.  (Accessed on 1/11/2015).

3.)   Richard Labeviere, Dollars For Terror: The United States and Islam (New York: Algora, 2000)

4.)   Reuters, quoting government sources, reports that the US is collaborating along with Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Turkey in a secret command center operated by Turkey near the Syrian border in the city of Adana.  The base had been established to help direct military and communications support to Assad’s opponents.  Hosenball, Mark.  Exclusive: Obama authorizes secret U.S. support for Syrian rebels.  August 1, 2012.  Reuters.  http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/08/01/us-usa-syria-obama-order-idUSBRE8701OK20120801.  (Accessed on 1/11/2015).

5.)   The Wall Street Journal reports on a ‘secret’ base in Jordan in which US, Jordanian, Saudi, and other allies’ intelligence agencies have been coordinating the covert Syrian operations, which includes vetting of rebel groups and the provision of arms and funding.  Entous, Adam et al.  A Veteran Saudi Power Player Works To Build Support to Topple Assad.  August 25, 2013.  The Wall Street Journal.  http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424127887323423804579024452583045962.  (Accessed on 1/11/2015).

6.)   Reports of widespread defection of US-supported FSA factions into the ranks of ISIS in July of 2014.  Raja, Abdullah.  FSA brigades pledge allegiance to ISIS in Al Bukamal, east Syria.  July 7, 2014.  Zaman Alwsl.  https://www.zamanalwsl.net/en/readNews.php?id=5696.  (Accessed on 1/11/2015).

7.)   In September 2014, US-supported Harakat Hazm affiliate Aasin Zeidan is quoted by the LATimes as saying, “Inside Syria we became labeled as secularists and feared Nusra Front was going to battle us… But Nusra doesn't fight us, we actually fight alongside them. We like Nusra.”  Harakat Hazm is, according to the Washington Post, “the biggest recipient of U.S. assistance offered under a small-scale, covert CIA program launched this year [2014], including the first deliveries of U.S.-made TOW antitank missiles.”  Abdulrahim, Raja.  Syria rebels, once hopeful of U.S. weapons, lament lack of firepower.  Setpember 7, 2014.  LA Times.  http://www.latimes.com/world/middleeast/la-fg-syria-harakat-hazm-20140907-story.html#page=1.  (Accessed on 1/11/2015).

8.)   In September 2014, the DailyStar quotes US-backed FSA commander Bassel Idriss as saying that, “We are collaborating with the Islamic State and the Nusra Front by attacking the Syrian Army’s gatherings in ... Qalamoun… We have reached a point where we have to collaborate with anyone against unfairness and injustice… Let’s face it: The Nusra Front is the biggest power present right now in Qalamoun and we as FSA would collaborate on any mission they launch as long as it coincides with our values.”  Knutsen, Elise.  Frustration drives Arsal’s FSA into ISIS ranks.  September 8, 2014.  The Daily Star.  http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Lebanon-News/2014/Sep-08/269883-frustration-drives-arsals-fsa-into-isis-ranks.ashx#ixzz3CpSZVuEG.  (Accessed on 1/11/2015).

9.)   In April 2014, The Independent quotes US-backed SRF leader Jamal Maarouf as saying, “It’s clear that I’m not fighting against al-Qa’ida. This is a problem outside of Syria’s border, so it’s not our problem. I don’t have a problem with anyone who fights against the regime inside Syria.”  The report goes on to state that, “Maarouf admits to fighting alongside Jabhat al-Nusra – one example being the offensive against Isis, whose brutal tactics were deemed too violent even for al-Qa’ida leader Ayman al-Zawahiri.  While Maarouf maintains that their military supplies are too few to share, he cites the battle of Yabroud, against the regime, as an example of how his group shared weapons with Jabhat al-Nusra.  “If the people who support us tell us to send weapons to another group, we send them. They asked us a month ago to send weapons to Yabroud so we sent a lot of weapons there. When they asked us to do this, we do it.”  Hunter, Isabel.  ‘I am not fighting against al-Qa’ida… it’s not our problem’, says West’s last hope in Syria.  April 2, 2014.  The Independent.  http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/i-am-not-fighting-againstalqaida-itsnot-our-problem-says-wests-last-hope-in-syria-9233424.html.  (Accessed on 1/11/2015).

10.)            For further information on US-supported rebels and their links to ISIS, al-Nusra, and extremism, this report by Patrick Poole contains a wealth of information and is extensively sourced.  Poole, Patrick.  ‘Vetted Moderate’ Free Syrian Army Commander Admits Alliance with ISIS, Confirms PJ Media Reporting.  September 10, 2014.  PJ Media.  http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2014/09/10/vetted-moderate-free-syrian-army-commander-admits-alliance-with-isis-confirms-pj-media-reporting/?singlepage=true.  (Accessed on 1/11/2015).

11.) France24 reports, citing an interview conducted by Le Monde, that French President Hollande has confirmed that France has delivered aid to Syrian rebels, most likely weapons caches.  France delivers arms to Syrian rebels, Hollande confirms.  August 21, 2014.  France24.  http://www.france24.com/en/20140821-france-arms-syria-rebels-hollande/.  (Accessed on 1/11/2015).

12.)StormCloudsGathering analysis of the video allegedly depicting police officer Ahmed Marebet being shot by assailant.  Charlie Hebdo Shooting Censored Video.  January 10, 2015.  Storm Clouds Gathering.  http://stormcloudsgathering.com/charlie-hebdo-shootings-censored-video.  (Accessed on 1/11/2015).

13.)In January of 2014 John Mearsheimer, respected scholar at the University of Chicago, writes on the Privacy Board established by the Obama administration to investigate the effectiveness of NSA spying programs, “The Obama administration, not surprisingly, initially claimed that the nsa’s spying played a key role in thwarting fifty-four terrorist plots against the United States, implying it violated the Fourth Amendment for good reason. This was a lie, however. General Keith Alexander, the nsa director, eventually admitted to Congress that he could claim only one success, and that involved catching a Somali immigrant and three cohorts living in San Diego who had sent $8,500 to a terrorist group in Somalia.”  Mearsheimer, John J.  America Unhinged.  January/February 2014, Number 129.  The National Interest.  http://nationalinterest.org/files/digital-edition/1388435556/129%20Digital%20Edition.pdf.  (Accessed on 1/11/2015). 

14.)            The nonprofit public policy group New American Foundation has published a report reviewing US terrorist arrests and concludes that widespread collection of telephone metadata does little to prevent terrorism.  Peter Bergen, director of the foundations national security program, stated, “Our investigation found that bulk collection of American phone metadata has had no discernible impact on preventing acts of terrorism and only the most marginal of impacts on preventing terrorist-related activity, such as fundraising for a terrorist group.”  Strohm, Chris.  NSA Data Have No Impact on Terrorism: Report.  January 13, 2014.  Bloomberg.  http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-01-13/nsa-data-has-no-discernible-impact-on-terrorism-report.html.  (Accessed on 1/11/2015).

15.)Far from stopping terrorism, US law enforcement has, in the pursuit of stopping terrorism, actively engaged in committing terrorism in order to bring about counterterrorism convictions.  Human Rights Watch has recently published a report with startling revelations of FBI conduct in regards to counterterrorism operations, stating that in many instances the FBI has created and developed terrorist plots, and pressured and encouraged them to take place.  It states, “Since the September 11 attacks, more than 500 individuals have been prosecuted in US federal courts for terrorism or related offenses.  Many prosecutions have properly targeted individuals engaged in planning or financing terror attacks. But many others have targeted individuals who do not appear to have been involved in terrorist plotting or financing at the time the government began to investigate them.  Indeed, in some cases the Federal Bureau of Investigation may have created terrorists out of law-abiding individuals by conducting sting operations that facilitated or invented the target’s willingness to act. According to multiple studies, nearly 50 percent of the more than 500 federal counterterrorism convictions resulted from informant-based cases; almost 30 percent of those cases were sting operations in which the informant played an active role in the underlying plot. In the case of the “Newburgh Four,” for example, a judge said the government “came up with the crime, provided the means, and removed all relevant obstacles,” and had, in the process, made a terrorist out of a man “whose buffoonery is positively Shakespearean in scope… While some of these cases involved foreign nationals and conduct overseas, or individuals who are not Muslim, many of the most high-profile terrorism prosecutions have focused on “homegrown” terrorist threats allegedly posed by American Muslims. Human Rights Watch and Columbia Law School’s Human Rights Institute found that at times, in aggressively pursuing terrorism threats before they even materialize, US law enforcement overstepped its role by effectively participating in developing terrorism plots—in at least two cases even offering the defendants money to entice them to participate in the plot.”  Illusion of Justice: Human Rights Abuses in US Terrorism Prosecutions.  Human Rights Watch.  Columbia Law School Human Rights Institute.  July 2014.  http://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/reports/usterrorism0714_ForUpload_0_0_0.pdf.  (Accessed on 1/11/2015).

16.)            Leading national security scholar Nafeez Ahmed writes in a recent piece, “France’s failed policies towards its Muslim minority communities have played a critical role in establishing a groundswell of social exclusion and alienation, that makes some French Muslims vulnerable to recruitment by Islamist extremists.  This was even acknowledged by Bernard Squarcini, the head of France’s Central Directorate of Interior Intelligence (DCRI), who recently admitted that the reasons France has faced an increasingly high risk of terrorist attack include the country’s history as a colonial power, its military involvement in Afghanistan, and the widening restrictions on Muslim women’s dress including the banning of headscarves in public service jobs. Yet in some ways, Squarcini also misses the point, even noted by private US intelligence firm Stratfor, which is closely linked to the American military intelligence community: “France has a significant Muslim minority largely segregated in slums known in French as ‘banlieues’ outside France's major cities. A significant proportion of the young Muslim men who live in these areas are unemployed and disaffected. This disaffection has been displayed periodically in the form of large-scale riots … which resulted in massive property destruction and produced the worst civil unrest in France since the late 1960s. While not all those involved in the riots were Muslims, Muslims did play a significant and visible role in them… Moves by the French government such as the burqa ban have stoked these tensions and feelings of anger and alienation. The ban, like the 2004 ban against headscarves in French schools, angered not only jihadists but also some mainstream Muslims in France and beyond.”  Ahmed, Nafeez.  Blowback in Paris.  January 8, 2015.  http://www.middleeasteye.net/columns/blowback-paris-1534074535.  (Accessed on 1/11/2015).

17.)Noam Chomsky writes in 2001, citing Wall Street Journal reports, “Immediately after 9-11, the Wall Street Journal, later others, began to investigate opinions of "moneyed Muslims": bankers, professionals, managers of multinationals, and so on. They strongly support US policies in general, but are bitter about the US role in the region: about US support for corrupt and repressive regimes that undermine democracy and development, and about specific policies, particularly regarding Palestine and Iraq. Though they are not surveyed, attitudes in the slums and villages are probably similar, but harsher; unlike the "moneyed Muslims," the mass of the population have never agreed that the wealth of the region should be drained to the West and local collaborators, rather than serving domestic needs. The "moneyed Muslims" recognize, ruefully, that Bin Laden's angry rhetoric has considerable resonance, in their own circles as well, even though they hate and fear him, if only because they are among his primary targets.  Chomsky, Noam.  Terror and Just Response.  July 2, 2002. Chomsky.info. http://www.chomsky.info/articles/20020702.htm.  (Accessed on 1/11/2015).  Waldman, Peter et al.  America in the Eyes of the Arab World: A Complex Mix of Emotions Fuels Hate.  September 14, 2001, The Wall Street Journal.  http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB1000432258298173371.  (Accessed on 1/11/2015).  Waldman, Peter.  Pope, Hugh.  'Crusade' Reference Reinforces Fears War on Terrorism Is Against Muslims.  September 21, 2001.  The Wall Street Journal.  http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB1001020294332922160.  (Accessed on 1/11/2015).