Syrian Rebels Embrace Al-Qaeda!

• Syrian Rebels Embrace al-Qaeda! 
  by Robert Parry, http://consortiumnews.com/ 
  Exclusive: The leading Syrian rebel groups have declared their intent to transform Syria into a Taliban-style state that would collaborate with al-Qaeda-affiliated groups in the heart of the Middle East. This lifting of the veil presents President Obama with an even trickier policy dilemma, reports Robert Parry.
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  Official Washington was caught off-guard this week when the radicalization of the Syrian rebels went from being an obscured reality to an undeniable truth. Syria’s most powerful rebel forces renounced the “moderate” exiles, who have been nurtured by the West, and embraced an Islamic extremist organization affiliated with al-Qaeda.
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  This development now confronts the West with a set of even grimmer choices: help the radical jihadists win the war and turn Syria into a Taliban-style homeland for terrorism in the center of the Middle East; accept an indefinite continuation of the bloody civil war hoping that no one wins as the bodies pile up; or work with the Assad regime and the weakened “moderates” to bring about some kind of political reform that might placate the estranged Sunni majority while isolating the extreme Islamists.
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  If the last option seems to you to be the least worst, you would find yourself in a distinct minority inside Official Washington, where politicians and pundits still prefer to swagger about, issuing ultimatums demanding the unconditional removal of President Bashar al-Assad, whose regime has committed many atrocities in a civil war where brutality is common on both sides.
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  But if President Barack Obama were to pick the negotiation option, he would not only face resistance across Official Washington; his choice would put him at odds with Saudi Arabia and Israel, which have formed a de facto alliance in pursuit of joint regional goals, including the ouster of Assad.
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  Saudi Arabia and its neighboring oil sheikdoms have spearheaded the arming and funding of the radical jihadists who are now flooding into Syria from across the Arab world and from other Muslim areas such as Chechnya in Russia. Israel has quietly supported this effort, too, in political and diplomatic circles.
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  Though the Saudi monarchy has long presented itself as a “moderate” Arab state and friend of the United States, it is, in reality, an extremist government that imposes the hard-line Wahhabi version of Sunni Islam on its people. Through its skillful intelligence service, Saudi Arabia also has financed Sunni extremists for decades, including Osama bin Laden and other radicals who formed al-Qaeda in the 1990s.
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  Bin Laden may have become an expatriate Saudi before the 9/11 attacks, but alleged Saudi financing for al-Qaeda has remained a national security mystery in the United States, with the 9/11 Commission’s conclusions on this sensitive topic the only section redacted in its final report.
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