US Govt-Funded Think Tank Praises “Moderate” Al Qaeda

With al Qaeda now seen by the U.S. as likely the only group in Syria “militarily capable of challenging the Assad regime’s grip on power, the U.S. is in the uncomfortable position of having to rehabilitate 9/11 and current terrorists into supportable “moderates.”

Whitney Webb
By Whitney Webb

Last week, Foreign Affairs, self-described as the “leading magazine for analysis and debate of foreign policy,” published an article titled “The Moderate Face of Al Qaeda.” The piece takes note of the fact that al Qaeda’s branch in Syria, long known as Jabhat al-Nusra or al-Nusra Front, changed its names numerous times in order to present itself as

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Hezbollah and Syrian Army Liberate Large Islamic State Group Enclave: Nasrallah

Hezbollah has been one of the most effective forces fighting Islamic State forces along the Syrian border, in collaboration with the Syrian government led by President Bashar al-Assad. Earlier this month, a Hezbollah offensive drove out numerous al-Nusra Front militants from a border region of Lebanon.

teleSUR
By teleSUR
Hezbollah

A joint offensive between Shia resistance movement Hezbollah and the Syrian army has liberated the majority of a significant enclave controlled by the so-called Islamic State group, the Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah announced in a televised speech on Thursday. According to Nasrallah, since the offensive began last week to clear out

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Over 500,000 Syrian Refugees Return To Gov’t-Controlled Areas Of Syria

Though it has been claimed that Syria’s refugees have fled the country to get away from its leader, poll results and other statistics indicate that Syria’s president still remains wildly popular in the country. His most recent re-election saw him win a whopping 88 percent of the popular vote.

Whitney Webb
By Whitney Webb
In the badly damaged Al-Shaar neighbourhood in East Aleppo, returnee families and displaced residents receive UNHCR relief assistance at a distribution point run by the Al Ihsan charity in March, 2017. (Photo: UNHCR/Hameed Marouf)

Crucial to the Western narrative of the Syrian conflict is the assertion that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is a brutal dictator who has taken to killing his own people over the course of Syria’s six-year-long conflict. This allegation has been the crux of the “humanitarian” justification for foreign military intervention in Syria that would

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US Takes Syria’s Al-Qaeda Off Terrorist Watchlist

By changing its name to Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the Syrian branch of al-Qaeda has managed to secure its removal from the U.S. and Canadian terror watchlists, allowing citizens of those countries to donate money and travel to fight with them.

Whitney Webb
By Whitney Webb

It turns out that getting off the U.S.’ and Canada’s terror watchlist is as simple as changing your name. While the terror watchlist in the U.S. has long been both secretive and controversial – as “reasonable suspicion” is enough to label any individual a “terrorist” – terrorist groups tied to al-Qaeda have found that getting off the watchlist only

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US Officials Still Can’t Explain Why Syria Would Carry Out A Chemical Attack

This new narrative, that the strike was done for operational reasons, seemingly contradicts previous claims that Syria attacked civilians with chemical weapons for no reason at all.

Jason Ditz
By Jason Ditz
US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson listens, right, to Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, back to a camera, during their meeting in Moscow, Russia, Wednesday, April 12, 2017. Tillerson's Moscow talks hinge on new US leverage over Syria. (AP/Alexander Zemlianichenko)

While it wouldn’t be unusual for Syria to bomb targets belonging to al-Qaeda’s Nusra Front in the Idlib Province with airstrikes, a big hole in the US-backed allegations of a “chemical weapons attack” by the Syrian military is that there was no reason for such a strike. Administration officials are trying to manufacture one, with an unnamed

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Trump’s On Attack Syria Trampled Many Laws

Exclusive: As the U.S. mainstream media hails President Trump’s missile strike on Syria, there has been almost no attention to either the truth about its justification or the myriad of laws violated in its execution, writes Marjorie Cohn.

Marjorie Cohn
By Marjorie Cohn
A protest against the US missile strike against Syria during a rally in New York on Friday, April 7, 2017. (AP/Andres Kudacki)

With 59 Tomahawk cruise missiles, each armed with over 1,000 pounds of explosives, Donald Trump went from scoundrel-in-chief to national hero, virtually overnight. The corporate media, the neoconservatives and most of Congress hailed Trump as strong and presidential for lobbing bombs into Syria, reportedly killing seven civilians and wounding

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