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Even the Soros-funded Human Rights Watch was forced to admit the executions constituted “war crimes.” The fact that al-Qaeda terrorists are now fully part of the Syrian “revolution” is no longer debatable. Much like the situation in Libya, the “rebels” are not rebels at all. They are merely NATO-backed death squads used for the purpose of destabilization and regime change. All in all, Syria is just one of the last steps to be made on the Path to Persia.
To undermine Iran, which is predominantly Shiite, the Bush Administration has decided, in effect, to reconfigure its priorities in the Middle East. In Lebanon, the Administration has coöperated with Saudi Arabia’s government, which is Sunni, in clandestine operations that are intended to weaken Hezbollah, the Shiite organization that is backed by Iran. The U.S. has also taken part in clandestine operations aimed at Iran and its ally Syria. A by-product of these activities has been the bolstering of Sunni extremist groups that espouse a militant vision of Islam and are hostile to America and sympathetic to Al Qaeda. Read more www.newyorker.com...
On May 25, when regime militias entered the town of Houla and carried out a gruesome massacre killing 108, including 49 children, something very strange happened. Despite the fact that Channel 4 had entered the town the very next day and collected on-camera testimonies from survivors, Stalinist outfits like MediaLens, media watchdogs like FAIR, and some left luminaries, including our friend Tariq Ali, started blaming the victims. There is no reason why official stories shouldn’t be doubted, but given the heinous nature of the crime, one would’ve thought they’d be careful with regard to their evidence. As it happened, all of them were relying on a single article appearing in a German publication, written by an author who never visited Houla or met a survivor. This was no innocent mistake: it was pointed out to both Medialens and FAIR that their source was dubious and its claim highly questionable. The source was discredited soon afterwards, and Der Spiegel and the UN have since both confirmed the original reports. Neither Medialens nor FAIR has apologized. Here meanwhile is Al Jazeera’s investigation into the massacre.
previous reports about CENTCOM's efforts claimed that the project used "fake online identities" to engage with online supporters of terror, something which journalism professor Jeff Jarvis lambasted as "clumsy". In the Post article, counter-terrorism expert Evan Kohlmann also questioned the effectiveness of such efforts in a place like Yemen, where internet penetration is approximately 1.8 per cent. "CENTCOM's engagement efforts seem like straight-up propaganda." The State Department has also engaged with online extremists via a multilingual Digital Outreach Team. That effort, too, has at times veered toward the absurd; in 2007, Palestinian blogger Haitham Sabbah reported being targeted by a member of the team after writing a blog post about US and Israeli state violence in the Middle East. Although the State Department's team explicitly acknowledged their government employer, it is not clear that CENTCOM's is as transparent. So while both ventures raise questions about effectiveness, CENTCOM's "engagement" efforts seem like straight-up propaganda.
As I previously posted -- the other news organizations have already admitted that the German article is not accurate.
Western officials continue to cite Friday’s Houla massacre as they move to diplomatically isolate Syria, and France’s new president is following in the footsteps of his predecessor in pushing for a UN-backed war. But what exactly happened in Houla? The UN’s new report is adding even more questions than it answers, and is once again throwing the rebels’ version of the event, which has been reported unaltered by US officials, into serious doubt. The rebel version of the story of the Houla massacre is that Syrian tanks and artillery surrounded the tiny town and started shelling indiscriminately, massacring well over 100 innocent civilians for no apparent reason. Though the death toll seems roughly correct, the UN report revealed that the shelling killed less than 20 people, with the vast majority executed by gunfire at close range. This of course makes no sense, since the rebel reports from Friday didn’t even have troops entering the town, claiming that rebel forces had chased them away after artillery fire on a protest.
theuglytruth.wordpress.com...
The religious legitimacy of the Syria war and the increase of funding and fighters almost unquestionably benefits Al Qaeda in Iraq. It is heavily involved in overseeing the war in Syria.
Originally posted by supamoto
Great post OP. This should be discussed & debated. Propaganda is obvious by both sides but we the entertained should keep an open mind to this situation.
It seems to me there is a comparasion with the events that took place in Lybia.
Gadaffi was portrayed as some kind of tyrant by our western media but the reality was very different.
He did much for Lybia/Lybian people that was never reported by western sources & I can't believe that his people wanted him gone. If my (the UK) government did such things for us we (in the UK) would worship them.
I am having a lot of problems with believing that Assad is so destructive to his own country & people.
Ultimately Syria will have to pay (money) much to put everything back together after this is all over. Who & how will this be paid for I wonder?
Obummer sorry Obhama (cant spell the priks name) just said on the BBC news something about chemical weapons potentially being used by the Syrian army! WMD all over again. Bush/Blair lies all over again.
'Don't believe the hype'.