Posted on 09/23/2014 7:26:49 PM PDT by xzins
From Hamas in the Gaza Strip to radical armed movements in Syria, Qatar's status as a prime sponsor of violent Islamists, including groups linked to al-Qaeda, is clear to diplomats and experts.
Qatar's promotion of extremism has so infuriated its neighbours that Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates all chose to withdraw their ambassadors from the country in March.
Take Syria, where Qatar has been sponsoring the rebellion against Bashar al-Assad's regime. In itself, that policy places Qatar alongside the leading Western powers and much of the Arab world.
But Qatar has deliberately channelled guns and cash towards Islamist rebels, notably a group styling itself Ahrar al-Sham, or "Free Men of Syria". Only last week, Khalid al-Attiyah, the Qatari foreign minister, praised this movement as "purely" Syrian.
He added that its fighters had suffered heavy losses while combating the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil), the group behind the murder of David Haines, the British aid worker, and which is holding John Cantlie and Alan Henning hostage.
Far from being a force for moderation, Ahrar al-Sham played a key role in transforming the anti-Assad revolt into an Islamist uprising. Its men fought alongside Jabhat al-Nusra, an al-Qaeda affiliate, during the battle for Aleppo and they were accused of at least one sectarian massacre.
Instead of fighting Isil, Ahrar al-Sham helped the jihadists to run Raqqa, the town in eastern Syria that is now the capital of the self-proclaimed "Caliphate". This cooperation with Isil happened for some months until the two groups fell out last year.
Last December, the US Treasury designated a Qatari academic and businessman, Abdul Rahman al-Nuaimi, as a "global terrorist". The US accused him of sending nearly £366,000 to "al-Qaeda's representative in Syria", named as Abu Khalid al-Suri.
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
From article:
“Last month, Gerd Müller, the German international development minister, implicated Qatar in the rise of Isil. “You have to ask who is arming, who is financing Isil troops. The keyword there is Qatar,” he said.
Yet a state endowed with large reserves of gas and oil and one of the world’s biggest sovereign wealth funds can wield immense influence, even over Berlin. Qatar was duly able to secure a formal withdrawal of this charge from the German government. “
Why not?
The Saudis own Obama and McCain, why shouldn't Qatar own the Germans?
Well, that’s no way to talk about our proud new coalition partner...
If they sponsor terrorists, can’t US-based assets of theirs be frozen (with due process, of course)?
Was he speaking on behalf of Russia?
Time for regime change in Qatar.
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