President Barack Obama has announced that the U.S. will formally back Syria’s main rebel group to pursue a common goal of bringing an end to President Bashar al-Assad’s dictatorship. The recognition puts the U.S. on the same page with its European allies who have already given their full support for the opposition.
In an interview with ABC News, President Obama said that the opposition coalition is representative enough of the Syrian people to the extent that they have earned the support of the U.S.
The Syrian National Coalition for revolutionary and Opposition Forces was formed in November and received immediate support from European nations. The U.S., however, was a little hesitant as it was concerned with Islamist rebels and extremists within the organization.
Western nations have also opened a window to engage in talks with Russia, which is one of Syria and Assad’s greatest allies. Obama has said that while it supports the opposition, it will also make sure to weed out those within the group who has ties to al Qaeda.
The Obama administration recently released intelligence reports that identify an opposition group as an affiliate of al Qaeda. The group is Jabhat al-Nusra, which has been linked to close to 600 terrorist attacks in Syria since November of last year. The U.S. has now barred all Americans from doing business with the organization. In addition, sanctions have also been imposed against two Jabhat al-Nusra members for their connection to al Qaeda in Iraq.
Plans for an international meeting will be held in Morocco where 80 nations from around the world will convene to discuss how it can further their collective support for the rebel groups. The conference is being dubbed as the “Friends of Syria†meeting. The conference will be held as the U.S. continues to monitor Assad’s government for signs of chemical weapons that it may deploy against its own people.
This doesn’t mean, however, that al-Qaeda is no longer a threat. They are still capable of inflicting heavy damage; this was evident when they launched an assault on a housing compound for foreign workers in Afghanistan that claimed seven lives.
My first impression of the Sinai Peninsula in the north of Egypt was a pleasant surprise. I travelled there with two of my comrades in the spring of 2006. We took a bus from our kibbutz in the north overnight through Israel and crossed the border at Eilat. After crossing the Egyptian border check (the Sinai Peninsula was ceded to Egypt by Israel in 1982 with an 
The tiny country’s new government is a flimsy coalition of Western-backed countries and of course 
Jund Ansar Allah, an Al Qaeda-inspired Gaza-based ultra radical terrorist organization calling for strict Islamic law in the strip, has been pretty upset with 
The Suez Canal has seen a heavy use of marine traffic lately, despite the frequent 
“I have seen all the proposals made so generously by Ehud Olmert, but I have not seen any result”; so spoke Israel’s new Foreign Minister, Avigdor Lieberman, during his first address to the media after assuming his post. He went on to say that the way the free world has tried to deal with issues like Islamic sponsored terrorism and Iran’s nuclear program hasn’t worked, and that the real world security problems are coming from countries like Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran and Iraq and not from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
His death is said to have caused by a bomb planted inside the headrest on the front seat of his Mitsubishi Pajero jeep. It was definitely a professional job, which is why the Hezbollah have immediately blamed “the Zionests” for carrying out the hit. But
Is the cat out of the bag, or is this something most people really knew all along? Only days after U.S. President Bush met with Pakistan’s president (or is it Dictator) Gen. Pervez Musharraf, in New York during the opening session of the U.N. General Assembly, the release of the General’s book, In the Line of Fire, some very revealing details concerning Pakistan’s “real relationship” with the United States. Musharraf, who himself is not lily-white when it comes to how he became the supreme ruler of the world’s only (so far) nuclear armed Islamic country, has now made a virtual confession concerning how he had no alternative other than to ‘change horses’ and give support to the U.S. led War on Terror following the Al Qaeda planned attacks against the U.S. in September, 2001.
Today at 9 a.m. E.D.T., and 4 p.m. M.E.T. (for those living in Israel and other similar time-zone countries), ceremonies will mark the fifth anniversary of what is now being considered the worst single attack against the United States, since Pearl Harbor. The events of this modern ‘day of infamy’ have been shown during the past few days by news networks all over the world. All the major U.S. new programs have been screening the horrible occurrences, in which at least 3.000 people lost their lives; most of them at the sight of the World Trade Center in lower Manhattan, New York City. Particularly as these events are re-screened, the nightmare of that fateful day becomes real again, almost a real as it was too many, a mere five years ago.
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