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Bombshell: King Of Jordan Blames Turkey For Terror In Europe, Says Israel “Looks Other Way” On Al-Qaeda

March 26, 2016

Bombshell: King Of Jordan Blames Turkey For Terror In Europe, Says Israel “Looks Other Way” On Al-Qaeda

When Vladimir Putin told the world that ISIS gets a significant portion of its funding by selling oil to Turkey, he had just finished meeting with Jordan’s King Abdullah.

The King is no stranger to confronting the jihadists. Last year, Abdullah threatened to fly combat missions against Islamic State himself following the release of a horrific video that depicted a Jordanian pilot being burned alive in a cage.

Here is the picture the King sent to the militants:

In January, Jordan agreed to share intelligence with Russia in the fight against ISIS and when the French began flying sorties against the extremists following the Paris attacks, their staging ground was an undisclosed Jordanian location.

In short, Jordan has at times appeared to be more genuine in its commitment to fighting extremism than say, the Saudis, whose determination to spread Wahhabism adds fuel to the ideological fire that drives the groups the kingdom claims to be fighting. “The global war — what I call the Third World War by other means — is one that is a generational one,” Abdullah told CNN in January. “Not only inside Islam, as we as Muslims gain the supremacy against the crazies, the outlaws, of our religion, but also reaching out to other religions that Islam is not what they have seen being perpetuated by 0.1% of our religion.”

On Friday, we learn that Abdullah met with US lawmakers in secret during the week of January 11 and disclosed that British SAS forces as well as Jordanian soldiers had been on the ground fighting ISIS in Libya since at least the beginning of the year. ”

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

How US Helps Al Qaeda in Yemen

February 26, 2016

How US Helps Al Qaeda in Yemen

Exclusive: The Obama administration, eager to assuage Saudi Arabia’s anger over the Iran nuclear deal and the failure to achieve “regime change” in Syria, has turned a blind eye to Riyadh’s savaging of Yemen, even though that is helping Al Qaeda militants expand their territory, writes Jonathan Marshall.

For nearly a year, the Obama administration has turned a blind eye to the humanitarian catastrophe in Yemen since Saudi Arabia invaded in March 2015 to crush an Iranian-supported insurgency and restore a discredited former president to power. But Washington cannot so easily ignore the rapid resurgence of a dangerous branch of Al Qaeda that is thriving on the chaos to take control of much of southern Yemen.

The war between indigenous Houthi rebels and Saudi-backed supporters of former President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi has cost more than 6,000 lives and caused more than 35,000 casualties.

King Salman the President and First Lady to a reception room at Erga Palace during a state visit to Saudi Arabia on Jan. 27, 2015. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

What a United Nations report called “widespread and systematic” attacks against civilians by Saudi and Gulf emirate pilots, armed with U.S.-made aircraft and cluster bombs that are banned by international treaty, account for the bulk of civilian deaths and for the wholesale destruction of ancient cities and cultural centers.

In addition, a Saudi-imposed blockade on Yemen, supported by Washington, has allowed only a trickle of relief supplies to reach the country, putting millions of people at risk of starvation.

In the midst of this Hobbesian nightmare, militant followers of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) militants are making a rapid comeback after being crippled in 2012.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Risking Nuclear War for Al Qaeda?

February 19, 2016

Risking Nuclear War for Al Qaeda?

Exclusive: The risk that the multi-sided Syrian war could spark World War III continues as Turkey, Saudi Arabia and U.S. neocons seek an invasion that could kill Russian troops — and possibly escalate the Syrian crisis into a nuclear showdown, amazingly to protect Al Qaeda terrorists, reports Robert Parry.

When President Barack Obama took questions from reporters on Tuesday, the one that needed to be asked – but wasn’t – was whether he had forbidden Turkey and Saudi Arabia to invade Syria, because on that question could hinge whether the ugly Syrian civil war could spin off into World War III and possibly a nuclear showdown.

If Turkey (with hundreds of thousands of troops massed near the Syrian border) and Saudi Arabia (with its sophisticated air force) follow through on threats and intervene militarily to save their rebel clients, who include Al Qaeda’s Nusra Front, from a powerful Russian-backed Syrian government offensive, then Russia will have to decide what to do to protect its 20,000 or so military personnel inside Syria.

President Barack Obama meets with Vice President Joe Biden and other advisers in the Oval Office on Feb. 2, 2016. [White House photo]

A source close to Russian President Vladimir Putin told me that the Russians have warned Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan that Moscow is prepared to use tactical nuclear weapons if necessary to save their troops in the face of a Turkish-Saudi onslaught. Since Turkey is a member of NATO, any such conflict could quickly escalate into a full-scale nuclear confrontation.Given Erdogan’s megalomania or mental instability and the aggressiveness and inexperience of Saudi Prince Mohammad bin Salman (defense minister and son of King Salman), the only person who probably can stop a Turkish-Saudi invasion is President Obama.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Wahhabism, ISIS, and the Saudi Connection

February 1, 2016

Wahhabism, ISIS, and the Saudi Connection

The rise of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) has become somewhat of a revelation to the international community over the last several months. Commencing with the desertion from Al-Qaeda, to the self-proclamation of Caliph by its leader Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi, and finally the surge in Iraq and Syria, each move has occurred without a countervailing effort. In order to conceptualize the mentality of ISIS and its motivation, look no further than inside the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to examine how its puritanical Wahhabi doctrine has enabled the ideology of ISIS and terrorist groups alike, and will continue to do so for potential Islamic extremist groups in the future.

It’s all too obvious that the theology of ISIS is reciprocal to the Wahhabi religious doctrine that has governed Saudi Arabia from its inception to this very day.

A Brief History of the Deal at the Heart of Saudi Society

Wahhabism refers to the Islamic doctrine founded by Muhammad Ibn’ Abdul-Wahhab. Born in 1703, Abdul-Wahab grew up in Nejd (present-day Saudi Arabia) and was a religious zealot who believed the two most important aspects of religion were, “the Quran and the sword.” As a young teen, he was introduced to the works of Ibn Taymiyyah, an atavistic theologian whose works still resonate in present-day Sunni militant theology. Ibn Taymiyyah’s belief that, “misguided Muslims who do not abide by his interpretation of Shari’ah law should be fought as if they were infidels,” is a foundational principle of Al-Qaeda and ISIS alike. Abdul-Wahhab continued his devotion to the teachings of Ibn Taymiyyah throughout his early adult life and began to travel across Nejd projecting his views on Shi’ite communities.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

U.S. Ally Turkey Arrests Academics for the Crime of Signing a Peace Petition

January 19, 2016

U.S. Ally Turkey Arrests Academics for the Crime of Signing a Peace Petition

A senior Western official familiar with a large cache of intelligence obtained this summer told the Guardian that “direct dealings between Turkish officials and ranking ISIS members was now ‘undeniable.’”

ISIS, in other words, is state-sponsored — indeed, sponsored by purportedly Western-friendly regimes in the Muslim world, who are integral to the anti-ISIS coalition. Which then begs the question as to why Hollande and other Western leaders expressing their determination to “destroy” ISIS using all means necessary, would prefer to avoid the most significant factor of all: the material infrastructure of ISIS’ emergence in the context of ongoing Gulf and Turkish state support for Islamist militancy in the region.

There are many explanations, but one perhaps stands out: the West’s abject dependence on terror-toting Muslim regimes, largely to maintain access to Middle East, Mediterranean and Central Asian oil and gas resources.

– From the post: So Who’s Really Sponsoring ISIS? Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Other U.S. “Allies”

There’s been a lot going on lately, so I wouldn’t be surprised if you missed the latest drama from of U.S. ally, and sometimes ISIS/al-Qaeda supporter Turkey.

Recently, a peace petition circled the globe calling on the Turkish government to end fighting against Kurdish militants in the country’s southeast, which has reportedly led to thousands of civilian deaths. By January 15th, 2,000 Turkish academics had signed the petition, which was too much for authoritarian president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to handle. He not only publicly denounced the entire affair, he went ahead and started arresting people.

Nature reports:

Hundreds of Turkish academics are waiting to find out whether they will be prosecuted or sacked for spreading “terrorist propaganda”, after they signed a petition calling for violence to end in Turkey’s southeast, where government forces have been fighting Kurdish separatists.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

America’s Subservience to Saud Family

January 10, 2016

America’s Subservience to Saud Family

The Saud royal family are by far the world’s largest buyers of US weapons. The King of Saudi Arabia is by far the world’s richest person, with a net worth well over a trillion dollars; and, when his (Aramco’s) 260 billion barrels of oil reserves were valued at $100 per barrel, his net worth was over $15 trillion. The King has total control over the world’s largest (in terms of dollar-value) company: Aramco. Since 1980, the Saudi government has owned 100% of it; the Saudi government is totally under the King’s exclusive control. The King owns all that oil. Forbes and Bloomberg decline to estimate his wealth, because kings don’t want them to; but, clearly, it dwarfs that of anyone such as Bill Gates or Warren Buffett. And Gates and Buffett don’t possess the power to keep their wealth from becoming published, but the Saudi King does.

On 13 September 2010, Britain’s Telegraph headlined «US secures record $60 billion arms sale to Saudi Arabia». On 28 January 2012, Dayton Business Journal bannered «Top 10 foreign buyers of US weapons», and Saudi Arabia was #1 that year, with $13.8 billion. #2 was UAE, with 10.4 billion. UAE is run by six royal families, all friends of the Saud family; and, like the Sauds, they follow the strictest, Wahhabist-Salafist, form of Islam, the type of Sunni Islam that’s preached by ISIS and by Al-Qaeda. Current ‘defense’ expenditure figures aren’t available; but, clearly, the Sauds are now fully embroiled in slaughtering Shiites both in Yemen and in Syria, and are buying far more US weapons today than they were before – the sum probably dwarfs any previous sales-volume.

It’s good business for the owners of US ‘Defense’ contractors. On 15 May 2015, Alex Kane at Alternet headlined «4 US Companies Getting Rich Off Gulf Arab Conflict With Iran», and the companies were: Boeing, Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, and United Technologies. In 2015, lobbying for the «Defense» sector amounted to $96 million. $56 million of that was specifically on «Defense Aerospace».

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

ISIS: The ‘Enemy’ the US Created, Armed, and Funded

January 3, 2016

ISIS: The ‘Enemy’ the US Created, Armed, and Funded

To delve into Daesh’s convoluted money trail, one must first explore its equally convoluted origins. And in both areas, the role of the U.S. and its allies can not be ignored.

(MINTPRESS) Out of nowhere, it seems, Daesh, also commonly referred to as ISIL or ISIS, spontaneously formed, a group that perverts aspects of Islam for its own violent ends, and threatens, we are told, all that the civilized world holds dear.

The “war on terror,” governments inform their citizens, has a new front. And that front is Daesh.

Let us not be too hasty. Things are not always what they appear. Daesh is well-financed, and that money must be coming from somewhere other than a ragtag band of malcontents. Daesh soldiers have advanced weaponry and sophisticated communications methods. They have tanks and Humvees. None of these can be obtained without significant funding. Though the source is quite illusive, there is some evidence that will lead to a trail.

First, we must look at Daesh’s origins, and even that is not easily discernible. Writing for The Guardian in August 2014, Ali Khedery suggests:

“Principally, Isis is the product of a genocide that continued unabated as the world stood back and watched. It is the illegitimate child born of pure hate and pure fear – the result of 200,000 murdered Syrians and of millions more displaced and divorced from their hopes and dreams. Isis’s rise is also a reminder of how Bashar al-Assad’s Machiavellian embrace of al-Qaida would come back to haunt him.

Facing Assad’s army and intelligence services, Lebanon’s Hezbollah, Iraq’s Shia Islamist militias and their grand patron, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, Syria’s initially peaceful protesters quickly became disenchanted, disillusioned and disenfranchised – and then radicalised and violently militant.”

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Odds Are Never In Your Favour

December 28, 2015

The Odds Are Never In Your Favour

The irony of the phrase “may the odds be ever in your favor” is not lost on the readers of the Hunger Games trilogy of novels or the film adaption. Despite the grimness of the story, over 65 million copies of the books have been sold. The total box office take so far has exceeded $1.4 billion for the four movies. The dystopian series tackles real issues like severe poverty, starvation, torture, oppression, betrayal and the brutality of war. It doesn’t fit into the standard film making success recipe of feel good fluff, politically correct storylines and happy endings. Each film in the series gets progressively darker, with the final episode permeating doom and gloom. The books and the movies capture the deepening crisis mood engulfing the world today. And they realistically portray the world as a place where there are no good guys in positions of power. The ruling class, in all cases, is driven by a voracious appetite for supremacy, wealth, and control.

An Ambiguous, Confusing, Dangerous World

The world is a morally ambiguous place where those in power and those seeking power utilize the influence of media propaganda and PR campaigns built around “heroes” and “icons” to psychologically control the masses, while enriching themselves and their crony capitalist sponsors. Endless war against the latest “bad guys” further enriches the arms dealers and their political lackeys who joyfully use faux patriotism and nationalistic fervor to insist upon more boots on the ground, drones in the air, bombs dropped, and missiles launched.

War is good for business and keeps the masses distracted, while the Wall Street financiers harvest the wealth of the citizens.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Saudi Arabia’s Phony War on Terror

December 22, 2015

Saudi Arabia’s Phony War on Terror

BERLIN – Containing the scourge of Islamist terror will be impossible without containing the ideology that drives it: Wahhabism, a messianic, jihad-extolling form of Sunni fundamentalism whose international expansion has been bankrolled by oil-rich sheikhdoms, especially Saudi Arabia. That is why the newly announced Saudi-led anti-terror coalition, the Islamic Military Alliance to Fight Terrorism, should be viewed with profound skepticism.

Wahhabism promotes, among other things, the subjugation of women and the death of “infidels.” It is – to quote US President Barack Obama’s description of what motivated a married couple of Pakistani origin to carry out the recent mass shooting in San Bernardino, California – a “perverted interpretation of Islam,” and the ideological mother of jihadist terrorism. Its offspring include Al Qaeda, the Taliban, Boko Haram, al-Shabaab, and the Islamic State, all of which blend hostility toward non-Sunnis and anti-modern romanticism into nihilistic rage.

Saudi Arabia has been bankrolling Islamist terrorism since the oil-price boom of the 1970s dramatically boosted the country’s wealth. According to a 2013 European Parliament report, some of the $10 billion invested by Saudi Arabia for “its Wahhabi agenda” in South and Southeast Asia was “diverted” to terrorist groups, including Lashkar-e-Taiba, which carried out the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks.

Western leaders have recognized the Saudi role for many years. In a 2009 diplomatic cable, then-US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton identified Saudi Arabia as “the most significant source of funding to Sunni terrorist groups worldwide.” Thanks largely to the West’s interest in Saudi oil, however, the Kingdom has faced no international sanctions.

Now, with the growth of terrorist movements like the Islamic State, priorities are changing. As German Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel said in a recent interview, “We must make it clear to the Saudis that the time of looking the other way is over.”

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Erdogan calls MP ‘traitor’ for telling RT that ISIS got chemical weapons via Turkey

December 18, 2015

Erdogan calls MP ‘traitor’ for telling RT that ISIS got chemical weapons via Turkey

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has accused opposition MP Eren Erdem of “betrayal.” Erdem told RT that Islamic State terrorists had obtained sarin gas supplies through Turkish territory – and that Ankara did nothing despite having all the evidence.

“There is a deputy in this country, buried so deep in a pit of betrayal, and to a party that claims to be as old as the republic saying during an interview to a foreign television channel that Turkey is selling chemical weapons to terrorists,” Erdogan told a crowd in the city of Konya.

The Turkish President also called the silence of the Republican People’s Party (CHP) concerning Erdem’s revelations“treason.”

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EXCLUSIVE: Sarin materials brought via Turkey & mixed in Syrian ISIS camps– Turkish MP to RT http://on.rt.com/6zep

1:49 AM – 14 Dec 2015

“What is this party waiting for? Why are they silent? This is treason. How can you allege this country sells sarin gas to the terrorist state of Syria which is run by the murderer Assad?” Erdogan said, as cited by local media.

“Shame on those who still keep him in the party!” he added.

What Erdem actually revealed in an interview with RT on Monday were the details from a criminal case opened, and then abruptly closed, by the General Prosecutor’s Office in the Turkish city of Adana. His account alleges that Turkish authorities had acquired a great deal of evidence concerning sarin gas shipments to those Al-Qaeda militants in Syria that later became known globally as Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL), but did nothing to stop them.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

A Special Relationship

December 18, 2015

A Special Relationship

The United States is teaming up with Al Qaeda, again

One morning early in 1988, Ed McWilliams, a foreign-service officer posted to the American Embassy in Kabul, heard the thump of a massive explosion from somewhere on the other side of the city. It was more than eight years after the Russian invasion of Afghanistan, and the embassy was a tiny enclave with only a handful of diplomats. McWilliams, a former Army intelligence operative, had made it his business to venture as much as possible into the Soviet-occupied capital. Now he set out to see what had happened.

It was obviously something big: although the explosion had taken place on the other side of Sher Darwaza, a mountain in the center of Kabul, McWilliams had heard it clearly. After negotiating a maze of narrow streets on the south side of the city, he found the site. A massive car bomb, designed to kill as many civilians as possible, had been detonated in a neighborhood full of Hazaras, a much-persecuted minority.

Afghan mujahedeen move toward the front line during the battle for Jalalabad, Afghanistan, March 1989 © Robert Nickelsberg

McWilliams took pictures of the devastation, headed back to the embassy, and sent a report to Washington. It was very badly received — not because someone had launched a terrorist attack against Afghan civilians, but because McWilliams had reported it. The bomb, it turned out, had been the work of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, the mujahedeen commander who received more CIA money and support than any other leader of the Afghan rebellion. The attack, the first of many, was part of a CIA-blessed scheme to “put pressure” on the Soviet presence in Kabul. Informing the Washington bureaucracy that Hekmatyar’s explosives were being deployed to kill civilians was therefore entirely unwelcome.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Drudge Sends the Biggest Secret Viral: “America Has Been Arming ISIS”

November 26, 2015

Drudge Sends the Biggest Secret Viral: “America Has Been Arming ISIS”

ISIS-drudge-tweet

The biggest open secret in the world has just been tweeted by the world’s biggest news aggregator.

Matt Drudge drives so much web traffic that he basically has his own gravity, and now the often-reclusive figure has sent out a message that should be a wake-up call for those who have been broadcasting news about the threat that ISIS poses.

Following their mass murder spree in Paris, the terrorist group is supposedly planning attacking inside America, all while taking supposedly also taking on the biggest military powers in the world during their protracted struggle for an Islamic State caliphate inside Syria and Iraq.

What would the world do if it realized the truth – that ISIS is the creation of Western forces, and that the United States has in fact been arming and supporting their own worst enemy?:

A shocking truth is unfolding: America has been arming ISIS…

— MATT DRUDGE (@DRUDGE) November 24, 2015

This bombshell tweet echoes numerous reports from inside the alternative media pointing out the sick truth behind the shocking resurgence of terrorism.

Barry Donegan of Truth in Media wrote:

Influential conservative news aggregator Matt Drudge issued a tweet on Tuesday acknowledging the growing body of evidence that suggests that the U.S. has participated in arming the terror group ISIS.

Drudge’s realization follows nearly two years of Truth in Media coverage of how U.S. foreign policy is enabling terrorism in Syria and Iraq and has led to the rise of ISIS.

In September of 2013, Ben Swann reported on how U.S. efforts to arm radical Islamist rebel groups against secular Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad were empowering extremists who were planning to create what he described at the time as an “al-Qaeda ‘super state,’ comprised of Iraq and Syria.”

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Hitting Saudi Arabia Where It Hurts

November 24, 2015

Hitting Saudi Arabia Where It Hurts

Exclusive: Though faced with a global terrorism crisis, Official Washington can’t get beyond its neocon-led “tough-guy-gal” rhetoric. But another option – financial sanctions on Saudi Arabia – might help finally shut down the covert supply of money and arms to Al Qaeda and the Islamic State, writes Robert Parry.

As the Islamic State and Al Qaeda enter a grim competition to see who can kill more civilians around the world, the fate of Western Civilization as we’ve known it arguably hangs in the balance. It will not take much more terror for the European Union to begin cracking up and for the United States to transform itself into a full-scale surveillance state.

Yet, in the face of this crisis, many of the same people who set us on this road to destruction continue to dominate – and indeed frame – the public debate. For instance, Official Washington’s neocons still insist on their recipe for “regime change” in countries that they targeted 20 years ago. They also demand a new Cold War with Russia in defense of a corrupt right-wing regime in Ukraine, further destabilizing Europe and disrupting U.S.-Russian cooperation in Syria.

Given the stakes, you might think that someone in a position of power – or one of the many candidates for U.S. president – would offer some pragmatic and realistic ideas for addressing this extraordinary threat. But most Republicans – from Marco Rubio to Carly Fiorina to Ted Cruz – only offer more of “more of the same,” i.e. neocon belligerence on steroids. Arguably, Donald Trump and Rand Paul are exceptions to this particular hysteria, but neither has offered a coherent and comprehensive counter-analysis.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Ending Blowback Terrorism

November 20, 2015

Ending Blowback Terrorism

NEW YORK – Terrorist attacks on civilians, whether the downing over Sinai of a Russian aircraft killing 224 civilian passengers, the horrific Paris massacre claiming 129 innocent lives, or the tragic bombing in Ankara that killed 102 peace activists, are crimes against humanity. Their perpetrators – in this case, the Islamic State (ISIS) – must be stopped. Success will require a clear understanding of the roots of this ruthless network of jihadists.

Painful as it is to admit, the West, especially the United States, bears significant responsibility for creating the conditions in which ISIS has flourished. Only a change in US and European foreign policy vis-à-vis the Middle East can reduce the risk of further terrorism.

The recent attacks should be understood as “blowback terrorism”: a dreadful unintended result of repeated US and European covert and overt military actions throughout the Middle East, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, and Central Asia that aimed to overthrow governments and install regimes compliant with Western interests. These operations have not only destabilized the targeted regions, causing great suffering; they have also put populations in the US, the European Union, Russia, and the Middle East at significant risk of terror.

The public has never really been told the true history of Osama bin Laden, Al Qaeda, or the rise of ISIS in Iraq and Syria. Starting in 1979, the CIA mobilized, recruited, trained, and armed Sunni young men to fight the Soviet Union in Afghanistan. The CIA recruited widely from Muslim populations (including in Europe) to form the Mujahideen, a multinational Sunni fighting force mobilized to oust the Soviet infidel from Afghanistan.

Bin Laden, from a wealthy Saudi family, was brought in to help lead and co-finance the operation. This was typical of CIA operations: relying on improvised funding through a wealthy Saudi family and proceeds from local smuggling and the narcotics trade

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

From the Annals of U.S. History: America’s Role in Creating Islamic Extremism

November 18, 2015

From the Annals of U.S. History: America’s Role in Creating Islamic Extremism

Shutterstock

This is a refrain that has been played before, but some Americans might need yet another refresher. In response to one of the inevitable questions—“Why did this happen?”—following events like Friday’s terrorist offensive in Paris and the 9/11 attacks in the U.S., Salon’s Ben Norton has helpfully laid out a detailed answer.

The whole article merits a close read, but here is a key passage designed to correct the country’s collective short-term memory problem on the issue:

Throughout the 1980s, the U.S. government supported and armed bin Laden and his mujahedin in Afghanistan, in their fight against the Soviet Union. President Ronald Reagan famously met with the mujahedin in the Oval Office in 1983. “To watch the courageous Afghan freedom fighters battle modern arsenals with simple hand-held weapons is an inspiration to those who love freedom,” Reagan declared.

Those “freedom fighters” are the forefathers of ISIS and al-Qaida. When the last Soviet troops were withdrawn in 1989, the mujahedin did not simply leave; a civil war of sorts followed, with various Islamist militant groups fighting for control in the power vacuum. The Taliban came out on top, and established a medieval theocratic regime to replace the former “godless” socialist government.

There are extremists in every religion, but they tend to be few in number, weak and isolated. Salafism, in its modern militarized form, has its origins in the 1920s, and even before. For decades, this movement remained weak and isolated. Yet, in the 1970s and ’80s, Western capitalist governments, particularly the U.S., came up with a new Cold War strategy: supporting these fringe Islamic extremist groups as a bulwark against socialism.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

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