[Author]Assad government to consider any military action an act of war
by Paul Joseph Watson
[/Author]
President Barack Obama is set to ignore Congress once again by launching military strikes inside Syria without consulting lawmakers, a move that threatens to enflame the entire region given that the Assad government has repeatedly insisted it will consider any military activity inside Syrian territory as an act of war.
“President Obama is prepared to use U.S. military airstrikes in Syria as part of an expanded campaign to defeat the Islamic State and does not believe he needs formal congressional approval to take that action, according to people who have spoken with the president in recent days,”reports the Washington Post.
Obama is set to deliver a prime time speech tonight during which he will make the case for U.S. air strikes inside Syria in the name of targeting ISIS militants.
In citing ISIS, which was armed and funded by the United States’ biggest allies in the region, as a justification for a military campaign inside Syria, Obama is set to accomplish what the administration failed to achieve last year after the chemical weapons attack in Ghouta was blamed on the Assad government, despite a subsequent MIT report which concluded the incident was more likely the work of US-backed rebels.
Despite many calling for Washington to renew its support for so-called “moderate” rebels in Syria in the name of combating ISIS, it recently emerged that murdered journalist Steven Sotloff was sold to ISIS by FSA militants. In addition, arms given to FSA rebels that originated from the U.S. and Saudi Arabia were later seized by ISIS fighters.
Bassel Idriss, commander of an FSA-run rebel brigade, also recently admitted that US-backed “moderate” rebels are still collaborating with ISIS.
During a recent appearance on Fox News, General Thomas McInerney also revealed how the United States inadvertently bolstered ISIS as a result of the terrorist group obtaining weapons from the U.S. consulate in Benghazi. A more direct method of support involved the U.S. training militants at a secret base in Jordan who later went on to become ISIS fighters in Syria.
Obama’s decision to launch air strikes inside Syrian territory without congressional approval echoes his 2011 assault on Libya, which again was a move to support radical jihadists that ended up with the African country turning into a failed state.
At the time, Obama brazenly undermined the power of Congress by insisting his authority came from the United Nations Security Council prior to the attack on Libya and that Congressional approval was not necessary. “I don’t even have to get to the Constitutional question,” scoffed the President.
According to Congressman Walter Jones, this was an act that constituted “an impeachable high crime and misdemeanor under article II, section 4 of the Constitution.”
Obama’s move to strike inside Syria in the name of fighting ISIS militants which his administration helped boost as a result of its disastrous policy to arm so-called “moderate” rebels threatens to spark a regional war given that the Assad government has repeatedly insisted that any military action within Syrian territory will be considered an act of war.
The global resistance to a U.S. attack on Syria, which successfully derailed last year’s seemingly inevitable assault, has largely evaporated in light of the western media’s ceaseless promotion of ISIS as a catastrophic threat.
As an MSNBC poll showed last night, anti-war fervor amongst liberals has all but disintegrated, with just 12 percent calling on Obama to get permission from Congress before launching an attack on ISIS inside Syria.
White House denies murdered journalist was sold to ISIS by US supported Syrian rebels
Will not change strategy on supporting Syrian ‘moderates’
Following accusations by the spokesperson for Steven Sotloff, the U.S. journalist murdered by Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), the Obama administration has claimed that the American was not sold to the extremist group by moderate Syrian rebels currently being supported by the White House.
The administration says that its own initial intelligence surrounding the disappearance of Sotloff has not revealed any indications that the journalist was exchanged by Syrian rebels for cash.
“Based on the information that has been provided to me, I don’t believe that is accurate,” White House press secretary Josh Earnest said Tuesday. “But I do know, at the same time, that this is the subject of an ongoing FBI investigation. So this is something that they’re looking into all aspects of this, including how Mr. Sotloff may have come into the hands of [ISIS].”
Appearing on CNN Monday, Sotloff family spokesman Barak Barfi slammed Obama, saying that “The administration could have done more, they could have helped us, they could have seen them through.”
Barfi also revealed that “sources on the ground” in Syria have informed the Sotloff family that the TIME journalist was sold for between $25,000 and $50,000 by the “so-called moderate rebels that people want our administration to support”
Barfi accused the White House of using Sotloff and his compatriot James Foley as “pawns” in their strategy for Syria, saying that the administration had made inaccurate and misleading statements, hiding the fact that the relationship between the family and the White House is “very strained”.
Barfi also threatened to divulge damning information should leaks by the White House to the media continue regarding the situation.
Despite these claims, White House press secretary Earnest said “the thoughts and prayers of everybody here at the White House continue to be with the Sotloff family as they grieve for the loss of their son.”
“Everybody here is grieving alongside them,” he added.
Earnest suggested that the U.S. support of Syrian rebels will not be altered or affected in any way by the accusations, calling the support “a core component of the strategy here.”
“The reason for that is simply that it is very dangerous for [ISIS] to be operating in a virtual safe haven anywhere in the world,” he said. “It’s particularly dangerous for them to be operating in a safe haven in a region of the world as volatile as Syria and Iraq.”
The same extremists who Killed US and NATO Troops in Iraq were supported all the way by the U.S. and its allies in Libya and Syria.
ISIS terrorists had already infiltrated those groups and the U.S. government knew it from their own intelligence and from independent intelligence. Like a cancer, the group grew and eventually consumed the so-called rebels fighting against the Syrian government.
Obama is scheduled to deliver a speech outlining a strategy to defeat ISIS. It is thought that he will advocate entering into a limited conflict that will last beyond his own term as president.
Steve Watson is a London based writer and editor for Alex Jones’ Infowars.com, and Prisonplanet.com. He has a Masters Degree in International Relations from the School of Politics at The University of Nottingham, and a Bachelor Of Arts Degree in Literature and Creative Writing from Nottingham Trent University.
