Rand Paul: Syrian rebels are allied with Al Qaeda and should not be armed

He's right, but not because of some unsubstantiated connection with Al-Qaeda, but rather because we shouldn't be getting involved.

 

The weakest President in US history agrees.

 

Rand Paul is a goofus.

 

They shouldn't be armed.

 

Arming a rebel extremist army with highly questionable ethics to dispose of a Russian-allied government so that they can put themselves in power as a proxy. What could possibly go wrong?

 

it's my understanding they're not even rebels, but paid mercenaries funded by qatar, whose interest is to sabotage formation of the iran-iwreck-syria gas pipeline.....they need the assad regime ousted and replaced with a 'friendly' puppet

 

It's hard to tell who's the lesser of two evils in Syria. I don't like the idea of wahabis getting control of Syria.

 

This is correct. I just spoke with a Qatar insider. However, there are different forces in Qatar, the more open-minded ones and the Islamist ones. These mercenaries are funded by the Islamist ones, as were many of the Islamist movements during the "Arab Spring".

Also, these mercenaries receive support through Islamist Erdogan from the Turkey side.

 

I think the only rebel who should be armed was the one they filmed actually eating the organs of a Syrian soldier he killed. With people like that possibly going to take over there's no problem at all with these rebels.

 

LOL!!

There is no such thing. There is one single force in Qatar and that's the royal family. Any funding from the state of Qatar comes from one source only.

Any other funding comes illegally from the population, just like any other country.

The fact that someone who knows the niece/nephew of the royal family told you what they think doesn't make them an insider nor does it make it true.

 

This is what I am afraid of it the Islamist rebels take control.

Assad being a minority has not hurt Christians in the country but if the rebel groups gain control this is something I fear will become more commonplace.

------------------------------
Armed Rebels Massacre Entire Population of Christian Village in Syria

TEHRAN (FNA) -- Armed rebels attacked a village in Syria's Western province of Homs and slaughtered all its Christian residents on Monday.

The armed rebels affiliated to the Free Syrian Army (FSA) raided the Christian-populated al-Duvair village in Reef (outskirts of) Homs near the border with Lebanon today and massacred all its civilian residents, including women and children.

The Syrian army, however, intervened and killed tens of terrorists during heavy clashes which are still going on in al-Duvair village.

The armed rebels' attack and crimes in al-Duvair village came after they sustained heavy defeats in al-Qusseir city which has almost been set free by the Syrian army except for a few districts.

Syria has been experiencing unrest since March 2011 with organized attacks by well-armed gangs against Syrian police forces and border guards being reported across the country.

Hundreds of people, including members of the security forces, have been killed, when some protest rallies turned into armed clashes.

The government blames outlaws, saboteurs, and armed terrorist groups for the deaths, stressing that the unrest is being orchestrated from abroad.

In October 2011, calm was almost restored in the Arab state after President Assad started a reform initiative in the country, but Israel, the US and its Arab allies sought hard to bring the country into chaos through any possible means. Tel Aviv, Washington and some Arab capitals have been staging various plots to topple President Bashar al-Assad, who is well known in the world for his anti-Israeli stances.

http://english.farsnews.com

 

Something we can all agree on.

 

It's telling that people in this thread are letting their paranoias get in the way of a massacre that has claimed 80,000 lives.

Everybody is dying, there are terrible things happening in that f**king country, there is no *I fear x is happening*, x IS already happening.

I'm no fan of hasty intervention, but there should be no question that the current regime has certainly proven to be beyond evil.

Hell, this isn't even a one-off thing. That entire family is f**ked. See: Hama massacre.

But if you guys want to justify the blood of 100,000+ people on the basis of your fears of a worse future---there is very little in terms of a worse future. The government is openly murdering its' citizens.

 

The Al-Thani family has many members. Certainly not all of them agree as individuals with the idea of funding Islamists.

 

You are a dumbass.

 

just a friendly reminder of the family you are indirectly supporting when you openly question if it is the lesser of two evils.

 

You are a dumbass.

 

Virtually none of them agree with funding Islamists for Islamic reasons, which is what you've implied here. The government of Qatar has taken the side of the rebels in Syria by providing them support - whether Qatar is hiring mercenaries or the rebels are hiring mercenaries using Qatari money is something I don't know about, and frankly insignificant. The fact is there are mercenaries fighting on both sides of this conflict who are being funded by money which came from outside Syria.

There is only one branch of the family which may have communicated the FALSE idea you shared: that there are some forces which lean Islamic and some forces which lean another way. Any GCC citizen could pinpoint to within a handful of people where such a bogus statement could come from.

There is a single ruling family, and not every member of the extended Al Thani family is invovled in ruling Qatar. There are members of the Al Thani family - directly related - which are not even Qatari.

As for whether they agree with funding Islamists - that is a political decision they have made. Please let me know - as I'm extremely interested - in whether you are stating that the funding of Islamist militants to pursue political goals and secure foreign interests is something which makes that government bad or immoral or whatever.

 

Both situations are horrendous in their own right, but surely you realize that to secure the safety of the Sunni 75% of Syrians, 80,000 of whom have already been massacred by Bashar, is probably a priority due to sheer numbers?

Ideally we have a country where everyone is safe and secure from this violence regardless of their religious beliefs - but, as frustrating as it is, more lives can be salvaged by replacing Bashar with these xenophobic animals.

I hope that with your post you are not implying that the massacre of this town is any more/less important than the massacre of other towns in Syria, or that the security of one religious group is more important than the security of others.

The sad thing is an Islamist Syria is probably going to be terrible news for Syrian Christians (10% of population or 2 million-ish), but a Bashar-ruled Syria would be terrible news for Sunni Muslims (74% or 15 million-ish). If these are the two options, which is the least horrible option?