Obama Administration Sponsors the Sponsors of Anti-American Terrorism

Barry Rubin

Is there any sponsor of anti-American terrorism in the Middle East that the Obama Administration hasn’t tried to sponsor?

U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan Cameron Munter told Radio Pakistan, September 17: “The attack that took place in Kabul a few days ago, that was the work of the Haqqani network….There is evidence linking the Haqqani Network to the Pakistan government. This is something that must stop.”

Do you realize the significance of those two sentences? It goes something like this:

–The United States gives billions of dollars to the Pakistani government to fight terrorism.

–Instead, the Pakistani government doesn’t do that very much. Remember where Usama bin Ladin was hanging out without Pakistan’s regime doing anything?

–The Pakistani government gives money to al-Qaida and Taliban-linked terrorists—the Haqqani Network. The Haqqani Network and other terrorists sponsored by Pakistan murder hundreds of people in India. They also attack Americans.

–A week ago, the Haqqani Network attacked the U.S. Embassy with rocket-propelled grenades. It took the Pakistani military 20 hours to get them out of a nearby building. Thus, U.S. taxpayers are paying money to the Pakistani government to fight terrorists attacking America that the government then uses to help terrorists attack America.

Might this be a problem? Could this be a central example of the insanity of U.S. policy that also, for example, gives money to the Palestinian Authority which is allied to Hamas, a genocidal, anti-American group, and successfully pressed Israel to reduce sanctions so that the Hamas regime in the Gaza Strip can flourish.

And Obama Administration policy was nice to Syria for 2.5 years, until it literally was forced to change that policy, despite the fact that Syria’s regime was giving money to kill Americans in Iraq. It also tried to be nice to Iran but Iranian intransigence and domestic pressure finally made it impose more sanctions.

The Obama Administration has also made the Turkish regime its favorite Middle East ally despite that government’s support for Hamas, Hizballah, and Turkish Islamist groups. It has even to some degree become the patron of the Egyptian and Syrian Muslim Brotherhoods which are profoundly anti-American, pro-terrorist groups.

In ordinary times, this sort of thing would be a major scandal. Front-page media stories would daily skewer the Obama Administration for aiding, abetting, and financing major sponsors of terrorism. Academic experts would pour on scorn; members of Congress would demand investigations. Yet in this era nothing happens.

The U.S. ambassador, under instructions from Washington, stamps his foot and says that Pakistani government support for anti-American and murderous terrorism “must stop.” But it won’t stop. And the Obama Administration won’t do anything about it.

Obama Middle East policy has strong parallels with the scandal about supplying weapons to Mexican narco-terrorists and then seeing them used for the murder of many people, including Americans, and the destabilizing of U.S. interests.