Sep 6, 2013 by External Resource

McCain, Kerry also informed by 26-year-old at Georgetown

NEW YORK – Evidence is mounting that the strategy by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Secretary of State John F. Kerry to cast members of the Free Syria Army as “moderates” among the rebel forces opposing the government of Bashir al-Assad was the brain-child of Elizabeth O’Bagy, a 26-year-old graduate student pursuing a Ph.D. in Arab studies and political science at Georgetown University, who is working on a dissertation on woman’s militancy.

In his testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Tuesday, Kerry cited O’Bagy, arguing that the war in Syria is “not being waged entirely or even predominately by dangerous Islamists and al-Qaida die-hards,” but rather the struggle is being led but “moderate opposition forces – a collection of groups known as the Free Syria Army.”





Kerry was citing an opinion piece O’Bagy wrote for the Wall Street Journal on Aug. 30 titled “On the Front Lines of Syria’s Civil War.” It ran with a tag-line “The conventional wisdom – that jihadists are running the rebellion [in Syria] – is not what I’ve witnessed on the ground.”

The O’Bagy narrative, however, is contradicted by intelligence estimates and experts specializing in the region.

After Kerry’s testimony to Congress this week, Reuters reported: “Secretary of State John Kerry’s public assertions that moderate Syrian opposition groups are growing in influence appear to be at odds with estimates by U.S. and European intelligence sources and non-governmental experts, who say Islamic extremists remain by far the fiercest and best-organized rebel elements.”

On April 27, the New York Times reported that the Jabhat al-Nursa Front, a group declared a terrorist organization by the U.S. State Department, has pledged allegiance to al Qaida’s top leader, Ayman al-Zawahiri, and remains the group of choice for foreign jihadis pouring into Syria. The Ahrar al-Sham, meanwhile, which shares much of al-Nusra’s extremist ideology, is composed mostly of Syrians.





In her capacity as a senior research analyst and the Syria team leader at the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War think-tank, O’Bagy authored a report in March titled “The Free Syrian Army” in which she argued as follows:

The opposition movement in Syria has been fragmented from its inception, a direct reflection of Syria’s social complexity and the decentralized grassroots of the uprising. This condition has plagued Syria’s armed opposition since peaceful protestors took up arms and began forming rebel groups under the umbrella of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) in the summer of 2001.

The narrative is currently being circulated in Congress in an attempt to counter the recent disclosure of evidence the rebel groups in Syria affiliated with al-Qaida and the Muslim Brotherhood, who have committed atrocities against government soldiers and Syrian civilians, may be the parties responsible for the chemical weapons attacks the Obama administration is blaming on the Assad government.

O’Bagy also works as the political director of the Washington-based Syrian Emergency Task Force, or SETF, chaired by Mohamed Kawam.

Kawam is linked with the Washington-based Syrian Support Group, or SSG, which encourages Americans to send money that arguably could be used to buy weapons for the Free Syria Group.

The “Donate” button on the Syrian Support Group website specifies donations will go toward providing “certain logistical, communications, and other services to the FSA.” The caveat is “the SSG intends to support only those military councils that have adopted the FSA’s Proclamation of Principles,” not the Jabhat al-Nusra or any other group designated a terrorist organization by the U.S. government.

via Obama relying on student’s spin on Syria?.