Sep 12, 2014

Congress may finally vote next week to arm Western-backed Syrian rebels, a year and a half after legislation to do just that was first filed.

After Saudi Arabia agreed last weekend to host a training operation for the Free Syrian Army, Obama administration officials turned up the pressure on lawmakers to take action. The White House says it can live without the extra $500 million it had previously requested for the train-and-equip mission for now, but it wants Congress to grant it the authority to start setting up the mission before lawmakers head out for the midterm elections.

Despite broad bipartisan concern over the rise of the Islamic State (IS), also known as ISIS, the vote is no sure thing.

The Senate Armed Services Committee authorized such an effort as part of its annual Defense Authorization bill in May, but the full Senate has yet to take up the bill. A number of senators have voiced misgivings, even as Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has indicated he hopes to resolve the issue by the end of the week.

"It is increasingly impossible to sort out the so-called vetted moderate rebels from the truly bad rebels," Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations panel on Europe, said in a Sept. 11 floor speech. "I want ISIS defeated in Syria. I want Bashar al-Assad to pay for his crimes against humanity. But too much can go wrong, for not enough possible gain, for the US to increase our involvement in the Syrian civil war."