by Anna Borshchevskaya
The U.S. decision to suspend nonlethal aid to opposition fighters in Syria on Friday after Islamic militants seized warehouses which contained aid for moderate fighters reflects, as CNN aptly put it, that the Obama administration policy in Syria “is falling apart at the seams.”
This decision is a serious blow to the moderate opposition fighting against Syrian authoritarian president Bashar al-Assad, which can only make increase their feelings of isolation and desperation—a fertile ground extremists are increasingly using to take hold in Syria.
Max Boot wrote about this decision in Commentary Magazine. The entire piece is worth reading, but here is an excerpt:
Yet somehow the administration, and in particular Secretary of State John Kerry, is still hoping to cobble together a Syria peace conference on January 22 in Switzerland. How, one wonders, is a deal going to be reached between an increasingly powerless and disjointed moderate opposition and a Syrian president who is growing increasingly confident in his ability to hold onto power?
This is so crazy that it makes you wonder whether the administration policy is on the level. Is it a total coincidence that Obama is trying to reach a deal with Iran and at the same time he is suspending aid to the Syria rebels fighting an Iranian-backed regime in Damascus? Is there perhaps a quid pro quo involved here?
One thing is certain—the Syrian conflict will continue claiming innocent lives, and extremists will continue taking firmer root in Syria—both internally and externally, in the current context of Western indifference.
Anna Borshchevskaya is Communications Director at the American Islamic Congress
