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Steven Emerson,
Executive Director
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April 3, 2018
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Syrian
American Council Learns How to Pressure Washington
by John Rossomando
IPT News
April 3, 2018
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A Syrian-American
advocacy group with Muslim Brotherhood links and a history of
misrepresenting jihadist groups as moderates recently completed a
weekend-long training session with left-wing activists on lobbying Congress
and how to do demonstrations.
The Syrian American Council (SAC) organized the "Revolution Bootcamp: The 7th Anniversary of the Syrian
Revolution," held at the New America Foundation. A group called
Beautiful Trouble, which "exists to make nonviolent revolution
irresistible," led much of the training.
The SAC has misrepresented Syrian rebel groups as moderate, despite
their jihadist orientations. It succeeded in persuading the Obama
administration to arm these groups.
The Syrian opposition "has increasingly become more defined by its
moderation, more defined by the breadth of its membership, and more defined
by its adherence to some, you know, democratic process and to an
all-inclusive, minority-protecting constitution," Kerry said in 2013 during congressional testimony.
At the time, however, U.S. intelligence agencies were concerned that
"the most radical elements" were poised to dominate the
opposition to dictator Bashar Al-Assad. That's exactly what happened, as rebel
groups fell in line behind the growing ISIS caliphate.
Now the SAC is looking for allies on Capitol Hill to pressure the Trump
administration to continue supporting these same groups. The training
sessions March 18-19 aimed to help SAC's members and their
non-Muslim/non-Syrian partners lobby effectively on their behalf.
The group brought representatives of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) to
Washington in January to lobby the Trump administration to resume training
and equipping its fighters. President Trump stopped arming the FSA last
year in favor of supporting the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF)
that subsequently dislodged ISIS from much of Syria with U.S. help. This
lobby effort took place days before FSA fighters joined the Turkish
military in its invasion of the Kurdish enclave of Afrin in northwestern
Syria. Reports indicated that FSA forces engaged in widespread looting in Afrin after it fell
last month, and many of the brigades that took part have jihadist
orientations.
By working with the SAC on Syria, the trainers in effect signed up to lobby on behalf of jihadists who oppose democracy, support slavery and promote hatred of religious
minorities.
No distinction existed between the Free Syrian Army (FSA), Ahar al-Sham
or Jabhat al-Nusra, Anas al-Abdeh, former president of the anti-Assad National
Coalition of Syrian Revolution and Opposition Forces (ETILAF), which includes
FSA representatives, told the London-based Arabic newspaper Al-Hayat in 2016. But SAC presented a very
different image to U.S. leaders.
At a minimum, the SAC is led by Muslim Brotherhood supporters. The
Brotherhood wishes to see an Islamic state spread from the Middle East
throughout the world. Molham al-Droubi, a key leader of the Syrian Muslim
Brotherhood, told the Investigative Project on Terrorism (IPT) in
2013 that many of the SAC's members formerly belonged to the Syrian
Brotherhood.
An Arabic post on the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood's website from 2014 stated that its ideology stood closer to that of ISIS
than to the West.
SAC founder Talal Sunbulli was listed in a 1992 international Muslim
Brotherhood phone book seized by federal investigators.
But last month's training was more about how to persuade American
policymakers.
Programming included
training about storytelling, op-ed writing; a protest to commemorate the
seventh anniversary of the Syrian Revolution; and a session on how to lobby
Congress.
Nadine Bloch, training director for Beautiful
Trouble, conducted a session
about community organizing. SAC's Twitter feed encouraged followers to
read an eponymously named book, Beautiful Trouble: A Toolbox For
Revolution, that discusses protest tactics. It also suggested playing a strategy game the group developed. Beautiful Trouble's
website lists Code Pink and an anarchist group called the Ruckus Society as partners.
Andrew Boyd, a co-editor of "Beautiful Trouble: A Toolbox For
Revolution," described the book as "an Anarchist Cookbook for
the 21st century, but without the bombs."
During an advocacy session,
SAC members were taught through role playing how to talk with congressional
staffers.
SAC's top leaders forged
an alliance in a September 2016 declaration with supporters of the
#BlackLivesMatter movement and the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS)
movement against Israel.
"The Syrian people in their revolutionary struggle for democracy
have identified and publicly expressed solidarity with other democratic
struggles, including the Black Lives Matter movement against racist police
violence, and Syrian immigrants and refugees stand in solidarity with all
immigrants and refugees," the declaration said.
Sunbulli was among the SAC members who signed the declaration.
The SAC and its Muslim Brotherhood allies monopolized access and
influence at the State Department, Kamal al-Labwani, a
former ETILAF member, told the IPT. SAC's lobbying, he said, led the
U.S. to support extremists who posed as moderates. As a result, actual
moderates like al-Labwani were sidelined. Infighting among the radical
groups created a vacuum that allowed ISIS to rise and the subsequent
occupation of much of Syria by Iranian-controlled militias.
SAC Government Relations Director Mohammed Ghanem openly
supported Muslim Brotherhood ideologue Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi, whose call for jihad against Assad and for foreign
fighters to go to Syria further inflamed the conflict.
"I love this appreciated scholar very much, even I adore his
jurisprudence," Ghanem wrote in a 2012 Facebook post. "I consider this a
great honor. And now, I am over the moon."
State Department officials still regarded Ghanem as a "very good contact," former State Department Syria Opposition Outreach Desk Officer
Khulood Kandil wrote in a Jan. 20, 2014 email obtained through a
Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request. Ghanem maintained an extensive network of contacts at
"all levels of the Syrian opposition."
Kandil was romantically involved with Ghanem, a Nov.
22, 2015 post on Ghanem's Facebook page shows. Her uncle, Hisham Kandil,
served as Egypt's prime minister during the Muslim Brotherhood's brief
rule.
In his effort to sell U.S. officials on supporting rebel groups, Ghanem
downplayed the close documented relationship between the FSA and groups like
the al-Qaida
linked Ahrar al-Sham in a September 2014 op-ed. Ahrar al-Sham's commander
at the time of his column formerly headed a FSA unit, and the jihadist
group often fought alongside FSA forces.
"Americans never felt this insecure when Ahrar al-Sham or other
'extremist' rebels established safe havens inside Syria. This is because
when Syrian rebels – whatever their political beliefs – conquer territory
from Assad or ISIS, they do so to seek greater opportunity and freedoms for
their homeland," Ghanem wrote. "Contrary to some news reports, rebel
fighters are not barbarians. "
Amnesty International accused Ahrar al-Sham and other FSA-linked groups of
war crimes in 2016.
Ghanem condemned the
Obama administration in 2012 for labeling Jabhat al-Nusra as a terrorist
organization. The al-Qaida affiliate should not be designated because it
"cooperates closely with the Free Syrian Army" and because
"has achieved military successes and has delivered critical civilian
aid."
SAC's campaign of lies extended to the Syrian fighters it brought to the
U.S. while presenting them as moderates.
For example, Col. Abdel Jabbar Akidi appeared via satellite at a June
2014 Washington news conference the SAC co-sponsored. Akidi is "[o]ne of the moderate,
vetted generals who have received U.S. assistance," SAC's press release
said. But a video
from 2013 showed Akidi celebrating with ISIS fighters after his FSA
forces jointly seized a regime airbase near Aleppo with the jihadists.
In another video, he claimed near daily contact with ISIS, calling his
relationship with its leaders "almost brotherly." He defended ISIS,
saying that the bad things that were said about them were
"overinflated," including allegations that ISIS killed fellow
Muslims who it accused of apostasy.
SAC's work with Akidi wasn't isolated to this press conference. Ghanem noted that the FSA
facilitated a 2015 interview that Akidi had with CNN's Christiane Amanpour.
Sheikh Mohammad Rateb Nabulsi was another terror
apologist whom SAC brought to America. He came on a multicity fundraising
tour in early 2014. Nabulsi's website contained an April 2001 fatwa
sanctioning suicide bombings against Israeli civilians.
A March 2014 New York Post article stated that the SAC submitted Nabulsi's visa through
the Syria Desk at the State Department where Kandil worked.
Ghanem glossed
over Nabulsi's radicalism in State Department emails after then-New York
Post D.C. Bureau Chief Geoff Earle asked the State Department about
Nabulsi's fatwa, an IPT article linked to the fatwa, FOIA documents show.
"I couldn't find anything on the website that incites violence
against Jews around the world. If you find something, please alert
me," Ghanem wrote in a Jan. 17, 2014 email to Kandil.
Nabulsi is "an influential voice of moderation with a huge
following in the Levant, not just Syria," Kandil wrote in an email to Deputy Assistant Secretary of
State for Near Eastern Affairs Lawrence
Silverman.
At the time, Nabulsi's fatwa supporting suicide bombings remained on his
website. It was gone less than a month later.
SAC's effort to make itself more effective at obtaining help for its
friends in Syria should be of the utmost concern considering its track
record for duping American officials into supporting groups opposed to
American values.
Related Topics: John
Rossomando, Syrian
civil war, Syrian
American Council, lobbying,
Talal
Sunbulli, Revolution
Bootcamp, moderates,
Free
Syrian Army, jihadists,
John
Kerry, Jabhat
al-Nusra, ETILAF,
Kamal
al-Labwani, Mohammed
Ghanem, Khulood
Kandil
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