US using al-Qaeda to overthrow Syrian government: Analyst

A prominent political analyst says the US and its allies have once again failed in their attempt to overthrow Syria’s government despite using all the tools at their disposal including al-Qaeda militants, Press TV reports.

“Obama relies on drones, he relies on special forces; he relies on irregular forces and his irregular forces include al-Qaeda, interestingly enough and all kinds of terrorist groups around the world that have now been recruited into this US strategy, so I do not think any intelligent observer is going to be much impressed by what Obama has said,” Webster Griffin Tarpley told Press TV on Tuesday.

On July 21, The New York Times reported that “[US President Barack] Obama’s administration has for now abandoned efforts for a diplomatic settlement to the conflict in Syria, and instead it is increasing aid to the rebels and redoubling efforts to rally a coalition of like-minded countries to forcibly bring down the government of President Bashar al-Assad.”

According to the report, the US diplomats have been in contact with Israeli and Turkish officials over how to overthrow Assad’s government.

Tarpley added, however, that these efforts against Syria “by some indications at least, have been a failure.”

The analyst said the Western media are blacking out democratic movements in Bahrain or Saudi Arabia and ignoring the terrible situation in those countries while concentrating on Syria.

“So I think it would be important to shift the attention to Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman, [and] the United Arab Emirates [UAE]; all these reactionary monarchies of the Persian Gulf, it seems to me, really are the ones that ought to be on the hot seat and that might give Syria some sort of cease,” he added.

Syria has been the scene of unrest since mid-March, 2011, with demonstrations being held both against and in support of President Bashar al-Assad’s government.

The West and the Syrian opposition accuse the government of killing protesters. But Damascus blames ”outlaws, saboteurs and armed terrorist groups” for the unrest, insisting that it is being orchestrated from abroad.