US delcares Jabhat al-Nusra “terrorist group”, provides US with ‘scape goat’ for US backed Human Rights Atrocities in Syria

US designates radical Syrian rebel group as terror organization
11 December, 2012 – NBC News

Islamic radicals captured a key Syrian army base outside Aleppo as the city is left battered and divided amid a growing humanitarian crisis. NBC’s Richard Engel reports.
By Reuters

The United States on Tuesday designated a radical Islamist Syrian rebel group, Jabhat al-Nusra, which is suspected of ties to al-Qaida, as a foreign terrorist organization.

By classifying al-Nusra as a terrorist organization, the U.S. State Department order essentially classifies the group, which has advocated for an Islamic state in Syria, as an affiliate of al-Qaida in Iraq. U.S. Treasury officials also imposed sanctions on two senior leaders of al-Nusrah.

With al-Nusra blacklisted, authorities now can freeze any assets the group or its members have in U.S. jurisdictions. The designation also prohibits Americans from giving it any material support.
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The group has claimed nearly 600 deadly attacks — from suicide attacks to small arms and improvised explosive device operations — in major city centers across Syria, the State Department said in a statement. Al-Nusrah has been accused by other rebel factions of indiscriminate tactics in the civil war aimed at ousting Syrian President Bashar Assad.

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The Treasury Department also moved to block the property of the Syrian government by sanctioning two militia groups that work under the Assad government, Jaysh al-Sha’bi and Shabiha, as well as two commanders of the Shabiha group. It said in a statement that the militias are part of the Assad regime’s campaign against Syrian citizens. Jaysh al-Sha’bi has ties to Iran and Hezbollah, it said.

Tuesday’s actions come as U.S. officials attend the Friends of Syria meeting in Marrakesh, Morocco, to discuss the 20-month-old crisis in Syria as rebels push forward on the battlefield and move to unify the political opposition.

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“The secretary of state concludes that there is a sufficient factual basis to find that al-Qaida in Iraq … uses or has used additional aliases,” including Jabhat al-Nusra, the State Department statement said.

U.S. officials have stressed their concern about the rising influence of extremist elements in the Syrian war.

Chemical weapons concern
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton had been expected to attend the Friends of Syria gathering before falling ill with a stomach virus. Deputy Secretary of State Bill Burns is attending in her place.

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Also on Tuesday, U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said that intelligence agencies have detected no new moves by the Syrian government that would indicate it was preparing to use chemical weapons against rebel forces.

Several Western countries issued coordinated warnings last week to Assad not to deploy chemical weapons, many citing secret intelligence that U.S. officials have said his government might be preparing to use poison gas.

Syria has rejected the warnings as “a pretext for intervention” by outsiders. …more