Libyan rebels officially recognized by Turkey, more aid promised; rebels still mysterious

Wiki Commons photo

Madison Ruppert, Contributing Writer
Activist Post

Today the only Muslim nation in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) officially recognized the al Qaeda-affiliated Libyan opposition forces. In addition, they pledged an additional $200 million in aid on top of the $100 million already handed over to the rebels.

Part of this show of support was a clear call for Gaddafi to step down, Xinhuanet quotes the Turkish Foreign Minister as saying, “Gaddafi should leave power and a genuine political change based on the demands and aspirations of the Libyan people should be realized.”

The rebel group known as the National Transitional Council (NTC) is now seen as the official legitimate representative body for the Libyan people, at least by the Turks.

However, this is not the only nation within NATO that has shown public support for the rebel forces in Libya. The first nation to officially recognize the rebels, who were then known as the National Libyan Council (NLC), was France in early March.

This statement came out of the office of Nicolas Sarkozy, President of France, while much of the rest of the EU and NATO were silent on this crucial issue.

The United States has yet to recognize the rebel council as the legitimate representatives of the people of Libya, but there have been some American legislators who are quite outspoken on the issue. While the meeting at the White House was unsuccessful and left the Libyan rebels without any official recognition, Senator John McCain has not been hesitant to show his support for these rebels which we know so little about.

In late April, McCain declared that the United States needs to arm the Libyan rebels and even went as far as to refer to them as “heroes.” We do not know nearly enough about these individuals to call them heroes or to give them arms or financial aid. This is especially true when we have no aid to give in the first place. Any funds or items we guaranteed them would be issued from us signing on to more debt, something that few Americans look forward to these days.

The question that remains to be answered is if the United States will follow suit and join the ranks of the other NATO countries that have officially recognized the Libyan rebels as the new Libyan government. While individuals like McCain leave no question as to their stance on the issue, the White House has been relatively tight-lipped.

One of the most accurate and sane statements coming out of any NATO nation’s government on this issue came from former Defense Secretary Robert Gates. He stated that the reluctance of the United States to arm these rebels is mostly because “we don’t know who they are.” This is quite true; we really do not know much about them other than that they have confirmed ties with al Qaeda. If we really are fighting a global war on terror, why would we be arming people openly affiliated with the same terrorist bogeymen we are supposed to fear?

Before we offer any “lethal aid” (a politically correct term for arming rebels with deadly weapons so they can murder whomever they please) to these opposition forces, we must know exactly who they are and what their goal is. At this point we do not know enough to justify any aid whatsoever. As I previously covered, the picture we are presented by the Western special interest media is far from complete.

Supporting a group of militants whom we know little to nothing about is almost guaranteed to backfire. We are told that they want a democratic regime, but is this true? Who elected these rebels to this transitional council? What about the one million Libyans (1/6th of the entire nation’s population) marching in support of the supposedly evil Gaddafi? Did they get a say in who gets support? Did NATO ask them if they would like to have their homes and infrastructure bombed into oblivion? Calling this revolution democratic is nothing short of fallacious at this stage.