Hillary Clinton's Libya war push armed Benghazi rebels with suspected al Qaeda ties - Washington Times

Secret Benghazi report reveals

Hillary’s Libya war push armed al
Qaeda-tied terrorists

Hillary Rodham Clinton is likely to face questions over whether she had an adequate plan for Libya in 2011 and whether her efforts led to
the Benghazi tragedy a year later. (Associated Press) more >

By Jeffrey Scott Shapiro - The Washington Times - Sunday, February 1, 2015

Last of three parts

Libyan officials were deeply concerned in 2011, as Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton
was trying to remove Moammar Gadhafi from power, that weapons were being funneled to
NATO-backed rebels with ties to al Qaeda, fearing that well-armed insurgents could create a
safe haven for terrorists, according to secret intelligence reports obtained by The Washington
Times.

The reports included a 16-page list of weapons that Libyans supposedly tracked to the rebels
from Western sources or their allies in the region. The memos were corroborated by a U.S.
Hillary Clinton's Libya war push armed Benghazi rebels with suspected al Qaeda ties - Washington Times

intelligence asset familiar with the documents as well as former top Gadhafi regime official
Mohammed Ismael.

AUDIO: Pentagon intelligence asset tells Libyan official U.S. may use frozen Gadhafi
funds to finance Benghazi rebels

“NATO has given permission to a number of weapons-loaded aircraft to land at Benghazi airport
and some Tunisian airports,” the intelligence report said, identifying masses of weapons
including tanks and surface-to-air missiles.

That report, which was prepared in English so it could be passed by a U.S. intelligence asset to
key members of Congress, identified specific air and sea shipments observed by Libyan
intelligence moving weapons to the rebels trying to unseat the Gadhafi regime.

“There is a close link between al Qaeda, Jihadi organizations, and the opposition in Libya,” the
report warned.

SEE ALSO: Exclusive: Secret tapes undermine Hillary Clinton on Libyan war

In the documents and separately recorded conversations with U.S. emissaries, Libyan officials
expressed particular concern that the weapons and training given the rebels would spread
throughout the region, in particular turning the city of Benghazi into a future terrorist haven.

Those fears would be realized a little over a year later when a band of jihadist insurgents
attacked the State Department diplomatic post in Benghazi and a related CIA compound, killing
four Americans including Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens. Today, more than three years
after Gadhafi fell from power and was killed, Benghazi and much of the rest of Libya remain in
chaos, riddled with violence among rival tribes and thriving jihadi groups.

Mrs. Clinton, now considering a run for president, was the moving force inside the Obama
administration to encourage U.S. military intervention to unseat Gadhafi in Libya. The latest
documents and audio recordings are likely to give her Republican critics on Capitol Hill fresh
ammunition to question whether she had an adequate plan and whether her efforts led to the
Hillary Clinton's Libya war push armed Benghazi rebels with suspected al Qaeda ties - Washington Times

tragedy in Benghazi a year later and the general lawlessness and chaos that have gripped
Libya since.

The Times reported last week that U.S. intelligence did not support the story that Mrs. Clinton
used to sell the war in Libya, mainly that there was an imminent danger of a genocide to be
carried out by the Gadhafi regime. The intelligence community, in fact, had come to the opposite
conclusion: that Gadhafi would not risk world outrage by killing civilians en masse even as he
tried to crush the rebellion in his country.

The Times also reported that the Pentagon and a key Democrat so distrusted Mrs. Clinton’s
decision-making on Libya that they opened their own secret diplomatic conversations with the
Gadhafi regime, going around the State Department.

In one conversation recorded in summer 2011 between Libyan officials and an intelligence asset
dispatched by the Pentagon as a back-door channel, the asset told Mr. Ismael, who served then
as Gadhafi’s chief of staff, that U.S. officials were considering taking some of the Libyan
dictator’s frozen money assets and sending it to the rebels.

“I’m in contact with some of the people over in Benghazi and they’ve told me point blank that
their first use of this money is, is to buy military training, weapons and mercenaries,” the
Pentagon intelligence asset told Mr. Ismael on July 24, 2011.

In a separate conversation with Dennis J. Kucinich, an Ohio Democrat serving in the House,
Gadhafi’s eldest son, Seif, told the congressman that Libyan intelligence had observed Qatar, a
major U.S. ally in the region, facilitating weapons shipments. Qatar has steadfastly and
repeatedly denied arming the rebels.

“The Qataris have spent more than $100 million on this, and they have an agreement with the
rebels that the moment you rule Libya you pay us back,” Seif Gadhafi told Mr. Kucinich in a
conversation recorded in May 2011.

“So, it’s your position that your government has been trying to defend itself against an
insurrection brought about by jihadists who were joined by gangsters, terrorists and that there’s
basically about 1,000 people who were joined by NATO?” Mr. Kucinich asked.

“Yes,” Seif Gadhafi replied.

“You’re saying that this relates to internal matters, matters internal to the region relating of a
power struggle in which they then turned their attention to Libya to try to engulf Libya in their
Hillary Clinton's Libya war push armed Benghazi rebels with suspected al Qaeda ties - Washington Times

own desire for increasing their power?” Mr. Kucinich asked.

“For the Qataris, they are doing this with every country, with every country,” Mr. Gadhafi said.
“This is their plan, I mean in public. This is their own agenda. I mean, it’s not something hidden,
or something, you know, private. But now, we have, and plus the French and British have also
have their own agenda, you know, commercial interests, political interests, they have their own
interests. They told us, especially the French, and the Qataris and the British: We want those
people to share the power with you, our own people, the heads of rebels.”

The recorded conversations also included concerns that the U.S. might try to arm the rebels
despite a U.N. arms embargo on Libya.

On March 27, 2011, days after the intervention began, Mrs. Clinton argued that the arms
embargo could be disregarded if shipping weapons to rebels would help protect civilians, but
defense officials in the United Kingdom disagreed with her interpretation of international law.

“We’re not arming the rebels. We’re not planning to arm the rebels,” British Defense Secretary
Liam Fox told the BBC the day Mrs. Clinton hinted otherwise.

Likewise, Qatari officials sent a letter Feb. 2, 2012, to the United Nations about the Libyan
uprising, “categorically” denying that they had “supplied the revolutionaries with arms and
ammunitions” as some had reported.

Attempts to contact the Qatari Embassy in Washington for comment Sunday were unsuccessful,
but the classified Libyan intelligence report indicates that Qatar sent tanks, missiles, trucks and
military advisers to the rebels.

Distrust between Libya and Qatar had simmered for years before the civil war in Libya erupted.
Mr. Ismael told The Times in an interview that the Qataris had a grudge against the Gadhafi
regime because it did not give them natural gas and oil concessions that were promised in 2007.

The Libyan intelligence reports provided to the Pentagon’s emissary detailed specific weapons
shipments they said came from Qatar.

“On 15th of March the ship loaded with arm[s] arrived to the seaport of Tobruk. On 4th April 2011
two Qatari aircraft laden with a number of tanks, [ground-attack] missiles and heavy trucks was
arranged. On 11th April 2011 a number of boats departed Benghazi for Misrata, the shipment
comprised assistance including SAM-7 [anti-aircraft] missiles. On 22nd April 2011, 800 rifles
were sent from Benghazi to Misrata,” the report said.
Hillary Clinton's Libya war push armed Benghazi rebels with suspected al Qaeda ties - Washington Times

Whether such shipments were supposed to stay with NATO or go to the rebels remains in
dispute. But academic analysts say the Libyan concerns that arming the rebels would benefit
terrorists were shared widely.

NATO allies knew of the dangerous jihadi elements operating in Benghazi before the 2011
intervention began, according to Noman Benotman, president of the British-based Quilliam
Foundation, a think tank dedicated to combating Islamic extremism.

Mr. Benotman also was a leader of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group but left the organization
prior to the 2011 revolution.

“A lot of jihadists that had been locked up by the regime were released after the revolution
started. They picked up many of the guns that were coming into the country and fought, but
they were not fighting for democracy — they were fighting their own revolution, trying to build a
state based on a vicious, violent, radical, Islamic ideology. They took advantage of the situation,”
he said.

“There were pro-democracy demonstrators participating in the revolution, of course, but there
was also crystal-clear evidence of jihadists and jihadist tactics in Benghazi before the NATO
intervention started, so no one can say there were no jihadists there,” he said.

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