What The Conservatives Do Not Want You To Know About Qatar

 

By Yasser Harrak

The conservative government indicated interest in signing trade cooperation agreements in order to strengthen and expand the bilateral commercial relationship with Qatar. In the Canadian Trade Commissioner website Qatar is portrayed as a country that is rapidly transforming into a modern market economy. It is portrayed as a country that leads in creating commercial opportunities in many areas, such as power generation, water desalination, tourism, telecommunications and information technologies, education, healthcare, and environmental technologies. What is missing in here is the fact that Qatar leads in creating commercial opportunities for global terrorism by providing the training, the financing and media coverage in favor of Al-Qaeda linked terrorist groups. The Canadian Trade Commissioner website provides a misleading information about Qatar that does not help creating opportunities for the people of Qatar to live in a free democratic country, nor does it create opportunities for Canada to deal with a representative government of Qatar rather than dealing with a tribal family rule. Canadians deserve to know about Qatar what the conservative government has been hiding in recent years.

One tweet from princess Hind Al-Thani last year made headlines in several Arabic newspapers. The tweet I considered in my article ``Qatar and Terrorism `` * as an apologist attempt to offer excuse for her father- the then Emir- Hamad Al-Thani deeply involved in supporting Alqaeda linked groups in Syria. She tweeted that her father’s main intention was to support the ``revolution`` in Syria but he ended up ``trapped``!. The reality is the fact that Qatar supports the Muslim Brotherhood who were allied with Al-Nosra terrorists and ISIS (Islamic State in Iraq and Sham -Syria-) in a joint effort to bring down the secular Syrian regime. After the Saudi backed ISIS gained more territory over the Qatari backed factions, the princess started to tweet. Ironically today, Aljazeera channel controlled by the ruler of Qatar considers in its news coverage that ISIS represents a popular revolt against the newly elected president in Iraq Nouri Al-Maliki. Qatar in Backing ISIS listed by Canada as a terrorist group went beyond media support. The International Islamic Conference controlled by Qatar and led by the prominent Islamist Sheikh Yussuf Al-Qarawadi issued a statement in favor of ISIS. On the 24th of March this year The Wall Street Journal reported that the US under secretary for terrorism and financial Intelligence David S. Cohen expressed concern about the fact that Qatar and other Gulf states facilitate and operate fund rising to finance Alqaeda linked groups in the Middle East. The Conservative government was busy at that time collecting information on Canadian citizens' phone calls and internet browsing history!

The Aljazeera channel controlled directly by the Qatari dictator is now available on most major Canadian television providers including Rogers and Bell TV after the CRTC approved the channel for distribution in Canada on the 26th of November 2009. Aljazeera Channel network broadcasts in English under Aljazeera English and in Arabic under Aljazeera and often the content is not the same. Aljazeera has provided a global media platform for terrorist organizations and was the only network Osama Bin Laden trusted for handling the recordings of Al-Qaeda. It was the first to introduce a video by the prominent terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi slaughtering an American contractor working in Iraq. Such videos continued to be broadcast to include the Iraqi national guard , the police, civilians and visitors. Aljazeera with such videos encouraged terrorists to produce more, and provided them with the visibility they were looking for. The building of trust between terrorists and Aljazeera journalists remains questionable as well. Aljazeera (Arabic) hosted Islamic extremists to speak about the culture of slaughter and gave them the opportunity to justify it and make it look and sound like a resistance movement. The terror sympathizers in stead of finding a place in jail, they were justifying on Aljazeera the targeting of Iraqi infrastructure and oil pipelines.

Even the literature used by Aljazeera in reporting the events has been full of hatred. Aljazeera invented terms such as the Shia crescent to scare the Sunni minority conveying that the fertile crescent will be dominated by the Shiites. Aljazeera used terms such as the Sunni triangle in Iraq (that includes the areas of Baquba, Ramadi and Baghdad) to convey that the Shiites leaving within that geographic area are trapped. Aljazeera emphasized the use of other divisive terms when reporting about Iraq such as : the Shiite South and the Kurdish North. When reporting about Syria, it used the term "opposition" to describe Al-Qaeda linked terrorist groups, and the term "Assad militia" to describe the Syrian army.

The extremist Sunni cleric Yussuf Al-Qaradawi known for issuing religious verdicts advocating the culture of suicide bombing in the Middle East enjoyed a weekly program on Aljazeera dedicated to broadcast live his religious opinions. The program named "Sharia and Life” lasted for years and played an important role in promoting extremist ideas. He delivered several execution orders such as ordering mobs to execute former Lybian dictator Muamar Al Qadafi. Qadafi was cruelly executed after capture without a due process and his corps was publicly abused. He ordered the execution of several Iraqi and Syrian officials that were subsequently killed by suicide bombers.

The Investigative Project on Terrorism research group founded by Steven Emerson published several articles about Qatar being a safe haven for terrorist leaders and sympathizers. One of Alqaeda`s leaders Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was permitted to reside in Qatar and benefit from health care coverage. He is now in U.S. military custody in Guantánamo Bay for alleged acts of terrorism including the mass murder of civilians. In addition, The state of Qatar recruited terrorists as journalists in its official channel directly owned by the Emir. Tayseer Allouni -a journalist from the Al Jazeera news channel- who interviewed Osama Bin Laden following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks was convicted on terrorism related charges in Spain in 2005. Although he is a Spanish citizen, after being freed in March 2012, he fled to Doha, the capital of Qatar.

The Pakistani Daily newspaper published on April 5th 2013 an article about Qatar opening a permanent office representing the interests of Taliban in Doha.

There are more facts discrediting the image that the conservatives want to sell to Canadians about Qatar. What is mentioned here is perhaps the most important given the respect we all owe to our fallen men and women in the fight against terrorism. The conservatives however said `` thank you`` to them by shinning the image of states that support terrorism.

*Published by Buratha News Agency on May 24th, 2013. Iraq.