“Iran Moderate Wins Presidency by a Large Margin,” reads one New York Times headline. A follow-up piece in the Times calls him “A Pragmatic Victor” in the headline and speculates “some sort of reformist revolution could be under way.”

“Iran’s Newly Elected President Urges ‘Path of Moderation,’” says a Washington Post headline, following the regime’s spin to the West that Rowhani will pursue different policies than his predecessor.

One Post headline reads, “Iran’s New President Promises ‘New Opportunity’ For Battered Reformists,” while another declares “Moderate Iranian Leader Could Complicate Israeli Efforts To Halt Nuke Program.”

A Los Angeles Times headline calls Rowhani a “Cleric Known As [A] Pragmatist” with “a reputation as a centrist.” Slate‘s headline describes Rowhani as a “reformist” and approvingly quoted a BBC reporter claiming his selection “may just usher in ‘an age of moderation in the next four years.’” Newsweek/Daily Beast calls Rowhani a “moderate cleric” and a “moderate conservative.”

One Iran expert, the Wall Street Journal‘s Sohrab Ahmari, who grew up in the Islamic Republic, offered a rare glimpse of the real Rowhani and how he became president.

“Iran’s presidential campaign season kicked off last month when an unelected body of 12 Islamic jurists disqualified more than 600 candidates,” Ahmari wrote. “Women were automatically out; so were Iranian Christians, Jews and even Sunni Muslims. The rest, including a former president, were purged for possessing insufficient revolutionary zeal. Eight regime loyalists made it onto the ballots. One emerged victorious on Saturday.”

Rowhani began his political career as a close aide to Ayatollah Khomeini and served as secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council for 16 years, where he oversaw a murderous crackdown on pro-democracy student protesters in 1999. Then he oversaw negotiations with western countries over the Iranian nuclear program that he later bragged to Iranian state media had been intentionally dishonest.

There is one Middle East political leader who prominent liberal publications agree is indisputably not a moderate or a reformer, but in fact a “hard-liner”: the thrice-democratically elected prime minister of the region’s only liberal democracy, Benjamin Netanyahu.

When Netanyahu won the premiership in 2009, the Washington Post described him in article after article as a “hard-liner,” a practice that continues to this day and that is shared liberally by the New York Times.

When he was re-elected in 2013, such publications again employed “hard-line” as their go-to descriptor of the Israeli leader and indeed of any Israeli political figure not firmly on the left wing of the political spectrum. Readers of the Associated Press, Los Angeles Times, Slate, and numerous other mainstream publications were presented his temperament and ideology as that of a hard-liner leading a coalition of other hard-liners and blocking peace.

Netanyahu has been calling for peace talks with the Palestinians for over four years. The Palestinians refuse to talk. Yet Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who openly denies there is any historic Jewish connection to Israel and whose dissertation at a Soviet university claims Jewish collusion in the Holocaust, is unfailingly described in the same publications as a “moderate.”

Rep. Peter Roskam (R., Ill.), the House’s chief deputy majority whip, offered the amendment late last week on the eve of the 2014 National Defense Authorization Act’s (NDAA) passage in the House.

The NDAA, which passed the House 315-108 on Friday after a flurry of last minute additions, funds all U.S. defense priorities for the coming fiscal year.

While the Senate version of the NDAA does not include a similar amendment regarding Israel, sources on Capitol Hill told the Washington Free Beacon that companion language is likely to be introduced in the near future.

Roskam’s amendment requires President Barack Obama to provide Congress with regular progress reports ensuring the United States makes good on promises to equip Israel with advanced weaponry, including air refueling tankers and advanced bunker-buster bombs.

This type of equipment would make it substantially easier for Israel to launch a unilateral strike on Iran’s dispersed nuclear sites.

Advanced bunker-buster bombs, for instance, would allow Israel to strike deep within Iran’s fortified underground nuclear sites, while air refueling planes would enable Israeli war planes to travel the long distance to Iran without stopping to refuel.

The amendment makes explicit reference to Iran’s nuclear program and Congressional support for Israel’s right to take any military action it deems necessary.

The United States’ arming of Israel could be critical to stopping Tehran from obtaining a nuclear bomb, Roskam told the Free Beacon.

“Under no circumstance can Israel, the United States, or the world afford a nuclear-capable Iran,” Roskam said in a statement. “When it comes to Iran’s quest for nuclear weapons, we must maintain a policy of prevention, not containment.”

“This amendment helps ensure that Israel, our greatest ally in the Middle East, has the capabilities to defend itself against any potential existential threat, including Iran,” Roskam said.

The arms amendment passed just days before the Iranians voted for a new president in a closely watched election.

The winner, cleric Hassan Rowhani, has been dubbed a moderate by the Western media.

However, experts believe Rowhani will engage in fruitless nuclear negotiations with the West as Tehran’s military leaders quietly accelerate their nuclear work.

International nuclear inspectors recently concluded that Iran could be just months away from successfully securing the key components in a nuclear weapon. They also found that Tehran is enriching large levels of uranium, the key component in a bomb.

Roskam’s amendment reinforces Congressional support for Israeli military action on Iran.

“It is the sense of Congress that air refueling tankers and advanced bunker-buster munitions should immediately be transferred to Israel to ensure our democratic ally has an independent capability to remove any existential threat posed by the Iranian nuclear program and defend its vital national interests,” the amendment says.

The amendment additionally “identifies all aerial refueling platforms, bunker-buster munitions, and other capabilities and platforms that would contribute significantly to the maintenance by Israel of a robust independent capability to remove existential security threats, including nuclear and ballistic missile facilities in Iran, and defend its vital national interests.”

Roskam’s amendment is meant to reinforce and strengthen the United States-Israel Enhanced Security Cooperation Act of 2012, which guaranteed the Jewish state “air refueling tankers, missile defense capabilities, and specialized munitions.”

The White House would be required under the bill to report to Congress every three months on the progress of its weapons deliveries to Israel.

The House version of the NDAA also would allow for the indefinite detention of several terrorists still being held at the Guantanamo Bay prison camp. At least $500 million has been allotted to upgrade and improve the facility.

Obama said in a speech to the National Defense University May 23 that because of the death of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and most of his top aides, “we are safer.”

While terrorist threats still exist, “the core of al Qaeda in Pakistan and Afghanistan is on the path to defeat,” the president said.

However, a U.S. counterterrorism official said the threat posed by al Qaeda is growing. “From Africa to Pakistan, it is spreading systematically,” the official said.

The official blamed the Obama administration policy of focusing its counterterrorism efforts almost exclusively on central al Qaeda.

The focus on Pakistan and Afghanistan resulted in a lack of targeted counterterrorism efforts in other locations, the official said. The official added that counterterrorism efforts have been weakened by the administration’s policy of dissociating Islam from al Qaeda and other Islamist terrorism. The policy was a key effort of John Brennan, White House counterterrorism chief during the first Obama administration. As CIA director, Brennan has expanded the policy of limiting links between Islam and terrorism at the agency.

The result is that Islamist terror groups are flourishing, posing direct threats to the United States and to U.S. interests outside the country, the official said.

That assessment is bolstered by a new report by the private Lignet intelligence group. The report made public Tuesday says the U.S. government’s overreliance on sanctions and surveillance has limited the war on terror.

The result is “a decentralized al Qaeda structure—and a much greater threat,” the report said.

“Al Qaeda has transitioned from a hierarchical cell structure to a franchise organization that is now responsible for four times as many terrorist attacks a year as it was before 9/11,” the report said.

“Al Qaeda training camps are now being established on the Arabian Peninsula, in Africa, countries of the former Soviet Union, and Southeast Asia.”

U.S. counterterrorism efforts in Southwest Asia, including a steady series of armed drone attacks against al Qaeda leaders, have resulted in central al Qaeda moving out of the region.

York Zirke, head of Germany’s federal criminal police agency, told a conference in Russia recently that al Qaeda and other terrorist groups are shifting operations from Pakistan and Afghanistan to Syria, northern Africa, Yemen, and other countries.

“Speaking about the situation in the world, it has to be reiterated that al Qaeda and organizations associated with it are not halting their activities, but the centers of its activities have moved from the area close to the Pakistani and Afghani borders to other regions such as Syria, Northern Africa, Mali, and Yemen,” Zirke said during a conference in Kazan, Russia, on June 6, according to Interfax.

The U.S. official outlined gains by al Qaeda both ideologically and operationally in expanding its reach as well as developing affiliates in key regions targeted by Islamists over the past several months.

Al Qaeda has moved rapidly to expand in parts of east, west, and north Africa, helped by the so-called Arab Spring.

A key affiliate, al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, known as AQIM, and the Somalia-based al Shabaab group are the two main groups operating and expanding in Africa. The Nigerian al Qaeda group Boko Haram also emerged as a new affiliate and is posing a significant threat to the region.

About 4,000 French troops were dispatched to Mali in January to battle al Qaeda terrorists.

AQIM is expanding despite the French military intervention. A BBC report from May 29 stated that the expansion is not new. “Militants and armed radical groups have expanded and entrenched their positions throughout the Sahel and Sahara over the last decade under the umbrella of [AQIM].”

French troops announced a day later they had uncovered an AQIM bomb factory engaged in making suicide bomber vests in northern Mali.

U.S. intelligence agencies recently identified a new AQIM training base near Timbuktu in Mali. An al Qaeda training manual discovered in Mali revealed that terrorists are training with SA-7 surface-to-air missiles, the Associated Press reported.

Al Qaeda affiliates in Libya are moving into the power vacuum left by the ouster of the regime of Muammar Gadhafi. The main al Qaeda affiliate there is Ansar al Sharia, blamed for the Sept. 11, 2012, attack against the U.S. diplomatic compound in Benghazi that killed four Americans, including Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens.

France’s government recently said Paris has become increasingly alarmed about al Qaeda activities in Libya and is considering a deployment of troops near Libya for counterterrorism operations.

French President Francois Hollande said in a speech last month that Libya-based jihadists represent the main security threat to North Africa and also to Europe. He told a reporter May 23 that the terrorist threat in Mali “began in Libya and is returning to Libya.”

The concerns are based on recent intelligence reports that al Qaeda and other jihadists groups have new training camps in the southern Libyan desert.

Further east in Africa, Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood government is creating an environment that is allowing al Qaeda to develop in that country.

A U.S. intelligence official has said reports from Egypt identified al Qaeda groups operating Al-Azhar University in Cairo. The university is said to be a covert base for al Qaeda organizational and training activities that is developing a jihadist network made up of many different nationalities.

Al Shabaab in Somalia continues to conduct attacks, although there are signs the group is fragmented, with some armed fighting among various groups within al Shabaab. The group remains a key al Qaeda affiliate.

Attacks related to al Shabaab continue to increase, according to U.S. officials.

One particular concern for security officials are reports that al Qaeda is moving into Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula. A U.S. official said in May that al Qaeda elements were conducting small arms training in the mountainous areas of the Sinai Peninsula in preparation for fighting alongside jihadist rebels in Syria.

The al Qaeda affiliate in the Sinai was identified by U.S. officials as Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis (ABM). The group’s logo is similar to that of al Qaeda—a black flag, an AK-47, and a globe.

Saudi Arabia has been battling the affiliate al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, which tried several high-profile airline bombings against the United States. The group is led by several former inmates of the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and is very active against the government of Yemen.

Earlier this year, a leaked memorandum from Saudi Arabia’s Interior Ministry revealed that Riyadh is exporting al Qaeda terrorists to Syria. The memo from April 2012 disclosed that 1,239 prisoners who were to be executed were trained and sent to “jihad in Syria” in exchange for a full pardon. The prisoners included 212 Saudis and the rest were foreigners from Syria, Pakistan, Yemen, Sudan, Egypt, Jordan, Somalia, Kuwait, Afghanistan, and Iraq and included Palestinians.

Syria’s al Qaeda group is the al Nusra Front, which has emerged as the most powerful rebel group opposing the forces of the Bashar al-Assad regime.

Obama said in his National Defense University speech that the “lethal yet less capable al Qaeda affiliates” and domestic jihadists remain a threat.

“But as we shape our response, we have to recognize that the scale of this threat closely resembles the types of attacks we faced before 9/11.”

The Lignet report said the use of sanctions and financial penalties against al Qaeda produced the unintended consequence of transforming al Qaeda into a coalition of loose, localized, autonomous terror cells.

“In terms of financing, al Qaeda’s shuria or high command council, no longer plays a central role in allocating expenditures or soliciting funds,” the report said. “Instead, terrorist financing has moved further into the ‘gray’ economy. Cells raise funds from a combination of charities, independent criminal ventures, and licit businesses.”

Crime is now the main source of al Qaeda funds and criminal activities by the group include extortion, hijacking, theft, blackmail, the drug trade, and kidnapping for ransom.

“Counterterrorism efforts that target the financing of terrorism are a work in process,” the report concludes. “The measures employed by the United States and others in the last 12 years have reshaped rather than resolved the terrorist threat. It remains to be seen if the United States will be able to in turn adapt to al Qaeda’s new and alarming franchise cell structure and finance methods.”

Joseph Myers, a retired Army officer and specialist on the ideology of Islamist terror, said U.S. efforts to target and kill al Qaeda leaders have been successful. But al Qaeda affiliates are spreading “from the Horn of Africa, across North Africa and post-Gaddafi Libya into central Africa to Dagestan and like-minded bombers in Boston,” he noted.

“Al Qaeda is an idea, not simply an organization and ideas are not easily ‘killed,’” Myers said in an email.

The U.S. government’s counterterrorism paradigm is misguided because the forefront of global Islamic jihad is not al Qaeda, but the Muslim Brotherhood “we are now partnering with as a matter of policy,” he said.

The doctrine of Islamic jihad remains the key ideological threat that must be recognized, he said. Until that is realized, “we will continue to have national security failures of analysis and prediction and not only al Qaeda, but other Islamic jihadist groups will continue to emerge and spread,” Myers said.

Fred Fleitz, a former intelligence analyst now with Lignet, said al Qaeda has shifted tactics toward “a multitude of smaller, low-probability attacks.”

“This includes recruiting members behind U.S. borders through Internet-based efforts to find and radicalize ‘home grown terrorists,’” Fleitz said in an email.

“I am especially concerned about the recent plot to bomb a Toronto to New York train which was backed by al Qaeda members in Iran,” Fleitz said. “This was a good example of what al Qaeda can still do.”

“We are also seeing al Qaeda franchises and other Islamist groups growing in strength in Mali, Somalia, and Nigeria.  Seven of nine Syrian rebel groups are Islamist and there is an al Qaeda presence in Syria.”

Sebastian Gorka, a counterterrorism expert and military affairs fellow with the Foundation for Defense for Democracies, said the administration has created a narrative that asserts the United States is solely at war with the remnants of al Qaeda Central and that the group is on the decline since bin Ladin was killed.

“The rest of the national security mission in counterterrorism has been reduced to the amorphous ‘counter violent extremism’ which is of course fallacious since as a nation we are not threatened by general violent extremism – Basque separatists or abortion clinic bombers – but a specific brand of religious extremism: global jihad,” Gorka said in an email.

“Anything that countermands the official narrative, such as the the Fort Hood shooter or the Boston bombers, has to be undermined with labels such ‘workplace violence’ or ‘loser jihadis’ since anything else would mean that al Qaeda is very much alive and well,” said Gorka, who teaches U.S. national security at Georgetown University. “This represents a politically driven distortion of objective threat assessments.”

Representatives from the U.S. and the Taliban will engage in Afghanistan peace talks Thursday in an office that has opened in Qatar, which Psaki called a significant “first step” in the process.

Psaki repeatedly rebuffed Lee’s questions about where in the Taliban’s statement it said it would adhere to the Afghan Constitution and specifically respect for women and minorities, saying the U.S. considered that a vital part of the talks and not up for negotiation.

“But if it’s not … I don’t get it. If they haven’t agreed to respect the Constitution, then it must mean that it’s up for negotiation,” Lee said:

PSAKI: It’s not up for negotiation. That is the end goal of the process. The opening of the office is just a beginning of the process.

LEE: Ok, but they have to come to that conclusion.

PSAKI: Correct.

LEE: Well, then I don’t get why you’re so happy. The Secretary said, ‘Good news, we’re very pleased at what’s taken place.’ I’m not sure I get … If they haven’t agreed to do the things you want them to do, except for this one statement with the two parts to it, but those are still the end goal of the process … It must mean that these are things up for negotiation.

PSAKI: They’re not up for negotiation. Those were defined as the end goal of the process.

LEE: So you’re hoping that the Afghans will convince the Taliban, their brethren, to respect the Constitution and the rights of minorities and women in their conversations, which means that that is up for negotiation.

PSAKI: It’s not up for negotiation. That is the end goal of the process of reconciliation. This is a first step in the process. I’m not over-estimating or overstating what it means, but certainly a first step is one farther step than we had just a few days ago.

REPORTER: As part of his trip right now, does that currently entail attending or observing an Afghan-Taliban–

PSAKI: This is so new, the meetings are still being scheduled. But as we have updates, we’re happy to provide them.

REPORTER: Jen, so the wires are already reporting it’s happening on Thursday, that meeting. Can you tell us, if you can’t confirm that date, maybe you can, can you tell us at least what the access will be?

PSAKI: The media access?

REPORTER: Yeah. Will there be de-briefs? Will there be any information shared from them?

PSAKI: We will be reading out meetings as they complete. The meetings were still being scheduled as I came down here. Maybe they happened rapidly.

REPORTER: Just to be clear on Jill’s point, the Taliban are not required to disown, disavow or disassociate themselves publicly with al-Qaeda?

PSAKI: That is a part of the end goal of the process.

REPORTER: Right. But to begin the process, to talk with them, they don’t have to do that. This is not a pre-condition for them.

PSAKI: Correct.

The Taliban announced Tuesday it would sit down for peace talks with U.S. and Afghanistan officials.

Rowhani has been portrayed as a moderate reformer by the media and some Iranian regime supporters, despite his close relationship with Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. Rowhani also supported deadly crackdowns on student protesters in 1999, and claimed that he deceived the West into allowing Iran’s nuclear program to progress while serving as Iran’s nuclear negotiator with the Europeans.

“Hassan Rowhani is no Nelson Mandela. He’s not even Mohammed Khatami,” said Karim Sadjadpour, a Carnegie Endowment for International Peace senior associate. “He is a consummate regime insider.”

Alireza Nader, senior international policy analyst at RAND Corporation, said it is unlikely Rowhani will help usher in democratic or human rights reforms in Iran.

“It’s true (that) Rowhani’s not a reformer,” Nader said. “His goal is not really to change Iran domestically, as much as it is to relieve Iran’s external pressure.”

Nader said Rowhani’s election was a sign that “U.S. pressure against Iran is beginning to pay off,” by increasing Iranian public support for a candidate who could negotiate with the West on nuclear issues more effectively than President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

“Rowhani comes from the tradition in Iran of the pragmatic conservatives,” said Sadjadpour. “They believe in order to preserve the regime, Iran needs to privilege economic expediency over [the regime’s] ideology.”

Rep. Ted Deutch (D., Fla.) asked whether Rowhani’s election was an attempt by Iran’s Supreme Leader “to undermine the united international coalition against Iran’s nuclear program that currently exists.”

“Will countries like Russia and China, for example, be able to accept a deal under Rowhani that they wouldn’t accept under Ahmadinejad?” Deutch asked. “What if [the Iranians] offer less, but it comes without the venom that came with Ahmadinejad?”

Sadjadpour said this was possible.

“The role Ahmadinejad played in uniting the international community against Iran, Rowhani is now creating potential fissures,” he said.

Nader said it was unlikely that there would be any meaningful reduction of sanctions without meaningful concessions from Iran.

Suzanne Maloney, senior fellow at the Saban Center for Middle East Policy, said she did not believe Rowhani was there to be “a patsy or a dupe” for the Supreme Leader, but noted that the Europeans “found him frustrating” when he served as Iran’s nuclear negotiator.

Corker, ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, placed a hold on $75 million in federal funds intended for Afghanistan until he receives “sufficient assurances that there is a process in place to ensure our policy toward governance in Afghanistan is coherent and supports our national interests.”

As a matter of oversight of U.S. foreign policy operations, I have repeatedly requested briefings and additional information on the nature and effect of this policy, classified and unclassified, as appropriate. The administration’s lack of any response to these requests, its apparent decision to flout the Foreign Relations Committee’s oversight, and its inability (or unwillingness) to explain such a policy is unacceptable. As a consequence, I have determined that the further commitment of taxpayer funds at this time toward such an incoherent governance strategy would not be in our national interest, and I am placing a formal hold on Congressional Notification 65, relating to USAID programs in Afghanistan. Specifically, the hold pertains to $75 million intended for electoral programs in Afghanistan.

Sean Joyce, a top FBI official claimed the surveillance efforts helped disrupt a plot to bomb the New York Stock Exchange. Joyce said NSA officials discovered the plot while monitoring a known extremist in Yemen, who was in contact with an individual in the U.S. Once the surveillance was initiated, they were able to detect “nascent plotting” to bomb the stock exchange and ultimately disrupt the plot.

“We’ve come full circle from going after al Qaeda to indirectly backing al Qaeda,” said one U.S. official opposed to the new policy, referring to the dominant rebel group now in Syria, the al Qaeda-linked al-Nusra Front.

Publicly, the Obama administration is opposing aid to al-Nusra and trying to bolster non-jihadist rebels in a last-ditch effort to shape the outcome of the post-Bashar al-Assad regime in Syria.

In doing so, the administration is joining 11 other states in arming the Syrian rebels, led mainly by Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Britain, and Qatar.

The main backing for al-Nusra and other jihadist groups has come from covert arms shipments provided by Saudi Arabia and Turkey for the past several months, according to U.S. officials. The Obama administration sought unsuccessfully to have both states end their backing of al-Nusra, whose fighters are transported in pick up trucks and who are known for wearing black clothes.

Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization, known as MAT, has been the leading conduit for arms support to al-Nusra, a group widely identified as the strongest—both ideologically and materially—of all Syrian rebel groups.

The Syria conflict also is now evolving into a regional conflict, as proxies for major powers fight over Syria and eye a takeover of Lebanon.

On the side of Assad are Russia and Iran, along with Iran’s main proxy Hezbollah, a terrorist group that for the past few months had engaged in armed conflicts with jihadist Syrian rebels.

President Barack Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin are expected to discuss their two nations’ differences on Syria at the G8 summit now underway in Britain.

U.S. intelligence agencies have identified at least 17 armed jihadists groups fighting the Assad regime in Syria, including the al-Nusra Front, an officially designated al Qaeda rebel group after its merger in March with al Qaeda’s Iraq affiliate. Numbers of jihadists are difficult to estimate, but more than 10,000 jihadists are fighting in this rebel faction.

By contrast, secular rebel groups led by the Free Syrian Army are believed to have around 20,000 fighters.

However, the jihadist groups sharply increased the number and lethality of attacks in Syria since the spring. Intelligence analysts believe they are positioned to take control of Syria after the ouster of Assad. Hundreds of jihadist rebel attacks have been claimed since March, including armed assaults, bombings, mortar attacks, and suicide strikes.

The ruthlessness of the jihadists was highlighted by an atrocity video that circulated on YouTube last month. The video [warning: graphic violence] showed a Syrian jihadist cut out the heart of a dead Syrian soldier with a knife and bite it as supporters shouted “Allah Akbar.”

The widely-circulated video was used by Assad regime supporters to exposed the nature of all Syrian rebels.

White House Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes told reporters on Friday that U.S. military aid will go to the Supreme Military Council that he called “the principal fighting force on the ground that we’ve been working with.”

The Supreme Military Council has called for a free, democratic, and multi-religious Syria. The overall rebel coalition is called the Free Syrian Army, made up of defectors from Assad’s armed forces and including large numbers of Muslim Brotherhood in Syria members as its top leaders. It is also believed to be infiltrated by jihadists who do not support its pluralistic goals.

The council and Free Syrian Army are opposing al-Nusra and the jihadist rebels groups.

The decision to send U.S. arms, mainly small arms, followed confirmation that the Assad regime had used chemical weapons, something Obama had described as a “red line.”

Rhodes said the U.S. relationship with the Syrian rebel military council would prevent arms from reaching Islamist rebels.

“That’s important because it both allows you to get assistance into the hands of those who need it, but it also allows you to have protections to try to keep assistance from reaching those who we don’t want to receive materiel—for instance, al-Nusra, which has generally been the most extremist element of the opposition,” Rhodes said.

However, U.S. officials familiar with the Syrian opposition said other nations backing the rebels have not cut off support to the Islamists, namely Turkey’s government, which is covertly arming a number of Islamist rebel groups.

Egypt’s Islamist government also announced on Monday that it would begin backing Syrian rebels.

Angelo Codevilla, a former U.S. intelligence official, said arming the Syrian rebels is a bad idea.

“They are not our friends and are unlikely to become such,” he said. “We have zero control over the situation and will not acquire any. In short, we are bringing water to others’ mills, irresponsibly.”

Codevilla said arming the rebels might bring “good to some and harm to others,” but noted: “The only sure thing is that we are doing no good for the U.S.A.”

“The fight there is between Sunni and Shia,” said. “We are hated by both now and will make ourselves more hated and despised by getting involved.”

Regionally, the struggle in Syria also links Russian efforts to control the Mediterranean.

“We are helping the rebels under the false assumption that Russia is somehow on our side,” he said. “It is not.”

On the plus side, the Syrian civil war is an opportunity to weaken Hezbollah, now fully engaged in the Syrian conflict. The United States should be covertly aiding people in Lebanon who want to oust Hezbollah and Iran, Codevilla said.

“The freedom of Lebanon is in our interest, and it is achievable,” he said. “But who wins or loses in Syria is not in our interest and is beyond our control.”

Former intelligence official and counterterrorism specialist Bruce Riedel also questioned the United States arming the rebels.

“If done well, this move can end a bloody civil war,” Riedel said in a column in the Daily Beast. “If done poorly, it could lead to disaster.”

Riedel warned that other states involved in arming the rebels likely have differing interests than those of the United States.

A worst case scenario: “Our arms could end up in al Qaeda’s hands not just in Syria but in Iraq, Jordan, and elsewhere,” Riedel said. “They could be used to kill Americans.”

Riedel said there are many unanswered questions about the covert arms aid, such as whether the mission is to stop the use of chemical arms or to oust the Assad regime.

Also, it is not clear whether the aid is meant to unite the rebels and purge the al-Nusra Front from the opposition, or to defeat Iran and Hezbollah in the region.

“We have yet to hear the answers to these questions,” Riedel said.