Former Treasury Official: Qatar’s Terror Ties Make it a Questionable U.S. Ally

The ongoing terror ties of Qatar, most recently evidenced by its hosting of Hamas’s release of the terror organization’s new political document, make it a problematic ally for the United States, Jonathan Schanzer and Kate Havard wrote Thursday in Newsweek.

Schanzer, a former U.S. Treasury Department official and currently Senior Vice President of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies (FDD), and Havard, a research analyst at FDD, wrote that in addition to hosting Hamas for the release of the document, which was falsely “promoted as a more moderate version of the group’s founding charter,” it has given millions in aid that allowed Hamas to reportedly “rebuild its network of terror tunnels,” and provided safe haven for many of the group’s leaders.

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“In other words, terrorists roam free in this tiny corner of the Middle East. In some cases, the government actively tries to help them rebrand. In others, the government simply turns a blind eye to their activities,” Schanzer and Havard observed.

The basis of the United States’ alliance with Qatar is that Qatar is home to the Al-Udeid air base, which the American rent from the monarchy.

Schanzer and Havard concluded:

The insanity of this arrangement is highlighted by the fact that the base is essentially down the street from the same hotel were Hamas has unfurled its new political document, and a stone’s throw from the Taliban’s “non-embassy.”

Some in the military insist that this is not a problem. Some beltway analysts insist that the government in Doha is changing. But this amounts to little more than a rebranding campaign of our own. Qatar is sponsoring terrorism. It is time to demand that this shifty Middle East country choose sides.

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Read the full article here.