WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — The United States is deeply concerned about members of Syria's moderate opposition coming under the spell of ISIL ideology and filling the terrorist group’s ranks, US State Department spokesperson John Kirby told reporters on Thursday.
"We have seen over the course of the last year that some moderates [in Syria] become extreme," Kirby said. "One of the things that so deeply concerns us about ISIL… is the resilience of the ideology and the attractiveness of it."
On Wednesday, US Assistant Secretary for Near Eastern Affairs Anne Patterson told a congressional committee that the Nusra Front, an al-Qaeda affiliate in northern Syria, has recruited fighters the United States previously designated as moderate opposition.
"If it can happen to people in Europe and the United States and Australia, it shouldn’t come as a shock to anybody that it could happen to people on the ground there in Syria," Kirby maintained.
On Wednesday, a Department of Defense spokesperson said the US military will continue re-arming anti-ISIL rebel forces in Syria, because it is encouraged by how the fighters have used munitions in most recent offensives.
In October, the United States airdropped 50 tons of small arms ammunition to the Syrian Arab Coalition.
In early October, the US cancelled a program to train and equip alleged moderate forces set to fight ISIL in Syria after the program failed to produce more than 60 fighters.
