New York Times' Benghazi Fairy Tale Written For Hillary 2016?

On Saturday,  the NY Times published a report finding no evidence that Al Qaeda or other international terrorist groups had a role in the 9/11/12 attack in Benghazi  that killed four American heroes, and the attack was fueled in large part by anger at an anti-Muslim video, as the Obama administration first claimed. Both points have already been proven wrong, but that doesn't matter to the Times or to Hillary Clinton who is the major beneficiary of the perpetuation of a Benghazi fantasy.

Speaking about the lack of al Qaeda participation:

“I dispute that, and the intelligence community, to a large volume, disputes that,” Michigan GOP Rep. Mike Rogers, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, told “Fox News Sunday.”

He also repeatedly said the story was “not accurate.”

Rogers was joined on the show by California Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff, who said, “intelligence indicates Al Qaeda was involved.”

The findings in the New York Times story also conflict with testimony from Greg Hicks, the deputy of Ambassador Christopher Stevens, who was killed in the attack. Hicks described the video as "a non-event in Libya" at that time, and consequently not a significant trigger for the attack

The Times article argues that terrorist organization Ansar al-Shariah not al Qaeda was behind the attack but it neglect the truth that Ansar al-Shariah was affiliated with al Qaeda.

Additionally the report ignores previous NY Times accounts of al Qaeda involvement. as reported by the Weekly Standard:

Left out of the Times’s account are the many leads tying the attackers to al Qaeda’s international network.

For instance, there is no mention of Muhammad Jamal al Kashef, an Egyptian, in Kirkpatrick’s retelling. This is odd, for many reasons.

On October 29, 2012 three other New York Times journalists reported that Jamal’s network, in addition to a known al Qaeda branch (al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb), was directly involved in the assault. The Times reported (emphasis added): “Three Congressional investigations and a State Department inquiry are now examining the attack, which American officials said included participants from Ansar al-Shariah, Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and the Muhammad Jamal network, a militant group in Egypt.”

The Times’ claim that the Benghazi attack “was fueled in large part by anger” at the video about Islam is also fantasy.

Gregory Hicks deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Libya testified before Congress that at at 2 a.m. Tripoli time on the evening of 9/11/12 he spoke with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton her senior staff. According to Hicks he briefed Clinton on what was happening on the ground in Benghazi and that in the course of his call no one mentioned the Mohammed internet video and the the ongoing attack was discussed as an act of terror.

A statement made in July by ousted head of US Forces in Africa also disputes the Times account.  General Carter Ham was one of the speakers at the  Aspen Security Forum and said it quickly became clear the assault on the American consulate in Benghazi last year was a terrorist attack and not a spontaneous demonstration.

"It became apparent to all of us quickly that this was not a demonstration, this was a violent attack," Ham said.  

When asked whether he specifically thought it was a terrorist attack, Ham said, "I don't know that that was my first reaction. But pretty quickly as we started to gain understanding within the hours after the initiation of the attack, yes. And at the command I don't think anyone thought differently."

Then there is the independent review of social media published by Fox in 2012 which looked at 4,000 social media postings from Benghazi found no reference to the video until the day after the attack. 

According to the Times report there were some social media references to the video that precede the Sept. 11 attack. But the overwhelming amount of the evidence indicates that the video did not play a significant role in the attack.

When one looks at the beneficiary of this collection of this collection of fantastical account of the Benghazi attack , it is obvious the Times is working hard to clear Hillary Clinton's name so this major failure of her tenure as Secretary of State does not hurt her Presidential chances.

As the "news spokesman" for the Democratic Party, the New York Times is simply doing its duty, when the news doesn't fit to print, make up a story.