Assad’s chemical attack opens space for shift in US line, driven by Pentagon and National Security Council

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THURSDAY FEATURES

Podcast: Assad’s Chemical Attack — Truth, Propaganda, & the US
Iran Daily: Tehran’s Caution Over Assad’s Chemical Attack

UPDATE 2010 GMT: Kareem Shaheen of The Guardian tweets that the Russian explanation for Tuesday’s events — that Assad regime warplanes bombed a rebel warehouse with chemical stocks — has no merit:

Eliot Higgins of Bellingcat adds, “Satellite imagery confirms the buildings were damaged before April 4th too.”

UPDATE 1930 GMT: US military and intelligence officials have told media outlets, including CNN and NBC, that the Assad regime’s planes dropped bombs at the time and place that Tuesday’s chemical attack on Khan Sheikhoun occurred.

A US official said radar intelligence followed the track of the warplanes and the infrared heat signature of the bombs.

UPDATE 1710 GMT: Riad Hijab, the head of the opposition High Negotiations Committee, has called on the Trump Administration to back up its rhetoric to act against the Assad regime’s use of chemical weapons.

Hijab, in Washington this week, said:

We expect deeds from President Trump, not words. We want deeds to protect the Syrian civilians and to protect the entire region, and to protect the American people as well. This is a defiance to President Trump in front of the American people and the entire world….

These weapons must be destroyed. The airplanes and the runways must be destroyed. All the weapons that are killing the Syrian people must be destroyed.

UPDATE 1700 GMT: US officials say the Pentagon has presented long-standing options to strike Syria’s chemical weapons capability to the Administration.

The sources said a decision has not been made, with one official saying that Donald Trump is relying on the judgment of Defense Secretary James Mattis.

Meanwhile, Russia has demanded an elucidation of the Trump Administration’s plans.

“Russia’s approach to Assad is clear. He is the legal president of an independent state. What is the US approach?” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told CNN in a text message.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov warned against “snap judgments”: “It’s indeed a very menacing course of events, dangerous and horrible crime. However, sticking labels on everyone, prematurely, is not a correct thing to do, in our opinion.”

UPDATE 1600 GMT: A short film featuring Abdul Hamid Youssef, the father from Khan Sheikhoun pictured holding his dead twins and travelling on a bus to bury them after Tuesday’s chemical attacks.

Youssef, who reportedly lost 18 members of his family, talks of his anguish and criticizes the US, Russia, and the Assad regime, “My children are now with God, whose grace is better than all these presidents”:

UPDATE 1455 GMT: Samples being taken from the crater left by the claimed chemical munition in Khan Sheikhoun:

UPDATE 1145 GMT: Dr. Abdel Hay Tennari, who treated victims of Tuesday’s chemical attack, says an antidote for sarin helped save lives.

Tennari said his field hospital in Idlib Province bought thousands of milligrams of Atropine, used to counter moderate cases of sarin poisoning, after the regime’s August 2013 sarin attacks near Damascus.

The doctor said he is sure that this week’s attack on Khan Sheikhoun was sarin or a highly similar gas. The 22 patients treated by his hospital showed clear signs of a nerve agent — difficulty in breathing, weak muscles, and constricted pupils.

Tennari gave Pralidoxime, held in a limited amount by the hospital, to the five most severe cases and “they responded almost immediately to the antidote”. Pralidoxime is used treatment for nerve agent poisoning, such as including, Soman, and VX.

UPDATE 1100 GMT: The White Helmets and Idlib Health Directorate have updated their official toll from Tuesday’s chemical attack to 84 killed, including 27 children and 19 women, and 546 injured.

UPDATE 1130 GMT: Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman has declared “100 percent certainty” that President Assad was directly responsible for Tuesday’s chemical attack: “The murderous chemical weapons attacks on citizens in Idlib province in Syria and on a local hospital were carried out on the direct order and planned by the Syrian president, Bashar Assad, using Syrian planes.”

Israel has been courting Moscow for closer ties over the Syrian conflict. Asked if Russia was involved in Tuesday’s operations, Liberman said “We don’t know. “We do know this is a Syrian operation by Assad from A to Z.”

But the Foreign Minister said Israel would not the lead in a response:

Why do we need to take the chestnuts out of the fire? This is the responsibility of the international community. I am not prepared to be the schmuck that the whole world pisses on.

“The [rest of] world should take responsibility instead of just saying it will.

ORIGINAL ENTRY: In a change of his public line, Donald Trump has raised the possibility of US action in response to the Assad regime’s chemical attack in northwest Syria.

Speaking at a joint press conference alongside visiting King Abdullah of Jordan, Trump said his views on President Assad had been changed by Monday’s “chemical attack that was so horrific, in Syria, against innocent people, including women, small children, and even beautiful little babies. Their deaths was an affront to humanity. These heinous actions by the Assad regime cannot be tolerated.”

See Syria Daily, April 5: Assad Regime’s Chemical Attack Kills 100+
Syria Pictures and Video: 58+ Killed in Assad Regime’s Latest Chemical Attacks

Only a few days ago, the Trump Administration made clear that it was ready to accept Assad’s continued stay in power, reversing US public declarations since August 2011. UN Ambassador Nikki Haley said the President’s departure was no longer a priority for Washington, and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson mimicked President Assad’s own words when he said the decision “should be left to the Syrian people”. The White House reinforced the message through press spokesman Sean Spicer.

But on Wednesday, Trump declared, “I now have responsibility”, as he proclaimed that he would not repeat President Obama’s step back from intervention after the Assad regime’s chemical attacks near Damascus that killed more than 1,400 people in August 2013: “It was a great opportunity missed.”

The sudden shift in the US approach did not appear to rest as much with Trump — who, in early September 2013, loudly advised Obama not to take military action inside Syria — as with the Pentagon and the National Security Council, both headed by veteran generals with long service in the Middle East. Defense Secretary James Mattis said, “[This] was a heinous act and will be treated as such.”

UN Ambassador Haley embodied that shift at the Security Council’s emergency hearing on the attack. Holding up pictures of children among the more than 100 people killed on Tuesday, she said that action would be taken outside the UN, if necessary.

Haley also called on Russia to stop shielding the Assad regime, and Secretary of State Tillerson said the Russians should “think carefully” about their position — in contrast to Trump’s omission of Moscow from his remarks.

Trump was vague about that action, responding to questions, “Militarily, I don’t like to say where I’m going and what I doing.”

Asked about his message for “the Iranian militias in Syria supporting the Syrian regime”, Trump said:

You will see. They will have a message. You will see what the message will be.

Qusai Zakarya, a survivor of the August 2013 chemical attacks near Damascus, describes that day and then appeals to Trump, “Mr President, please help us”: