Syria’s Chemical Weapons: Western Military Alliance and Israel continue to Support Al Qaeda Affiliated Rebels

Amply documented the Al Nusrah rebels are in possession of chemical weapons.

In an unusual twist, An August 9, 2013 UPI report intimates that the Al Qaeda affiliated Al Nusrah rebels rather than the Syrian government constitute a threat to the security of Israel, an absurd proposition. And that Israel, so to speak, fears that chemical weapons might “fall in the wrong hands”.

Troops loyal to Syrian President Bashar Assad have broken through rebel forces encircling the northern city of Aleppo to secure a major chemical weapons base that, if they can hold it, will be a big help to U.N. experts sent in to destroy Assad’s chemical arsenal.

The sprawling facility at al-Safira is one of the most important chemical warfare centers in Syria, and has been one of the most threatened by the rebels, including hard-line jihadist groups like the al-Nusra Front.

The nightmare scenario for Israeli and Western leaders is that the jihadists get their hands on Assad’s vast armory of chemical weapons and deadly nerve agents like sarin and VX. (UPI, August 9, 2013)

Confirmed by CNN, the rebels were trained in the use of chemical weapons by Western special forces. Moreover, Israel has been supporting Al Nusrah out of the Golan heights, so how on earth could the Al Nusrah rebels constitute  a threat to the security of the State of Israel.

The report points to the fact that UN inspectors on the ground have acknowledged that the threat comes from the Al Nusrah rebels:

“The capture of al-Safira [by the government from the rebels], which includes a heavily guarded facility where nerve agents are produced and weaponized, could allow the U.N. specialists to eliminate a significant portion of Assad’s weapons of mass destruction.”

Assad’s forces, supported by mobile artillery and airstrikes, Monday broke through rebel lines to secure the chemical weapons facility at al-Safira, where important defense plants are located, outside the strategic city of Aleppo.

…On Oct. 3, the regime retook the key town of Khanasser near Aleppo which controls the main highway to al-Safira, allowing Assad’s forces to break through to Al-Safira four days later.

“This development will be welcomed even by the United States,whose opposition to the Assad regime is currently outweighed by its concerns for securing the chemical weapons in Syria,” the U.S. intelligence consulting firm Stratfor said.  Read complete UPI report

Welcomed by the US?

Washington has supported the Al Qaeda affiliated rebels from the very outset including the rebel assault on al Safira.  Moreover, according to Israeli sources,  NATO and Turkey’s High command were involved as of mid-2011 in the recruitment of Mujahideen to be dispatched to Syria.

“a campaign to enlist thousands of Muslim volunteers in Middle East countries and the Muslim world to fight alongside the Syrian rebels. The Turkish army would house these volunteers, train them and secure their passage into Syria. (DEBKAfile, NATO to give rebels anti-tank weapons, August 14, 2011).

“NATO strategists are thinking more in terms of pouring large quantities of anti-tank and anti-air rockets, mortars and heavy machine guns into the protest centers for beating back the government armored forces.” (DEBKAfile, NATO to give rebels anti-tank weapons, August 14, 2011)

What is not mentioned by the mainstream media is that rebel stronghold in Aleppo province was largely acquired with the support of the US and its allies including Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar through the dispatch of weapons and special forces across the border from of Turkey.

Military sources confirm that Syrian rebels have from mid- 2011 been trained “in the use of the new weapons with Turkish military officers at makeshift installations in Turkish bases near the Syrian border.” (DEBKAfile, Ibid).


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About the author:

Michel Chossudovsky is an award-winning author, Professor of Economics (emeritus) at the University of Ottawa, Founder and Director of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG), Montreal, Editor of Global Research. He has undertaken field research in Latin America, Asia, the Middle East, sub-Saharan Africa and the Pacific and has written extensively on the economies of developing countries with a focus on poverty and social inequality. He has also undertaken research in Health Economics (UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), UNFPA, CIDA, WHO, Government of Venezuela, John Hopkins International Journal of Health Services (1979, 1983) He is the author of 13 books including The Globalization of Poverty and The New World Order (2003), America’s “War on Terrorism” (2005), The Globalization of War, America’s Long War against Humanity (2015). He is a contributor to the Encyclopaedia Britannica. His writings have been published in more than twenty languages. In 2014, he was awarded the Gold Medal for Merit of the Republic of Serbia for his writings on NATO’s war of aggression against Yugoslavia. He can be reached at [email protected]

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