(1)Syria Gas attack was FALSE FLAG - Deutsche Welle (DW), Alex Jones, Robert Parry

(2)Deutsche Welle (DW) alleges Syria Gas attack was FALSE FLAG

(3)Ron Paul: ‘Zero Chance’ Assad behind Syria Chemical Weapons attack

(4)Ex-UK Ambassador To Syria says Chemical Attack wreaks of a 'false flag'operation

(5)Global Research:  UN 2013 Reportconfirmed that US-backed Rebels had Chemical Weapons

(6)Syria Gas a provocation planned and executed by CIA - WSWS Trots

(7)NYT Retreats on 2013 Syria-Sarin Claims - Robert Parry

(8)Another Dangerous Rush to Judgment in Syria - Robert Parry

(9)The Syrian-Sarin ‘False Flag’ Lesson - ex-CIA analyst Ray McGovern

(10)False Flag attack started Syria/US Conflict - Alex Jones (Infowars)

(11)Dilbert creator Scott Adams says gas attack blamed on Syrian gov't is a falseflag

(12)Syria False Flag 'unproven', says Slate.com, forgetting that the onus of proofis on the other side

(13)Former CIA officer Philip Giraldi says missiles hit an al Qaida warehouse whererebels were storing chemicals

(14)Michael Savage Turns on Trump, Says Syrian Gas Attack Was False Flag Operation

(1)Syria Gas attack was FALSE FLAG - Deutsche Welle (DW), Alex Jones Infowars & others, byPeter Myers

Assessments that the Syrian gas attack wasa False Flag event have been made earlier, and by more eminent authorities,than was the case with similar events in the past, including 9/11. A growingsegment of the populace is seeing a familiar pattern of a staged atrocitystampeding us into war.

The highest-level body to make such a claimis Deutsche Welle (DW), which is Germany's public international broadcaster:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutsche_Welle

In the US, Alex Jones, a stalwart of theTrump campaign, has also backed the False Flag assessment. So have many otherswho backed Trump.

Trump seems to think that, with theelection over, he can dispense with their support, provided that he finds favorin Congress and the Mainstream media (largely Jewish-owned). Thus he hasjettisoned Steve Bannon for Jared Kushner.

Trump has caved in to the Deep State,ditched his own foreign policy, and adopted Hillary's instead.

We voted for him to keep us out of wars;now he is the leader of the War Party.

We should dump him. Who cares if theyimpeach him. But, of course, the Deep State won't impeach him, now that he'sjoined them.

(2)Deutsche Welle (DW) alleges Syria Gas attack was FALSE FLAG

http://www.dw.com/en/is-assad-to-blame-for-the-chemical-weapons-attack-in-syria/a-38330217

Is Assad to blame for the chemical weaponsattack in Syria?

Is the regime of President Bashar al-Assadresponsible for the chemical weapons attack in northern Syria? Experts suggestit could have been jihadi rebels. It wouldn't be the first time.

More than 80 people were killed by suspectedchemical weapons in Khan Sheikhoun. That is about the only thing certain aboutthe attack. Western statements place blame at the feet of Syria's PresidentBashar al-Assad, an accusation Damascus and Moscow contest.

The Syrian regime may not have had acompelling motive, believes Günther Meyer, the director of the Research Centerfor the Arab World at the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz. "Onlyarmed opposition groups could profit from an attack with chemicalweapons," he told DW. "With their backs against the wall, they havenext to no chance of opposing the regime militarily. As President [Donald]Trump's recent statements show, such actions make it possible for anti-Assadgroups to receive further support."

Former President Barack Obama famously drewa "red line" in 2012. "We have been very clear to the Assadregime, but also to other players on the ground, that a red line for us is westart seeing a whole bunch of chemical weapons moving around or being utilized.That would change my calculus," he said at the time. Meyer views thestatement as an "invitation for Assad's opponents to use chemical weaponsand make the Assad regime responsible for it."

Rebels' chemical weapons

In 2014, investigative journalist Seymour Hersh reported on oppositionforces' ability to use chemical weapons. In an article for the "LondonReview of Books," Hersh obtained documentsfrom the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), the Pentagon's own spy organization.They suggested that the Nusra Front, a Syrian offshoot of al Qaeda, had accessto the sarin nerve agent. A chemical weapons attack on the Damascus suburb ofGhouta in August 2013, which was blamed on Assad, was carried out by rebels,according to Hersh's article. They wanted Washington to presume Assad had crossedObama's "red line" and draw the US into a war.

There are doubts over whether the suspectedchemical weapons strike in Ghouta came from Assad's forces

The Ghouta attack

Obama's Director of National Intelligence at the time, James Clapper, was ableto dissuade Obama from ordering a cruise missile strike, according to anewly-published book by Mideast expert Michael Lüders. Presumably, a decidingfactor was an analysis of the chemical weapons used in Ghouta, conducted by aBritish military lab, which found the gas to be of a different composition thanthe Syrian army possessed.

The attack took place while UN weaponsinspectors were in the country, on Assad's invitation, said Meyer. Assad hadasked them to investigate a chemical weapons attack from March 2013 outsideAleppo, which killed Syrian soldiers.

"It makes no sense that the regimewould carry out an attack with inspectors in the country," he said.

The USS Mahan would be capable of firingmissiles on Syria from the Mediterranean Sea

Formerweapons inspector Richard Lloyd and MIT professor Theodore Postol cast furtherdoubt on Assad's role in the Ghouta attack. Theyreported in 2014 that the chemical weapons could have only been fired fromrebel-held territory, with a range of up to 2.5 kilometers (1.6 miles).

Chemical weapons as a deterrent

At the time of the Ghouta attack, theSyrian government had access to about 600 tons of material necessary to makesarin and mustard gas. The stockpile was to counterbalance Israel's nucleararsenal, Meyer said. "Israel has an estimated 200 nuclear weapons,"he said. "Chemical weapons are something of a poor man's atomicweapon."

The US reported these chemical stockpileshad been destroyed in 2014, although the state of confusion surrounding such awar zone makes that hard to confirm.

In Idlib, the al Qaeda-linked Nusra Frontmaintains significant influence

Al Qaeda's role

No one can say how the situation hasevolved since the DIA's assessment in 2013 of the Nusra Front's weapons. The alQaeda affiliate is today the most significant rebel group in the northernSyrian province of Idlib, Meyer said. Along with other jihadi extremists, ithas turned itself into the "de facto ruler of Idlib."

Assad has not hesitated to use ruthlessmeans to stay in power. In confronting the most recent use of chemical weaponsin Syria, credible questions remain as to why Assad would bring world opinionagainst him at a time when his continued rule is beginning to be accepted.

(3)Ron Paul: ‘Zero Chance’ Assad behind Syria Chemical Weapons attack

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-04-06/ron-paul-zero-chance-assad-behind-chemical-weapons-attack-syria-likely-false-flag

Ron Paul: ‘Zero Chance’ Assad Behind SyriaChemical Weapons Attack

by Tyler Durden

Apr 6, 2017 7:30 PM

According to former Congressman Ron Paul,the chemical weapons attack in Khan Sheikhoun that killed 30 children and hasled to calls for the Trump administration to intervene in Syria could have beena false flag attack.

As Paul Joseph Watson details, pointing outthat the prospect of peace in Syria was moving closer before the attack, withISIS and Al-Qaeda on the run, Paul said the attack made no sense.

  “Itlooks like maybe somebody didn’t likethat so there had to be an episode,” said Paul, asking, “who benefits?”

  “Itdoesn’t make any sense for Assad under these conditions to all of a sudden usepoison gases – I think there’s zero chance he would have done thisdeliberately,” said Paul.

The former Congressman went on to explainhow the incident was clearly beingexploited by neo-cons and the deep state to enlist support for war.

 “It’s the neo-conservatives who are benefiting tremendously from thisbecause it’s derailed the progress thathas already been made moving toward a more peaceful settlement in Syria,”said Paul.

Many have questioned why Assad would be so strategically stupid as to order a chemicalweapons attack and incite the wrath of the world given that he is closer than ever to winning the war againstISIS and jihadist rebels.

Just five days before the attack, U.S.Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said, “The longer-term status of PresidentAssad will be decided by the Syrian people,” implying a definite shift in U.S.foreign policy away from regime change in Syria.

Why would Assad put such assurances injeopardy by launching a horrific chemical attack, allowing establishment newsoutlets like CNN to once against usechildren as props to push for yet another massive war in the Middle East?

(4)Ex-UK Ambassador To Syria says Chemical Attack wreaks of a 'false flag'operation

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-04-07/ex-uk-ambassador-syria-questions-chemical-attack-it-doesnt-make-sense-assad-not-mad

Ex-UK Ambassador To Syria QuestionsChemical Attack; "It Doesn't Make Sense, Assad Is Not Mad"

by Tyler Durden

Apr 7, 2017 3:58 PM

The formerUK ambassador to Syria, Peter Ford, has joined the chorus of folks implyingthat the chemical attack in Syria wreaksof a 'false flag' operation. Speaking on BBC Radio earlier, Ford said there is "no proof thatthe cause of the explosion was what they said it was" and that it simply wouldn't make sense for Assad tolaunch such an attack as it would be "totally self-defeating."

 "There is no proof that the cause of the explosion was what theysaid it was.  Remember what happened inIraq...I've seen testimony alleged from witnesses who said they saw chemicalbombs dropping from the air.  Well, youcan not see chemical weapons dropping from the air.  Such testimony is worthless."

 "But think about the consequences because this is not likely to bethe end of it. It doesn't make sense that Assad would do it.  Lets not leave our brains outside the doorwhen we examine evidence.  It would betotally self-defeating as shown by the results...Assad is not mad."

As we pointed out yesterday, Ford'scomments seemingly align with the opinion of former Representative Ron Paul whoargued that there was a 0% chance that Assad deliberately launched a chemicalweapons attack on Syrian citizens.

 "Who benefits?”

  “Itdoesn’t make any sense for Assad under these conditions to all of a sudden usepoison gases – I think there’s zero chance he would have done thisdeliberately,” said Paul.

Meanwhile, this CNN anchor was leftspeechless Wednesday during a televised interview when a congressman questionedthe mainstream narrative that Bashar al-Assad attacked his own people withchemical weapons.

 “It’s hard to know exactly what’s happening in Syria right now. I’d liketo know specifically how that release of chemical gas, if it did occur — and it looks like it did — how that occurred,”Representative Thomas Massie told CNN’s Kate Bolduan.

 “Because frankly, I don’t thinkAssad would have done that. It does not serve his interests. It would tendto draw us into that civil war even further.”

  “Idon’t think it would’ve served Assad’s purposes to do a   chemical attack on his people…It’s hard forme to understand why he   would do that —if he did.”

Note that the corporate anchor’s expressionsnaps to attention the instant she realizes Massie is doubting the narrative.

(5)Global Research:  UN 2013 Reportconfirmed that US-backed Rebels had Chemical Weapons

http://www.globalresearch.ca/united-nations-confirmed-that-us-supported-rebels-were-using-chemical-weapons/5583988

Washington’s False Flag: United NationsConfirmed that US Supported Syrian “Rebels” Were Using Chemical Weapons

By Prof Michel Chossudovsky

Global Research, April 08, 2017

Washington is Lying.

Both Trump and Obama have blood on theirhands. The Chemical Weapons Attack is being used as a “False Flag”, a pretextand a justification to wage an illegal war of aggression.

The United Nations in a 2013 reportconfirms that Syrian opposition “rebels” (supported by Washington) “may haveused chemical weapons against [Syrian] government forces.”

The UN report refutes Washington’sallegations that the government of Bashar al Assad was using chemical weaponsagainst his own people.

What the UN mission findings confirm isthat the US sponsored opposition “rebels” largely composed of Al Qaedaaffiliated groups, financed and supported by the Western military alliance wereresponsible for these 2013 chemical weapons attacks.

Moreover, as confirmed in an earlierreport, the Al Qaeda rebels were being trained in the use of chemical weaponsby specialists on contract to the Pentagon.

Washington (which supports the oppositionrebels in the use of chemical weapons) rather than Damascus is responsible forextensive crimes against humanity. [...]

What say you?  Did Trump just have his "weapons of massdestruction" moment?

(6)Syria Gas a provocation planned and executed by CIA - WSWS Trots

http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/04/06/pers-a06.html

Syria’s alleged gas attack: An imperialistprovocation

6 April 2017

The Trump administration publicly respondedto unsubstantiated allegations that forces loyal to the government of PresidentBashar al-Assad bore responsibility for a chemical attack in Syria’snorthwestern Idlib province with the threat of a new escalation of the Americanintervention in the war-ravaged Middle Eastern country.

Speaking alongside one of Washington’sfavorite Arab puppet rulers, Jordan’s King Abdullah II, during a joint newsconference at the White House, Trump declared that the “heinous actions by theAssad regime cannot be tolerated” and had “crossed a lot of lines for me.”While condemning his predecessor, Barack Obama, for failing to carry through ona threat to intervene militarily in Syria over alleged chemical weapons attacksin 2013, Trump declared “I now have the responsibility,” adding that his“attitude toward Syria and Assad has changed very much.”

Washington’s ambassador to the UnitedNations Nikki Haley, meanwhile, issued an even more direct threat of unilateralUS military action in the run-up to an anticipated Russian veto of aprovocative Western-backed resolution that could serve as a fig leaf foraggression against Syria. “When the United Nations consistently fails in itsduty to act collectively, there are times in the life of states that we arecompelled to take our own action,” she said.

Fourteen years after the US invaded Iraq,turning that country and much of the Middle East into a charnel house,Washington is at it again, employing a strikingly similar pretext for imperialistaggression.

Once again, the US and world public isbeing bombarded with unsubstantiatedclaims about “weapons of mass destruction” allegedly employed by anoppressed former colonial country, mixed with crocodile tears and feigned moraloutrage from a government responsible for more civilian deaths and war crimesthan any regime since the fall of the Nazi Third Reich.

The pretext for this orchestrated campaignhas all the earmarks of an imperialist provocation planned and executed by theCentral Intelligence Agency and allied Western secret services with the aim ofshifting US policy in relation to Syria.

First, there is the question of motive. Who benefits from such acrime? Clearly, it is not the Assadregime, which, with the aid of Russia and Iran, has largely vanquished the Islamist “rebels” that were armed, financed andtrained by the CIA and Washington’s regional allies in the bloodysix-year-long war for regime change. The government now rules over 80 percentof the country, including all of its major cities, with the Islamists’ holdreduced to largely rural areas of Idlib province. Under conditions in which theTrump administration had been signaling a shift in focus from toppling Assad tofighting the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), why would Damascus carryout such a provocative attack?

TheCIA-backed “rebels” themselves, however—along with their patrons in the US military and intelligence apparatus—haveevery interest in staging such a provocation as a means of thwarting thegovernment’s consolidation of its rule throughout Syria. Moreover, numerousinvestigations, including by the UN’s own chemical disarmament agency, havemade it clear that these forces, dominated by the Syrian Al Qaeda affiliate,the Al Nusra Front, have carried out similar attacks using both chlorine andsarin gas, which they have received from their regional backers in SaudiArabia, Qatar and Turkey and which they themselves have proven capable ofmanufacturing.

Then there is the issue of timing. The alleged gas attack was launchedTuesday morning, coinciding with the opening in Brussels of a EuropeanUnion-sponsored “Conference on Supporting the Future of Syria and theRegion,” which was to review proposals for “political transition” in Syria aswell as Europe’s intervention in the potentially lucrative reconstruction ofthe ravaged country. The alleged chemical attack set the stage for reneweddemands for regime change and criticism of the Trump administration forsuggesting that the ouster of Assad was no longer a priority.

There is a definite pattern here. The lasttime that Washington and its allies accused the Assad regime of a majorchemical weapons attack and nearly launched a full-scale war on that pretextwas in August 2013. That alleged attack, which subsequent revelations exposedas a “rebel” provocation carried out with the help of Turkish intelligence, waslaunched on the very day that UN weapons inspectors arrived in Damascus.

The most telling aspect of the entireaffair, however, is the extraordinary coordinationof the entire corporate media in the launching of a full-throated campaign formilitary action before the basic facts of the incident were even known,much less a serious investigation conducted. It seemed that even before thealleged incident in Syria was reported, all of the major newspaper editors andcolumnists as well as the television news commentators had received the sametalking points.

None of them, of course, bothered to informtheir readers and viewers that the solesources of the information they retailed as good coin consisted of AlQaeda-connected “activists” in Syria along with US intelligence andmilitary officials pushing for war.

Leading the pack, as usual, was the NewYork Times, which carried the headline “Chemical Attack on Syrians IgnitesWorld’s Outrage.” What evidence there is of such “outrage,” outside of theworld of intelligence agencies, state officials and their media hacks was notclear. Nor, for that matter, was there any explanation for the selectivecharacter of this “outrage.” [...]

A Washington Post editorial insisted: “Nowit is Mr. Trump’s turn to decide whether to stand up to Mr. Assad and hisIranian and Russian sponsors.”

The aim is clear. The murky events in Syria are to be exploited inorder to shift the bitter internal debate on foreign policy within the USruling establishment. The intention is to bring the Trump administrationinto line with the predominant tendency within the US military and intelligenceapparatus which is pushing for an uninterrupted buildup to militaryconfrontation with both Iran and Russia.

That these efforts are having their desiredeffect found concrete expression Wednesday not only in Trump’s remarks onSyria, but also in the removal ofStephen Bannon, Trump’s fascistic chief strategist, from the principalscommittee of the National Security Council. The ouster of the ideologicalarchitect of Trump’s “America first” right-wing nationalist demagogy wasreportedly dictated by Gen. H.R. McMaster, the president’s new national securityadviser, an active duty officer who speaks for the Pentagon. Faced withintractable social and political crises at home, Trump, like his predecessors,appears to be turning toward war abroad.

The working class in both the US andinternationally must take these developments, along with the CIA provocation inSyria and its accompanying media propaganda campaign, as a deadly seriouswarning. It faces the threat of being dragged not only into a renewed bloodbathin the Middle East, but a far more dangerous conflagration involving theworld’s two major nuclear powers.

(7)NYT Retreats on 2013 Syria-Sarin Claims - Robert Parry

https://consortiumnews.com/2017/04/06/nyt-retreats-on-2013-syria-sarin-claims/

NYT Retreats on 2013 Syria-Sarin Claims

April 6, 2017

Exclusive: Even as The New York Times leadsthe charge against the Syrian government for this week’s alleged chemicalattack, it is quietly retreating on its earlier certainty about the 2013Syria-sarin case, reports Robert Parry.

By Robert Parry

The New York Times, which has never heardan allegation against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad that it hasn’timmediately believed, has compiled alist of his alleged atrocities with a surprising omission: the Aug. 21, 2013sarin gas attack outside Damascus.

Why this omission is so surprising is thatthe sarin incident was the moment when the Western media and the Washingtonestablishment piled on President Barack Obama for not enforcing his “red line”by launching military strikes against the Syrian government to retaliate forAssad “gassing his own people.”

The retaliation, which would have pummeledthe Syrian military, was hotly desired by neoconservatives and liberalinterventionists who were obsessed with achieving another Mideast “regimechange” even if that risked turning Syria over to Al Qaeda and/or the IslamicState. The story of Obama’s supposed “red line” retreat has become a treasuredgroupthink of all the “important people” in D.C.

So, for the Times to compile a summary ofalleged Assad atrocities, which included a separate section on “chemicalattacks,” and to leave out the August 2013 case suggests that even The New York Times cannot sustain oneof the most beloved myths of the Syrian war, that Assad was at fault forthe sarin attack.

Previously, the Times backed away from oneof its front-page reports – published about a month after the sarin attack –that used a “vector analysis” to place the site of the sarin missile launch ata Syrian military base about 9 kilometers from the two impact zones. Thatanalysis was considered the slam-dunk proof of Assad’s guilt, but it collapsedwhen it turned out that one of the missiles contained no sarin and the otherrocket, which did have sarin, had a range of only about 2 kilometers, placingthe likely firing location in rebel-controlled territory.

Hersh’s Findings

Investigative journalist Seymour Hershfurther demolished the Assad-sarin myth in an article that traced the chemicalsback to Turkish intelligence, but the mainstream U.S. media was so hostile toany dissenting view on the Assad-did-it groupthink that Hersh had to publishhis findings in the London Review of Books. Later, Turkish police andopposition officials corroborated much of Hersh’s findings – and I’ve been toldthat U.S. intelligence analysts now agree, at least generally, with Hersh’sconclusions.

But theTimes never directly repudiated its earlier accusations against Assad’smilitary, thus allowing the groupthinkto be sustained that Assad was responsible for the 2013 attack. Thathistory became important again on Tuesday when another incident – alsoapparently involving sarin or a similar poison gas – claimed lives in an AlQaeda-dominated area of northern Syria.

The U.S. mainstream media (along withPresident Trump and his top aides) immediately blamed Assad again, with Trumpand his team threatening to launch a retaliatory military strike even withoutthe approval of the United Nations Security Council. The 2013 case loomed largein the background with Trump implicitly referencing Obama’s presumed failure toenforce his “red line.”

Prominent U.S. news personalities, such asMSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell, also have cited the old Assad-was-guilty-in-2013conventional wisdom to buttress their new rush to judgment over the Tuesdayincident. Indeed, the 2013 sarin case has become a perfect example of how themajor U.S. media often jumps to conclusions and then refuses to back downregardless of the ensuing evidence.

But now we have the Times’ list of alleged Assad atrocities, compiled by Russell Goldman,a senior staff editor on the International Desk, that doesn’t allege thatAssad or his forces were responsible for the 2013 sarin attack.

Goldman reports: “In the latest attack oncivilians, more than 100 people, including children, were believed to have beenkilled by chemical weapons in a rebel-held town in Idlib Province on Tuesday. Adoctor there said the victims’ pupils were reduced to pinhole-size dots, acharacteristic of nerve agents and other banned toxic substances.

“The United States put the blame for theattack on the Syrian government and its patrons, Russia and Iran, and suggestedthat the salvo was a war crime. While the attack was among the deadliest usesof chemical weapons in Syria in years, it was far from an isolated case.

“During the war, the Assad government hasbeen accused of regularly using chlorine gas, which is less deadly than theagent used on Tuesday and is legal in its commercial form. According to theViolations Documentation Center, an antigovernment watchdog, more than 1,100Syrians have been killed in chemical weapons and gas attacks.”

The reference to the anti-Assad group’sclaim about the 1,100 Syrians allegedly killed by chemical weapons wouldpresumably include the 2013 sarin incident, although local medical personnelput the death toll much lower, at perhaps several hundred. But note how the Times used a passive tense indescribing those deaths – “more than 1,100 Syrians have been killed” – without attribution of who did the killing.

And nothing specific at all about the 2013sarin case and who was responsible.

The Chlorine Cases

The chlorine-gas cases have resulted inonly a few fatalities, which also undercuts the claims that the Assadgovernment was responsible for them. Why would Assad risk more outside militaryintervention against his government by using a chemical weapon that has almostno military value, at least as allegedly deployed in Syria?

The controversial map developed by HumanRights Watch and embraced by the New York Times, supposedly showing the flightpaths of two missiles from the Aug. 21, 2013 Sarin attack intersecting at aSyrian military base.

U.N. investigators – under intense pressurefrom the West to find something that could be pinned on Assad – agreed to blamehim for a couple of the chlorine allegations coming from rebel forces and theircivilian allies. But the U.N. team did not inspect the sites directly, relying instead of the testimony of Assad’senemies.

In one of the chlorine cases, however, Syrian eyewitnesses came forward to testifythat the rebels had staged the alleged attack so it could be blamed on thegovernment. In that incident, the U.N. team reached no conclusion as to whathad really happened, but neither did the investigators – now alerted to therebels’ tactic of staging chemical attacks – apply any additional skepticism tothe other cases.

In one case, the rebels and theirsupporters also claimed to know that an alleged “barrel bomb” contained acanister of chlorine because of the sound that it made while descending. Therewas no explanation for how that sort of detection was even possible.

Yet, despite the flaws in the rebels’chlorine claims – and the collapse of the 2013 sarin case – the Times and othermainstream U.S. news outlets report the chlorine allegations as flat-fact,without reference to sourcing from the U.N. investigators whose careers largelydepended on them coming up with conclusions that pleased the majority of thefive-member Security Council – the U.S., Great Britain and France.

If this fuller history were understood,much greater skepticism would be warranted by the new allegations about Assadordering a new sarin attack. While it’s conceivable that Assad’s military isguilty – although why Assad would take this risk at this moment is hard tofathom – it’s also conceivable that Al Qaeda’s jihadists – finding themselvesfacing impending defeat – chose to stage a sarin attack even if that meantkilling some innocent civilians.

Al Qaeda’s goal would be to draw in theU.S. or Israeli military against the Syrian government, creating space for ajihadist counteroffensive. And, as we should all recall, it’s not as if AlQaeda hasn’t killed many innocent civilians before.

[For more on the mysterious 2013 sarincase, see a memo from U.S. intelligence veterans, “A Call for Proof onSyrian-Sarin Attack.”]

(8)Another Dangerous Rush to Judgment in Syria - Robert Parry

https://consortiumnews.com/2017/04/05/another-dangerous-rush-to-judgment-in-syria/

Another Dangerous Rush to Judgment in Syria

April 5, 2017

Exclusive: The U.S. government and themainstream media rushed to judgment again, blaming the Syrian government for anew poison-gas attack and ignoring other possibilities, reports Robert Parry.

By Robert Parry

With the latest hasty judgment aboutTuesday’s poison-gas deaths in a rebel-held area of northern Syria, themainstream U.S. news media once more reveals itself to be a threat toresponsible journalism and to the future of humanity. Again, we see thetroubling pattern of verdict first, investigation later, even when thatbehavior can lead to a dangerous war escalation and many more deaths.

Before a careful evaluation of the evidenceabout Tuesday’s tragedy was possible, The New York Times and other major U.S.news outlets had pinned the blame for the scores of dead on the Syriangovernment of Bashar al-Assad. That revived demands that the U.S. and othernations establish a “no-fly zone” over Syria, which would amount to launchinganother “regime change” war and would put America into a likely hot war withnuclear-armed Russia.

Even as basic facts were still beingassembled about Tuesday’s incident, we,the public, were prepped to disbelieve the Syrian government’s response thatthe poison gas may have come from rebel stockpiles that could have been released either accidentally orintentionally causing the civilian deaths in a town in Idlib Province.

One possible scenario was that Syrianwarplanes bombed a rebel weapons depot where the poison gas was stored, causingthe containers to rupture. Another possibility was a staged event byincreasingly desperate Al Qaeda jihadists who are known for their disregard forinnocent human life.

While it’s hard to know at this early stagewhat’s true and what’s not, thesealternative explanations, I’m told, are being seriously examined by U.S.intelligence. One source cited the possibility that Turkey had supplied the rebels with the poison gas (the exact typestill not determined) for potential use against Kurdish forces operating innorthern Syria near the Turkish border or for a terror attack in agovernment-controlled city like the capital of Damascus.

Reporting by investigative journalistSeymour Hersh and statements by some Turkish police and opposition politicianslinked Turkish intelligence and Al Qaeda-affiliated jihadists to the Aug. 21,2013 sarin gas attack outside Damascus that killed hundreds, although the Timesand other major U.S. news outlets continue to blame that incident on Assad’sregime.

Seasoned Propagandists

On Tuesday, the Times assigned two of itsmost committed anti-Syrian-governmentpropagandists to cover the Syrian poison-gas story, Michael B. Gordon andAnne Barnard.

The controversial map developed by HumanRights Watch and embraced by the New York Times, supposedly showing the flightpaths of two missiles from the Aug. 21 Sarin attack intersecting at a Syrianmilitary base.

Gordon has been at the front lines of the neocon “regime change” strategies foryears. He co-authored the Times’ infamous aluminum tube story of Sept. 8, 2002,which relied on U.S. government sources and Iraqi defectors to frightenAmericans with images of “mushroom clouds” if they didn’t support PresidentGeorge W. Bush’s upcoming invasion of Iraq. The timing played perfectly intothe administration’s advertising “rollout” for the Iraq War.

Of course, the story turned out to be false and to have unfairly downplayedskeptics of the claim that the aluminum tubes were for nuclear centrifuges,when the aluminum tubes actually were meant for artillery. But the articleprovided a great impetus toward the Iraq War, which ended up killing nearly4,500 U.S. soldiers and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis.

Gordon’s co-author, Judith Miller, became the only U.S. journalist known to have lost a jobover the reckless and shoddy reporting that contributed to the Iraqdisaster. For his part, Gordon continued serving as a respected Pentagoncorrespondent.

Gordon’s name also showed up in asupporting role on the Times’ botched “vector analysis,” which supposedly provedthat the Syrian military was responsible for the Aug. 21, 2013 sarin-gasattack. The “vector analysis” story of Sept. 17, 2013, traced the flight pathsof two rockets, recovered in suburbs of Damascus back to a Syrian military base9.5 kilometers away.

The article became the “slam-dunk” evidencethat the Syrian government was lying when it denied launching the sarin attack.However, like the aluminum tube story, the Times’ ”vector analysis” ignoredcontrary evidence, such as the unreliability of one azimuth from a rocket thatlanded in Moadamiya because it had struck a building in its descent. Thatrocket also was found to contain no sarin, so it’s inclusion in the vectoringof two sarin-laden rockets made no sense.

But the Times’ story ultimately fell apartwhen rocket scientists analyzed the onesarin-laden rocket that had landed in the Zamalka area and determined that ithad a maximum range of about two kilometers, meaning that it could not haveoriginated from the Syrian military base. C.J. Chivers, one of the co-authorsof the article, waited until Dec. 28, 2013, to publish a halfheartedsemi-retraction. [See Consortiumnews.com’s “NYT Backs Off Its Syria-SarinAnalysis.”]

Gordon was a co-author of another bogusTimes’ front-page story on April 21, 2014, when the State Department and theUkrainian government fed the Times two photographs that supposedly proved thata group of Russian soldiers – firstphotographed in Russia – had entered Ukraine, where they were photographedagain.

However, two days later, Gordon was forcedto pen a retraction because it turnedout that both photos had been shot inside Ukraine, destroying the story’spremise. [See Consortiumnews.com’s “NYT Retracts Russian-Photo Scoop.”]

Gordon perhaps personifies better thananyone how mainstream journalism works. Ifyou publish false stories that fit with the Establishment’s narratives, yourjob is safe even if the stories blow up in your face. However, if you goagainst the grain – and if someone important raises a question about your story– you can easily find yourself out on the street even if your story is correct.[...]

The Times, however, apparently has no concern anymore for lettingthe facts be assembled and then letting them speak for themselves. The Timesweighed in on Wednesday with an editorial entitled “A New Level of DepravityFrom Mr. Assad.”

Another problem with the behavior of theTimes and the mainstream media is that by jumping to a conclusion they pressureother important people to join in the condemnations and that, in turn, canprejudice the investigation while also generating a dangerous momentum towardwar.

Once the political leadership pronouncesjudgment, it becomes career-threateningfor lower-level officials to disagree with those conclusions. We’ve seenthat already with how United Nations investigators accepted rebel claims aboutthe Syrian government’s use of chlorine gas, a set of accusations that theTimes and other media now report simply as flat-fact.

Yet, the claims about the Syrian militarymixing in canisters of chlorine in supposed “barrel bombs” make little sensebecause chlorine deployed in that fashion is ineffective as a lethal weapon butit has become an important element of the rebels’ propaganda campaign.

U.N. investigators, who were under intensepressure from the United States and Western nations to give them something touse against Assad, did support rebel claims about the government using chlorinein a couple of cases, but the investigators also received testimony fromresidents in one area who described the staging of a chlorine attack forpropaganda purposes.

One might have thought that the evidence ofone staged attack would have increased skepticism about the other incidents,but the U.N. investigators apparently understood what was good for theircareers, so they endorsed a couple of other alleged cases despite theirinability to conduct a field investigation. [See Consortiumnews.com’s “UN TeamHeard Claims of Staged Chemical Attacks.”]

Now, that dubious U.N. report is being leveragedinto this new incident, one opportunistic finding used to justify another. Butthe pressing question now is: Have the American people come to understandenough about “psychological operations” and “strategic communications” thatthey will finally show the skepticism that no longer exists in the major U.S.news media?

Investigative reporter Robert Parry brokemany of the Iran-Contra stories for The Associated Press and Newsweek in the1980s. You can buy his latest book, America’s Stolen Narrative, either in printhere or as an e-book (from Amazon and barnesandnoble.com).

(9)The Syrian-Sarin ‘False Flag’ Lesson - ex-CIA analyst Ray McGovern

https://consortiumnews.com/2016/12/11/the-syrian-sarin-false-flag-lesson/

The Syrian-Sarin ‘False Flag’ Lesson

December 11, 2016

Exclusive: Amid Official Washington’sdesire to censor non-official news on the Internet, it’s worth remembering howthe lack of mainstream skepticism almost led the U.S. into a war on Syria, saysex-CIA analyst Ray McGovern.

By Ray McGovern

A review of events leading to the very edgeof full-blown U.S. shock-and-awe on Syria three years ago provides a case studywith important lessons for new policymakers as they begin to arrive inWashington.

It is high time to expose the whys andwherefores of the almost-successful attemptto mousetrap President Barack Obama into an open attack on Syria threeyears ago. Little-known and still less appreciated is the last-minuteintervention of Russian President

Accumulating evidence offers persuasiveproof that Syrian rebels supported byTurkish intelligence – not Syrian Army troops – bear responsibility for the infamous sarin nerve-gas attackkilling hundreds of people on Aug. 21, 2013 in Ghouta, a suburb of Damascus.The incident bears all the earmarks of a false-flag attack.

But U.S. and other “rebel-friendly” mediaoutlets wasted no time in offering “compelling” evidence from “social media” –which Secretary of State John Kerry described as an “extraordinary tool” – toplace the onus on the Syrian government.

However, as the war juggernaut startedrolling toward war, enter Putin from stage right with an offer difficult forObama to refuse – guaranteed destructionof Syria’s chemical weapons on a U.S. ship outfitted for such purpose. Thischeated Washington’s neocon mousetrap-setters out of their war on Syria. Theywould get back at Putin six months laterby orchestrating an anti-Russian coup in Kiev.

But the play-by-play in U.S.-Russianrelations in summer 2013 arguably surpasses in importance even the avoidance ofan overt U.S. assault on Syria. Thus, it is important to appreciate the lessonsdrawn by Russian leaders from the entire experience.

Putting Cheese in the Mousetrap

So, let us recall that on Dec. 10, 2015,just over one year ago, Turkish Memberof Parliament Eren Erdem testified about how Turkey’s intelligence servicehelped deliver sarin precursors to rebels in Syria.

The Official Story blaming Syrian PresidentBashar al-Assad was already collapsing – largely discredited by reports inindependent media and by investigative journalist Seymour Hersh – though itremained widely accepted in the U.S. mainstream media which repeatedly citedthe case as the moment when Assad crossed Obama’s “red line” against usingchemical weapons and Obama had failed to back up his threat.

But Erdem took the debunking of the“official” tale to a public and official level. Based on government documents from a Turkish court, which he waved before his MPcolleagues, Erdem poured ice water on the West’s long-running excitedbelief that Assad had “gassed his own people.”

But, alas, if you do not understandTurkish, or if you missed this story inthe Belfast Telegraph of Dec. 14 or if you don’t read some independent Websites or if you believe that RT publishes only Russian “propaganda,” thisdevelopment may still come as a huge surprise, for Erdem’s revelations appeared in no other English-language newspaper.

So, those malnourished by “mainstreammedia” may be clueless about the scary reality that Obama came within inches ofletting himself be mousetrapped into ordering U.S. armed forces to mount ashock-and-awe-type attack on Syria in late summer 2013.

Turkish MP Testimony

Addressing fellow members of the TurkishParliament, Turkish MP Erdem from the opposition Republican People’s Partydirectly confronted his government on this key issue. Waving a copy of“Criminal Case Number 2013/120,” Erdem described official Turkish reports andelectronic evidence documenting a smuggling operation with Turkish governmentcomplicity.

In an interview with RT four days later,Erdem said Turkish authorities had evidence of sarin gas-related shipments toanti-government rebels in Syria, and did nothing to stop them.

The General Prosecutor in the Turkish cityof Adana opened a criminal case and an indictment stated “chemical weaponscomponents” from Europe “were to be seamlessly shipped via a designated routethrough Turkey to militant labs in Syria.”

Erdem cited evidence implicating theTurkish Minister of Justice and the Turkish Mechanical and Chemical IndustryCorporation in the smuggling of sarin. Small wonder that Turkish PresidentRecep Tayyip Erdogan immediately accused Erdem of “treason.”

Erdem testified that the 13 suspects, whohad been arrested in police raids on the plotters, were released just a weekafter they were indicted. The case was shut down abruptly by higher authority.

Erdem told RT that the sarin attack atGhouta took place shortly after the criminal case was closed and that theattack probably was carried out by jihadists with sarin gas smuggled throughTurkey.

Erdem’s disclosures were not entirely new.More than two years before Erdem’s brave actions, in a Memorandum for the President by the Veteran Intelligence Professionalsfor Sanity of Sept. 6, 2013, we had reported that coordination meetings had taken place just weeks before the sarinattack at a Turkish military garrison in Antakya, some 15 miles from theborder with Syria.

In Antakya, senior Turkish, Qatari and U.S. intelligence officials were said to becoordinating plans with Western-sponsored rebels who were told to expect animminent escalation in the fighting due to “a war-changing development.” This,in turn, would lead to a U.S.-ledbombing of Syria, and rebel commanders were ordered to prepare their forces quickly to exploit the bombing, march intoDamascus, and remove the Assad government.

A year earlier, The New York Times reportedthat the Antakya area had become a “magnet for foreign jihadis, who areflocking into Turkey to fight holy war in Syria.” The Times quoted a Syrianopposition member based in Antakya, saying the Turkish police were patrollingthis border area “with their eyes closed.”

Kerry Dancing

It is a safe bet that Secretary of StateJohn Kerry’s aides briefed him in timely fashion on Erdem’s revelations. Thismay account for why, on a visit to Moscow on Dec. 15, 2015 (four days afterErdem’s testimony), Kerry chose to repeat the meme that Assad “gassed hispeople; I mean, gas hasn’t been used in warfare formally for years and gas isoutlawed, but Assad used it.”

Three days later, The Washington Postdutifully echoed Kerry, charging that Assad had killed “his own people withchemical weapons.” And this charge remains a staple in U.S. corporate media,where Erdem’s testimony is still nowhere to be found.

Kerry also didn’t want to admit that he hadgrossly misled the American people on an issue of war and peace. Just daysafter the Aug. 21, 2013 sarin attack at Ghouta, Kerry and his neocon alliesdisplayed their acumen in following George W. Bush’s dictum: “You got to keeprepeating things over and over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kindof catapult the propaganda.”

On Aug. 30, Kerry solemnly claimed, nofewer than 35 times, “We know” the Assad government was responsible for thesarin deaths, finally giving Kerry and the neocons their casus belli.

But on Aug. 31, with U.S. intelligence analysts expressing their own doubts thatAssad’s forces were responsible, Obama put the brakes on the juggernaut towardwar, saying he would first seek approval from Congress. Kerry, undaunted, wasted no time inlobbying Congress for war.

On Sept. 1, Kerry told ABC’s GeorgeStephanopoulos that briefings in Congress had already begun and that “we arenot going to lose this vote.” On Sept. 3, Kerry was back at it with a bravuraperformance before the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee, whose leaders showedin their own remarks the degree to which they were lusting for an attack onSyria.

The following offers a taste for Kerry’s“protest-too-much” testimony: “the Assad regime, and only, undeniably, theAssad regime, unleashed an outrageous chemical attack against its own citizens.… In their lust to hold on to power, [they] were willing to infect the air ofDamascus with a poison that killed innocent mothers and fathers and hundreds oftheir children, their lives all snuffed out by gas in the early morning ofAugust 21st.

“Now, some people here and there,amazingly, have questioned the evidence of this assault on conscience. I repeathere again today that only the most willful desire to avoid reality can assertthat this did not occur as described or that the regime did not do it. It didhappen, and the Assad regime did it.

“Within minutes of the attack, the socialmedia exploded with horrific images of men and women, the elderly, and childrensprawled on a hospital floor with no wounds, no blood, but all dead. Thosescenes of human chaos and desperation were not contrived. They were real. Noone could contrive such a scene. …

“And as we debate, the world wonders, notwhether Assad’s regime executed the worst chemical weapons attack of the 21stcentury — that fact I think is now beyond question — the world wonders whetherthe United States of America will consent through silence to standing asidewhile this kind of brutality is allowed to happen without consequence.”

Kerry’s added a credulity-stretchingattempt to play down the role and effectiveness of Al Qaeda in Syria, andexaggerated the strength of the “moderate” rebels there. This drew unusuallyprompt and personal criticism from Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Putin: “Kerry Lies”

Rarely does it happen that a president of amajor country calls the head diplomat of a rival state a “liar,” but that isthe label Russian President Putin chose for Kerry on the day after hiscongressional testimony. Referring to Kerry during a televised meeting of theRussian Presidential Human Rights Council on Sept. 4, Putin addressed the sarinissue in these words:

Secretary of State John Kerry (center)testifies on the Syrian crisis before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee onSept. 3, 2013. At the left of the photo is Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of theJoint Chiefs of Staff. and on the right is Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel. No seniorU.S. intelligence official joined in the testimony. (U.S. State Departmentphoto)

“It is simply absurd to imagine that Assadused chemical weapons, given that he is gaining ground. After all, this is aweapon of last resort.” Putin claimed, correctly, that Assad had “encircled hisadversaries in some places and was finishing them off.”

Putin continued: “I watched thecongressional debates. A congressman asked Mr. Kerry, ‘Is Al Qaeda presentthere? I’ve heard they have gained momentum.’ He replied, ‘No. I can tell youearnestly, they are not.’”

Putin continued, “The main combat unit, theso-called Al-Nusra, is an Al-Qaeda subdivision. They [the Americans] know aboutthis. This was very unpleasant and surprising for me. After all … we talk withthem, and we assume they are decent people. But he is lying, and he knows he islying. That is sad. …

“We are currently focused on the fact thatthe U.S. Congress and Senate are discussing authorization for use of force. …As you know, Syria is not attacking the U.S., so there is no question ofself-defense; and anything else, lacking U.N. authorization, is an act ofaggression. … we are all glued to our televisions, waiting to see if they willget the approval of Congress.”

On the following day, Sept. 5, Obama arrivedin St. Petersburg for a G-20 summit, with ample reason to suspect that Putinwas right about Kerry lying about the sarin attack – the President having beenwarned the previous week by National Intelligence Director James Clapper thatthere was no “slam-dunk” evidence against the Assad regime. So, Obama agreed toPutin’s offer to get Syria to surrender its chemical weapons for destruction,and the war fever began to abate.

Curiously, Kerry himself was kept in thedark about the Putin-Obama agreement and was still making the case for war onSept. 9. At the very end of a press conference that day in London, Kerry wasasked whether there was anything Assad could do to prevent a U.S. attack. Kerryanswered that Assad could give up every one of his chemical weapons, but “heisn’t about to do that; it can’t be done.”

Still later on Sept. 9, Russian ForeignMinister Sergei Lavrov and his Syrian counterpart announced that Syria hadagreed to allow all its chemical weapons to be removed and destroyed. As soon asKerry arrived back in Washington, he was sent off to Geneva to sign the dealthat Obama had cut directly with Putin. (All Syria’s chemical weapons have nowbeen destroyed.)

Yet, two weeks later, Obama was stillreading from the neocon teleprompter. In his formal address to the UN GeneralAssembly on Sept. 24, 2013, he declared, “It’s an insult to human reason and tothe legitimacy of this institution to suggest that anyone other than the[Syrian] regime carried out this [sarin] attack.”

More Candor With Goldberg

Earlier this year, though, Obama wasbragging to his informal biographer, Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic, abouthaving thwarted planning for open war on Syria, even though that requireddisregarding the advice of virtually all his foreign-policy advisers.

One gem fished out by Goldberg was Obama’sadmission that DNI Clapper had warnedhim in late August (a week before he went to St. Petersburg and a monthbefore his U.N. speech) that the evidence pinning blame on Damascus for thesarin attack was hardly airtight.

Goldberg wrote that Clapper interrupted thePresident’s morning intelligence briefing “to make clear that the intelligenceon Syria’s use of sarin gas, while robust, was not a ‘slam dunk.’” Clapperchose his words carefully, echoing the language that CIA Director George Tenetused to falsely assure President George W. Bush that the case could be made toconvince the American people that Iraq was hiding WMDs.

Even though Obama continued to dissembleand the mainstream U.S. news media has continued to treat Syria’s “guilt” inthe sarin attack as “flat fact,” the neocons did not get their war on Syria. Idescribe an unusually up-front-and-personal experience of their chagrin underthe subtitle “Morose at CNN” in “How War on Syria Lost Its Way.”

Nor did neocon disappointment subside insubsequent years. Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tennessee, Chair of the Foreign RelationsCommittee, has remained among the most outspoken critics of Obama’s decision tocancel the attack on Syria in 2013.

On Dec. 3, 2014, Corker complained that,while the U.S. military was poised to launch a “very targeted, very brief”operation against the Syrian government for using chemical weapons, Obamacalled off the attack at the last minute.

Corker’s criticism was scathing: “I thinkthe worst moment in U.S. foreign policy since I’ve been here, as far assignaling to the world where we were as a nation, was August a year ago when wehad a 10-hour operation that was getting ready to take place in Syria but itdidn’t happen. … In essence and – I’m sorry to be slightly rhetorical — wejumped in Putin’s lap.”

Ray McGovern works with Tell the Word, apublishing arm of the ecumenical Church of the Savior in inner-city Washington.A CIA analyst for 27 years, he has experience recognizing false-flag attackswhen he sees them. Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, which heco-founded, has published several memoranda on the sarin attack.

(10)False Flag attack started Syria/US Conflict -Alex Jones (Infowars)

https://www.infowars.com/false-flag-attack-started-syriaus-conflict-alex-jones-reports/

False Flag Attack Started Syria/USConflict: Alex Jones Reports

Will fate of humanity be decided in thenext few weeks?

Alex Jones | Infowars.com - April 7, 2017

The false flag attack is maneuvering us toWW3, much to the globalists’ delight:

For more intel, please watch the followingtwo videos [...]

(11)Dilbert creator Scott Adams says gas attack blamed on Syrian gov't is a falseflag

https://www.infowars.com/scott-adams-syria-gas-attack-a-false-flag/

Scott Adams: Syria Gas Attack a False Flag

I’m going to call bullshit on the gasattack, he says

Kit Daniels | Infowars.com - April 6, 2017

The recent gas attack blamed on the Syriangovernment is a false flag, says Dilbert creator Scott Adams.

“I’m going to call bullshit on the gasattack. It’s too ‘on-the-nose,’ as Hollywood script-writers sometimes say,meaning a little too perfect to be natural,” he said. “This has the look of amanufactured event.”

“My guess is that President Trump knowsthis smells fishy, but he has to talk tough anyway.”

Adams pointed out that Syrian PresidentAssad, who’s finally regaining territory from ISIS after six years ofbloodshed, has absolutely nothing to gain from launching a gas attack which hispolitical enemies in Saudi Arabia and the West could use to justify hisoverthrow and execution.

“Assad – who has been fighting for his lifefor several years, and is only lately feeling safer – suddenly decided tocommit suicide-by-Trump,” he added. “Because the best way to make that happenis to commit a war crime against your own people in exactly the way that wouldforce President Trump to respond or else suffer humiliation at the hands of themainstream media.”

“And how about those pictures coming inabout the tragedy. Lots of visual imagery. Dead babies.”

Adams also said the “attack” was suspiciously similar to the fake WMD stories coming outof Iraq before Bush’s 2003 invasion, and the gas attack itself, whichoccurred in a war-zone with little to no press, was too well-documented withvideo and photos.

“So how does a Master Persuader [Trump]respond to a fake war crime? He does it with a fake response, if he’s smart,”he concluded. “The longer he drags things out, the less power the story willhave on the public… we’ll be wondering for weeks when those bombs will starthitting Damascus, and Trump will continue to remind us that he doesn’t talkabout military options.”

Former congressman Ron Paul drew a similarconclusion.

“It looks like maybe somebody didn’t likethat so there had to be an episode,” said Paul, asking, “who benefits?”

“It doesn’t make any sense for Assad underthese conditions to all of a sudden use poison gases – I think there’s zerochance he would have done this deliberately.”

His son, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), remindedPresident Trump he was against military action in Syria in 2013 when Obamademanded the overthrow of Assad.

At the time, Trump wrote “what will we getfor bombing Syria besides more debt and a possible long term conflict? Obamaneeds Congressional approval.”

Sen. Paul dug up that tweet, commenting“this remains true today as it was in 2013. Both parts.”

As Infowars reported on Wednesday, theWhite Helmets, a al-Qaeda affiliated group funded by George Soros and theBritish government, reportedly staged the sarin attack on civilians in theSyrian city of Khan Shaykhun to lay blame on the Syrian government.

“Unsurprisingly, the mainstream media andneo-con politicians have been quick to regurgitate the al-Qaeda-linked rebelsversion of the events before any investigation takes place,” reported MimiAl-Laham.

(12)Syria False Flag 'unproven', says Slate.com, forgetting that the onus of proofis on the other side

http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2017/04/07/conservative_media_suggested_that_trump_fell_prey_to_a_false_flag_in_syria.html

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2017/apr/07/unproven-online-theories-doubting-syrian-gas-attac/

Conspiracy claims that Syrian gas attackwas 'false flag' are unproven

By Joshua Gillin on Friday, April 7th, 2017at 3:31 p.m.

In the hours between this week’s chemicalweapons attack in Syria and President Donald Trump’s retaliatory missilestrike, conspiracy theorists workedto discredit the civilian deaths. They called it a "false flag"operation designed to trigger American involvement in the country’s civil war.

Bloggers, political leaders and evenDilbert cartoonist Scott Adams all questioned the reason behind the toxic gasattack on April 4 in Khan Sheikhoun, a rebel-controlled area in northwesternSyria.

The attack reportedly killed at least 86people, and came less than a week after U.S. Ambassador to the United NationsNikki Haley said that removing Syrian President Bashar al-Assad was no longer a"focus" of diplomatic policy.

On the evening of April 6, Trump orderedtwo Navy warships to fire 59 Tomahawk missiles at a Syrian airfield toretaliate against the attack, killing at least six.

So, was the chemical attack a hoaxorchestrated to draw the United States into Syria’s civil war?

Wefound no credible evidence of it. While doubtershave raised eyebrows, asked questions and offered theories, there’s little inthe way of proof that their claims are anything more than speculation.

Here are the charges some are alleging.

The rebel conspiracy

Chief among the skeptics was Alex Jones’InfoWars website, which questioned the validity of the attack in an April 5post that blamed a group called the White Helmets for arranging the attack fornefarious reasons.

The WhiteHelmets, officially known as Syria Civil Defence, is a group of ostensiblynonpartisan volunteers who aid civilian victims of the civil war. The group hasbeen accused of being pro-rebel, and InfoWars contends they are an al-Qaida affiliate funded by GeorgeSoros and the British government.

The website’s story says the White Helmets have staged rescue videos aspropaganda, and helped spread a false narrative of the gas attack. The sitelinked to a 2016 video in which rescue workers were conducting a"mannequin challenge" during a staged recovery scene, a failed PRstunt for which the group later apologized.

The BBC reported that the pro-oppositionEdlib Media Center said the WhiteHelmets may have been targeted by Syrian warplanes in the attack.

InfoWars and other sources also questionedreports by Dr. Shajul Islam, a British doctor and aid worker in Syria whodocumented the aftermath of the attack.

Websites pointed out Islam had been accusedof kidnapping journalists in 2012 (the case was dismissed) and questioned hissource of funding and equipment.

These same sites further wondered whyrescue workers in gas attack videos weren’t using what they deemed properprocedures, that they treated victims without wearing protective clothingthemselves and how they had time to take video and photographs of theaftermath.

They also wondered why Islam and the WhiteHelmets received gas masks prior to the attack.

The New York Times did report that severalaid workers were sickened from exposure, and the World Health Organizationissued a statement corroborating some accounts of the attack’s results.

On April 6, after Trump ordered the missileattack, InfoWars editor-at-large Paul Joseph Watson criticized the president[...]

The false flag theory also was championedby far-right blogger Mike Cernovich, a Trump supporter who worried that the gasattack was coordinated to provoke a military response from Trump — which itdid.

Cernovich put in hours online to convincereaders the gas attack was a hoax "sponsored by deep state." Deepstate is the alt-right belief in a network of government officials thatsecretly runs things, and in America is currently trying to bring down theTrump presidency. Cernovich alleged that the media, to which he referred as"the fake news media," is in cahoots with deep state to start WorldWar III.

Cernovich stayed online for a multi-hourlivestream starting April 6, questioning whether U.S. Sen. John McCain,R-Ariz., had armed ISIS with gas and saying the attack had been planned by theUnited States since 2013 to escalate intervention.

He also began using the hashtag #SyriaHoax, which caught on across Twitter.

On April 6, allegations started to fly that#SyriaHoax was actually started by Russian bots before Cernovich began usingit.

White nationalist and AltRight.com bloggerRichard Spencer agreed with Cernovich that the far right did not want war inSyria, tweeting on April 6 that the alt-rightwants "good relations with Bashar al-Assad, and we urge Trump to haltthe rush to war." [...]

(13)Former CIA officer Philip Giraldi says missiles hit an al Qaida warehouse whererebels were storing chemicals

http://www.unz.com/mwhitney/the-impending-clash-between-the-u-s-and-russia/

The Impending Clash Between the U.S. andRussia

Mike Whitney

April 7, 2017

President Donald Trump’s missile attack onthe Shayrat Airfield in Western Syria was a poorly planned display of imperialmuscle-flexing that had the exact opposite effect of what was intended. Whilethe attack undoubtedly lifted the morale of the jihadists who have beenrampaging across the country for the last six years, it had no military orstrategic value at all. The damage to the airfield was very slight and there isno reason to believe it will impact the Syrian Army’s progress on the ground.

The attack did however kill four Syrianservicemen which means the US troops in Syria can no longer be considered partof an international coalition fighting terrorism. The US is now a hostile forcethat represents an existential threat to the sovereign government. [...]

I don’t know who is responsible for thechemical attack at Khan Shaikhoun, but there is an interesting interview onThursday’s Scott Horton show that suggests that things may not be what theyseem. In a 14 minute interview, formerCIA officer and Director of the Council for the National Interest, PhilipGiraldi, explains what’s happening behind the scenes in the Middle Eastwhere “military and intelligence personnel,” “intimately familiar” with theintelligence, say that the narrativethat Assad or Russia did it is a “sham.”

I have transcribed a 5 minute segment ofthe interview here– not because it provides conclusive evidence one way or theother— but because curious readers will find it intriguing. (Any mistakes inthe transcript are mine.)

 Philip Giraldi– I am hearing from sources on the ground, in the MiddleEast, the people who are intimately familiar with the intelligence availableare saying that the essential narrativewe are all hearing about the Syrian government or the Russians using chemicalweapons on innocent civilians is a sham. The intelligence confirms prettymuch the account the Russians have been giving since last night which is thatthey hit a warehouse where al Qaidarebels were storing chemicals of their own and it basically caused anexplosion that resulted in the casualties. Apparently the intelligence on thisis very clear, and people both in the Agency and in the military who are awareof the intelligence are freaking out about this because essentially Trumpcompletely misrepresented what he should already have known — but maybedidn’t–and they’re afraid this is moving towards a situation that could easilyturn into an armed conflict.

 Scott Horton– Tell me everything you can about your sources or how youare learning about this?

 Philip Giraldi– Okay. These are essentially sources that are right ontop of the issue right in the Middle East. They’re people who are stationedthere with the military and the Intelligence agencies that are aware and haveseen the intelligence And, as I say, they are coming back to contacts over herein the US essentially that they astonished at how this is being played by theadministration and by the media and in some cases people are considering goingpublic to stop it. They’re that concerned about it, that upset by what’s goingon.

 Scott Horton– So current CIA officers are thinking about going publicright now?

 Philip Giraldi– They are, because they’re that concerned about the waythis thing is moving. They are military and intelligence personnel who arestationed in the Middle East and are active duty and they are seeing theintelligence the US government has in its hands about what happened in Syria,and the intelligence indicates that it was not an attack by the Syriangovernment using chemical weapons… There was an attack but it was withconventional weapons–a bomb– and the bomb ignited the chemicals that werealready in place that had been put in there by the terrorist group affiliatedwith al Qaida.

 Scott Horton– You say this thing is moving really fast. How fast is thisthing moving?

 Philip Giraldi– It’s moving really fast. Apparently the concern among the people who are activeduty personnel is that the White House is anticipating doing something totake steps against the Syrian government. What that might consist of nobodyknows. But Trump was sending a fairly clear signal yesterday and so was ourambassador to the UN. about the heinousness of this act. Trump talked aboutcrossing numerous “red lines” and they are essentially fearful that this isgoing to escalate . Now bear in mind, Assad had no motive for doing this. Ifanything, he had a negative motive. The Trump said there was no longer anyreason to remove him from office, well, this was a big win for him. To turnaround and use chemical weapons 48 hours later, does not fit ant reasonablescenario, although I’ve seen some floated out there, but they are quiteridiculous.” (T he Scott Horton Show) [...]

(14)Michael Savage Turns on Trump, Says Syrian Gas Attack Was False Flag Operation

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-04-08/michael-savage-turns-trump-says-syrian-gas-attack-was-false-flag-operation

by The_Real_Fly - Apr 8, 2017 3:12 AM

Trump's base has vanished.

Conservative talk show host, MichaelSavage, who fervently supported Trump during the

Presidential campaign, soured on him today.Savage, referencing his background in science, having

a PhD in epidemiology, said the alleged gasattack in the ISIS controlled city of Idlib was most

likely phosgene and not sarin.

Backing up his claim that the attack didnot contain sarin, Savage made reference to photos

showing first responders attending tobodies without gloves or protective gear. Had sarin been

used in the attack, all of those men inwhite helmets would be dead.

In nearly a 15 minute soliloquy over theattack, Savage lamented that the neocon 'military tweet'

by Trump was a ploy to increase hispopularity, in light of falling poll numbers. Verbosely, Savage

hemmed and hawed with disappointment,dispirited that he spent over a year advocating for

Trump, who said he eschewed theinterventionist policies of people like McCain, Graham, and

Schumer, only to cave in shortly afterwinning the Presidency.

Savage also questioned the timing of Jared Kushner's trip to Iraq,coupled with Bannon's timely

demotion from the NSC -- just ahead of the attacks as being highlysuspicious.

"This whole thing stinks to highheaven,' said Savage. Furthering his criticism of the President,

Savage proclaimed: "It looks like Hillary, deep state won, and Trump isdoing her bidding."

As it pertained to who was responsible forthe attack, Savage reminded his audience that just

last week Putin was considered to be thesmartest and most diabolical man on earth. If so, why

on earth would he permit Assad to launch achemical weapons attack, when they had already

defeated the rebels, which was sure to turnpublic opinion against them?

"Why would he do it, you moronsyou?", said Savage.

Who are we supporting? According to LindseyGraham, the 'free Syrian army.'

Savage exploded: "The free SyrianArmy? There is no such thing. The freeSyrian Army are our

moderateterrorists created by the CIA and John McCain. JohnMcCain and Lindsey Graham are the

mouthpieces for this army ofmurderers."

"The west jumped to a conclusion,before there was any investigation."