Images of dead bodies laid out on floors wrapped in white cloth, with no sign of blood or injury circulated across social and news media last week to signal another horrific stage of the Syrian war. As of 24 August, Doctors without Borders has indicated that many patients treated in the aftermath of the attack in eastern Ghouta had "neurotoxic symptoms" though they stressed they can neither confirm scientifically nor establish causality. Since then, several other groups—including the Violation Documentation Center—have left little doubt that some sort of chemical attack did indeed occur. The mass scale of suffering in Syria, upwards of 100,000 killed and millions displaced should not numb us to the fact that this was a major crime that, like other killings that have taken place inside Syria, should be impartially and independently investigated.
The government accused the rebels of a false flag operation, as have other observers arguing for the implausibility of a government attack while UN inspectors were in Syria for the first time in over a year—stationed several miles away from the assault. Why should the government attack now when it seems to be winning the war with conventional weapons? If confirmed, it would be the only scenario that might trigger more aggressive US and/or European armed intervention. A rebel attack seems equally implausible. If rebels are indeed able to manufacture such a large scale chemical attack, and murderous enough to use these weapons on civilians, why not attack government forces and change the tide of the war, instead of choosing territory sympathetic to the uprising and outside regime control? Logic and reason are therefore not sufficient means of investigating such actions or attributing culpability. There are other interpretations that are also plausible: that the regime initiated the attack in response to a perceived or actual escalation by the rebels (including reported US and US-trained special operations units advancing towards Damascus); that defectors connected with the opposition and launched the attack to spur international intervention by implicating the regime; or finally, that the command structure is disintegrating within the Syrian government, a topic that consumed many reports of late.
What should be the response to these events? The answer for those who care about the fate of Syrians is the same as it has been to the ongoing violence previously, which is to push for a political settlement and an immediate cessation of violence coupled with humanitarian aid for Syrians.
read more at the following link--- http://www.jadaliyya.com/chemical-attacks
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| [Syrian man mourning over a dead body after an alleged poisonous gas attack fired by regime forces in Douma town, Damascus, on Wednesday 21 August 2013. Image by Associated Press / Media Office Of Douma City] |
The government accused the rebels of a false flag operation, as have other observers arguing for the implausibility of a government attack while UN inspectors were in Syria for the first time in over a year—stationed several miles away from the assault. Why should the government attack now when it seems to be winning the war with conventional weapons? If confirmed, it would be the only scenario that might trigger more aggressive US and/or European armed intervention. A rebel attack seems equally implausible. If rebels are indeed able to manufacture such a large scale chemical attack, and murderous enough to use these weapons on civilians, why not attack government forces and change the tide of the war, instead of choosing territory sympathetic to the uprising and outside regime control? Logic and reason are therefore not sufficient means of investigating such actions or attributing culpability. There are other interpretations that are also plausible: that the regime initiated the attack in response to a perceived or actual escalation by the rebels (including reported US and US-trained special operations units advancing towards Damascus); that defectors connected with the opposition and launched the attack to spur international intervention by implicating the regime; or finally, that the command structure is disintegrating within the Syrian government, a topic that consumed many reports of late.
What should be the response to these events? The answer for those who care about the fate of Syrians is the same as it has been to the ongoing violence previously, which is to push for a political settlement and an immediate cessation of violence coupled with humanitarian aid for Syrians.
read more at the following link--- http://www.jadaliyya.com/chemical-attacks
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