Israel: We've been 'absolutely certain' for months Assad using nerve gas | The Times of Israel

Brig. Gen. Itai Brun, head of the IDF Military Intelligence research and analysis division, at a Foreign Affairs and Defense committee hearing at the Knesset in 2012 (photo credit: Noam Moskowitz/Flash90)

Israel has been “absolutely certain” for many months — long before the alleged August 21 chemical weapons attack that prompted the current Syria crisis — that President Bashar Assad was using chemical weapons in the civil war, the Israeli army’s top intelligence analyst said in an interview broadcast Saturday.

Brig. Gen. Itai Brun, the senior analyst in the IDF’s Military Intelligence hierarchy, said the Israeli army had an extremely effective intelligence-gathering capacity on Syria, but declined to go into specifics..........

FULL ARTICLE HERE: Israel: We've been 'absolutely certain' for months Assad using nerve gas | The Times of Israel

Hezbollah to receive ‘game-changing weapons’ from Syria - Alarabiya.net English | Front Page

Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said on Thursday that his Lebanese militant group is ready to receive “game-changing weapons” from Syria.

Nasrallah’s statements come after an Israeli strike on Damascus earlier this week, which allegedly was aimed at stopping a weapons supply from reaching Hezbollah.

“If the aim of your (Israel's) attack was to prevent the strengthening of the resistance’s capabilities, then Syria will give the resistance sophisticated weapons the like of which it hasn’t seen before,” he said........

FULL ARTICLE HERE: Hezbollah to receive ‘game-changing weapons’ from Syria - Alarabiya.net English | Front Page

Israel urges U.S. action over Syrian chemical weapons - Alarabiya.net English | Front Page

Israel's Deputy Foreign Minister Zev Elkin says the U.S. should consider military action to curb Syrian chemical weapons. (Photo Courtesy: Haaretz)
 
The United States should consider military action to curb Syrian chemical weapons after Washington went public with suspicions they have been used in the country’s civil war, Israel’s deputy foreign minister said on Friday.  

 The challenge by Zev Elkin, a confidant of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, underscored tension this week over the allies’ assessments on Syria, as well as longer-running disputes about how aggressively to confront Iran’s nuclear program.

FULL ARTICLE: Israel urges U.S. action over Syrian chemical weapons - Alarabiya.net English | Front Page

France, UK say they have proof of use of chemical weapons by Assad forces | The Times of Israel

Alleged victim of chemical weapons attack on Homs, December 23, 2012 (photo credit: screen capture/YouTube)

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Britain and France have told the secretary-general they have reliable evidence that the Syrian government used chemical weapons near Aleppo, in Homs and possibly in Damascus, U.N. diplomats and officials say.

The British and French ambassadors told Ban Ki-moon in a letter on March 25 that soil samples and interviews with witnesses and opposition figures backed their belief that the government used chemical shells that had caused injuries and deaths, the diplomats and officials said.....

FULL ARTICLE: France, UK say they have proof of use of chemical weapons by Assad forces | The Times of Israel

Rogers: Assad Regime Crossed 'Red Line'

Rogers: Assad Regime Crossed 'Red Line'

Rep. Rogers: ‘High Probability’ Chemical Weapons Used in Syria

Rep. Mike Rogers, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said on Tuesday that there was a “high probability” that chemical weapons were used by President Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria.

“I have a high probability to believe that chemical weapons were used,” the Michigan Republican told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer. “We need that field verification.  

 “Given everything we’ve known over the last year-and-a-half, I, as chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, have come to the conclusion that they are either positioned for use and ready to do that, or, in fact, have been used,” Rogers said.

“We need to make sure,” Rogers added. “We need to make sure that this was chemical-weapons usage.”

He said that the United States had “limited efforts, very small, special capabilities” that could be used to “render their chemical weapons delivery systems not for use.

“If it takes a limited military strike to do that, I think we are morally obligated to do that if, in fact, they have crossed the president’s ‘red line’ of chemical weapons use,” Rogers said, referring to President Barack Obama’s previous warnings to Assad on using chemical weapons......

FULL ARTICLE: Rep. Rogers: ‘High Probability’ Chemical Weapons Used in Syria

ASSAD PROPAGANDA MANEUVER? Witnesses report onset of chemical warfare in Syria

Troops equipped for
chemical warfare

Extensive preparations by Syrian army units for launching chemical weapons against rebel forces have been sighted in the northern town of Homs, Western intelligence agencies told debkafile’s military sources Tuesday, March 19.

Damascus paved the way for resorting to unconventional weaponry with an accusation run by the state news agency SANA Tuesday that Syrian rebels had fired a rocket containing chemical substances in the Khan al-Assal area of rural Aleppo, allegedly killing 15 people, mostly civilians.

Rebels quickly denied the report and accused regime forces of “firing a chemical weapon on a long-range SCUD, after which 20 people died of asphyxia and poisoning.”

Neither of the accusations could immediately verified.

But a Reuters photographer said he had seen people come into two Aleppo hospitals with breathing problems after the attack. They claimed people were suffocating on the streets............

FULL ARRTICLE: Witnesses report onset of chemical warfare in Syria