Earlier this week, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon submitted the findings of the UN chemical weapons inspection team dispatched to Syria last month to gather evidence on the August 21st chemical weapons attack in Ghouta.

The report has been used as justification for the US and UK’s allegations that the attack originated from the Syrian government, but it does not in fact reach this conclusion. The inspection team’s mandate was limited to determining if an attack took place, not where it originated from, limiting their findings to a simple statement of fact…

Two Years Ago: How the Syrian Chemical Weapons Videos Were Staged

By James Corbett, Mother Agnes Mariam, and Prof Michel Chossudovsky

August 21, 2013: Obama’s insidious and criminal objective in August 2013 was to use these attacks with a view to justifying a humanitarian war against Syria.
This GRTV report was first broadcast in September 2013 in the month following the East Ghouta Chemical Attacks
In the wake of the Syrian chemical weapons attack, shocking footage of the victims of that attack were widely circulated in an effort to raise the ire of the public and spur support for military intervention.
Now, a new report on that footage finds troubling inconsistencies and manipulation with the video that calls the official narrative of the attack and its victims into question.
This is the GRTV Backgrounder on Global Research TV.

Earlier this week, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon submitted the findings of the UN chemical weapons inspection team dispatched to Syria last month to gather evidence on the August 21st chemical weapons attack in Ghouta.
The report has been used as justification for the US and UK’s allegations that the attack originated from the Syrian government, but it does not in fact reach this conclusion. The inspection team’s mandate was limited to determining if an attack took place, not where it originated from, limiting their findings to a simple statement of fact:
“On the basis of the evidence obtained during our investigation of the Ghouta incident, the conclusion is that, on 21st August 2013, chemical weapons have been used in the ongoing conflict between the parties in the Syrian Arab Republic, also against civilians, including children, on a relatively large scale.”
The determination of where the attacks originated from is of course the key issue geopolitically speaking. If the attack originated with the Syrian government it would mark a serious escalation in the conflict, but if the weapons were launched by the terrorist insurgency it would mean the attack was a false flag provocation, designed to draw the US and its allies into armed military intervention in the country.
As analysts have been at pains to point out, the motive for such an attack has always suggested that it was more likely that the terrorists were the culprits in Ghouta, not the Syrian government. They have been losing the ground war against Syrian government forces for months, and they knew that the use of chemical weapons was the “red line” that Obama had set as the threshold for military intervention. Those who argue Assad’s culpability have to believe that not only did he suddenly and inexplicably resort to using chemical weapons on his own people for no strategic military reason, but that he waited until UN chemical weapons inspectors arrived in the country before doing so.
The background and history of the conflict also provide ample evidence that the terrorists have chemical weapons in their possession, and are trained and motivated to use them. Last December it was reported that US forces were training the terrorist forces in the the handling of chemical weapons. Also last December the insurgents released a video showing their chemical weapons operations and threatening to use them against government supporters. And in July of this year, Russia submitted an exhaustive 100-page report to the UN outlining how the terrorist insurgency was in fact to blame for the March 19th chemical weapons attack in Khan al-Asal on the outskirts of Aleppo.
But in the light of this latest chemical weapons attack, the UK, the US and France have all released their own intelligence studies blaming Assad for the incident and calling on the “international community” to increase pressure on the Syrian government. The reports, however, contradict each other in numerous places, with wildly different estimates of casualties in the events suggesting that the intelligence agencies that produced the report cannot even agree on the most basic details of the attack.
Now, new evidence is emerging that the attacks were used and manipulated by the terrorists in order to provoke the US and its allies into armed intervention in Syria. This evidence suggests that the videos used by the US and its allies to conclude what happened in Ghouta were in fact carefully stage managed to portray a narrative that would pin the blame for the attacks on Assad.
The first indications of this plot emerged early on, when expert analysis of the videos suggested inconsistencies in the footage itself.
That analysis was later expanded on by a report from ISTEAMS, a Syria-based human rights group working in conjunction with the International Institute for Peace, Justice and Human Rights. In this thorough report, published on GlobalResearch.ca on September 16th, numerous discrepancies and inconsistencies in the footage are documented.
The report documents through eyewitness testimony and video evidence that the affected areas had been largely abandoned by local residents in the days prior to the attack. Yet in the footage of the aftermath, there are large numbers of child victims who are portrayed. There exists very little footage of parents with their children, and what little footage exists portrays some of the parents apparently “discovering” their children on multiple occasions in different locations. Other footage shows the same children arranged in different formations in geographically distant neighborhoods. The report concludes that the footage was carefully stage managed to create the greatest emotional impact on foreign audiences. These videos were then used by the Obama administration to convince the Senate of their case for military intervention.
ISTEAMS President and one of the key researchers on the report, Mother Agnes Mariam, joined The Corbett Report to discuss the problems with the official narrative of the chemical weapon attack emanating from Washington and its allies last month.
The ISTEAMS report raises many troubling questions about the scenes in the Ghouta videos. Were the victims of the attack local children? If so, why were they there after these areas had been largely abandoned? Where are their parents? In the days after the attack, Dr. Bouthaina Shaaban, an advisor to the Assad government, provided an equally troubling answer to these questions to Sky News.
These reports dovetail with videos posted by the Mujahedeen Press Office to YouTube just six days before the attack confirming that the terrorists had kidnapped hundreds of women and children from the rural villages of Alawite stronghold Lattakia to use as bargaining chips in the conflict. Were these kidnap victims moved to Ghouta to be killed in the chemical weapons attack? Is this why so many children were there in these largely-vacated areas, and why so few parents appear on video mourning their children?
Although further research and investigation is urgently needed by third-party organizations to establish the identity of the Ghouta attack victims and the whereabouts of the kidnapped Lattakian families, the reports, if true, are evidence of the most disgraceful war crimes imaginable and the most cold-blooded manipulations of evidence to suit an agenda. Earlier this month, Global Research Director Michel Chossudovsky appeared on GRTV to discuss the nature of the terrorist insurgency.
Now, the US and its allies are trying to use the UN’s new report in combination with the video “evidence” of the attack’s aftermaths to justify the use of military force to back up the Syrian chemical disarmament process. Some are even calling for Assad to face war crimes prosecution on the back of this and similarly manipulated evidence.
In order to prevent this war agenda from proceeding any further or these propaganda images from being used in the pursuit of military intervention, it is vital that this latest ISTEAMS report is downloaded from Global Research, widely disseminated, and thoroughly investigated.
Complete Report of the ISTEAM: The Chemical Attacks in East Ghouta Used to Justify a Military Intervention in Syria (pdf)
See also:
The Chemical Attacks in East Ghouta Used to Justify a Military Intervention in Syria By Mother Agnes Mariam, September 16, 2013
Syria: Fabricating Chemical Lies. Who is Behind the East Ghouta Attacks?By Prof Michel Chossudovsky, September 17, 2013
Global Research

U.S. Military Intelligence Involved in Chemical Attack in Syria

By Global Research News
by Oriental Review
The situation in Syria is still in focus of the world media. Another U.S.-led “humanitarian intervention” may be unleashed soon. The Pentagon announced that it is ready to attack Syria in order to punish Bashar al-Assad and Syrian army for the alleged use of chemical weapons against the civilians.
Meanwhile, the new evidence of the U.S. intelligence being involved in chemical attack near Damascus on August 21, 2013 has been leaked to Internet.
A hacker got access to the U.S. intelligence correspondence and published private emails of Col. Anthony J. Macdonald, who is the General Staff Director, Operations and Plans Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence the US Army Staff.
In an email exchange on August 22, 2013 with the US Army civilian analyst Eugene P. Furst congratulates Col. on successful operation and refers him to a Washington Post publication about chemical attack in Syria.

E.FURST: By the way, saw your latest success, my congratulations. Good job.
A.MACDONALD: As you see, I’m far from this now, but I know our guys did their best.
Another set of private correspondence between his wife Jeniffer MacDonald and Mary Shapiro reveals that colonel did not keep his mouth shut in the bedroom:

M.SHAPIRO: I can’t stop thinking about that terrible gas attack in Syria now. Did you see those kids? I was really crying They were poisoned, they died. When is it over? I see their faces when in sleep. What did Tony say you about this?
J.MACDONALD: I saw it too and got afraid very much. But Tony comforted me. He said the kids weren’t hurt, it was done for cameras. So you don’t worry, my dear.
M.SHAPIRO: I’m still thinking about those Syrian kids. Thanks God, they are alive. I hope they got a kind of present or some cash.
From Col. MacDonalds’s wife dialog with her friend it’s clear that the video with the children killed in the chemical attack near Damascus was staged by the U.S. Military Intelligence.
This information sheds new light on the US administration’s confession that “there were indications three days prior that an attack [on August 21] was coming”.
As Y. Bodansky from GIS/Defense & Foreign Affairs wrote on Sunday:

“On August 13-14, 2013, Western-sponsored opposition forces in Turkey started advance preparations for a major and irregular military surge. Initial meetings between senior opposition military commanders and representatives of Qatari, Turkish, and US Intelligence [“Mukhabarat Amriki”] took place at the converted Turkish military garrison in Antakya, Hatay Province, used as the command center and headquarters of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) and their foreign sponsors. Very senior opposition commanders who had arrived from Istanbul briefed the regional commanders of an imminent escalation in the fighting due to “a war-changing development” which would, in turn, lead to a US-led bombing of Syria.”

According to the same source,

On August 24, 2013, Syrian Commando forces acted on intelligence about the possible perpetrators of the chemical attack and raided a cluster of rebel tunnels in the Damascus suburb of Jobar. Canisters of toxic material were hit in the fierce fire-fight as several Syrian soldiers suffered from suffocation and “some of the injured are in a critical condition”.
The Commando eventually seized an opposition warehouse containing barrels full of chemicals required for mixing “kitchen sarin”, laboratory equipment, as well as a large number of protective masks. The Syrian Commando also captured several improvised explosive devices, RPG rounds, and mortar shells. The same day, at least four Hizballah fighters operating in Damascus near Ghouta were hit by chemical agents at the very same time the Syrian Commando unit was hit while searching a group of rebel tunnels in Jobar. Both the Syrian and the Hizballah forces were acting on intelligence information about the real perpetrators of the chemical attack.

The samples of toxic agents were reportedly sent to Moscow for a detailed analysis.

Published data clearly indicate that the US administration is about to create any pretext to launch a military strike on Syria. Most recent revelation that the US Secretary of State John Kerry has used a photo taken in Iraq in 2003 to illustrate “Syrian victims of gas attack” last Friday to justify his bellicous message to the US Congressmen gives even more evidence that  the “intelligence information” the warmongers claim to be based on is groundless or simply fabricated.
Now the vast majority of people worldwide perfectly understand that a kind of tricky game is being played on their behalf. The British parliament has already met the demand of clearly expressed public opinion and opposed the suicidal war over Mediterranean. Will the US legislators show us the same prudence and common sense? We will see it next week.
Copyright The Oriental Review 2013.
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