So Assad Did Indeed Not Use Chemical Weapons In Douma.

[Spicerack]

https://goo.gl/pg9kE5

MSM kept that quiet, didn't they?

[ichkeria]

Quite apart from the actual collateral evidence of Assad’s guilt is the crazed and self contradictory of the denials, which claimed on the one hand that there had been no chemical attack and in the other that there had, but that it had been carried out by ‘other other side’
In Douma in any case I believe it was Jaish al Islam not US or Nusra and there was one allegation of their use of chemical weapons in Aleppo fired from mortars

[Gromit]

// “The military source who spoke to Channel 4 News confirmed that artillery reports from the Syrian Army suggest a small rocket was fired from the vicinity of Al-Bab, a district close to Aleppo that is controlled by Jabhat al-Nusra – a jihadist group said to be linked with al-Qaeda and deemed a “terrorist organisation” by the US.”

“Survivors and witnesses of what was being described by the government news agency as a chemical attack said they smelled something like chlorine. And as the owner of Syria’s only chlorine-gas manufacturing plant, Sabbagh knew that if chlorine was involved, it most likely came from his factory.” //

http://nation.time.com/2013/04/01/the-mystery-behind-a-deadly-chemical-attack/

[Gromit]

The Jaysh al-Islam group along with Ahrar ash-Sham are among the main Syrian rebel groups supported by Saudi Arabia. (As I said in my first answer).

Ich,
You seem to have changed sides? You were asserting Assad was to blame for chemical weapons attacks in Syria, and now you are blaming the rebels.

[Gromit]

// Britain and the EU should have been supporting Assad, just like they should have been supporting Hussein //

We should not have been supporting anyone, particularly those two. We should stay out of the middle east and stop meddling. We only make things worse by our interference.

[Gromit]

vengaroberta

Events?

We went to war with Iraq because they were blamed for 9/11, even though they had nothing to do with it.

[dannyk13]

Gromit, I thought we went to war with Iraq because they invaded Kuwait.

[fiction-factory]

Aren't we confusing 2 different invasions of Iraq

[ichkeria]

"Ich,
You seem to have changed sides? You were asserting Assad was to blame for chemical weapons attacks in Syria, and now you are blaming the rebels. "

??
I was explaining why it was unlikely to have been the rebels.
The spin our friend should be putting on this is "hurray they found chlorine it was the other lot what done it"
As I said earlier, one minute "there was no chemical attack" the next "there was but it was someone else, mate". If that was a police statement it would have had the author incriminated several times over.
I agree tho that we focus too much on the use of chemical weapons.
It was the mistake of allowing the Russians to take charge of supposedly dismantling Assad's chemical arsenal that set us on the final doomed course, when he merely redoubled his use of other nasties, while still of course having a bit of chemical for emergencies. A bit like putting the NRA in charge of making sure no one's concealing any pistols :-)

[sevenOP]

"the first sentence of the ref says
A chemical weapons watchdog says chlorine may have been used in April's attack on the Syrian city of Douma.
so.... how does this square with no the OP headline ? "

If by 'ref' you mean the BBC link jno provided to an article titled "Syria war: 'Possible chlorine' at Douma attack site - watchdog", which is not the link SpiceRack provided in the OP, this BBC article provides no proof of this assertion in that article.

Or perhaps you see the BBC as some impartial refer(h)ee(hee).

Nowhere in the actual report does it state "chlorine may have been used in April's attack on the Syrian city of Douma." Maybe the BBC were alluding to another 'watchdog' or cat(belling).

https://www.opcw.org/fileadmin/OPCW/S_series/2018/en/s-1645-2018_e_.pdf

But the actual report light into "the inspectors were denied access to the site for so long"

'2.2 The FFM team was not able to enter Douma for almost a week after its arrival, owing
to the high security risks to the team, which included the presence of unexploded
ordnance, explosives, and sleeper cells still suspected of being active in Douma. On
18 April 2018, during a reconnaissance visit to two sites of interest, the security detail
was confronted by a hostile crowd and came under fire from small arms and a hand
grenade that exploded. The incident reportedly resulted in two fatalities and one
injury.
2.3 On 21 April 2018, after security concerns had been addressed, the FFM team
conducted its first visit to one of the alleged sites of interest, and it was deemed an
acceptable risk to enter Douma. The FFM team deployed four additional times to
other sites of interest over the following 10 days,...'
'6. SECURITY AND ACCESS TO THE SITES OF THE ALLEGED INCIDENTS
6.1 Given the recent military activities and the volatile situation in Douma at the time of
the FFM deployment, security and safety considerations were of paramount
importance. Considerable time and effort were invested in discussions and planning to
mitigate the inherent security risks to the FFM team and others deploying into
Douma. According to Syrian Arab Republic and Russian Military Police
representatives, there were a number of unacceptable risks to the team, including
mines and explosives that still needed to be cleared, a risk of explosions, and sleeper
cells still suspected of being active in Douma. This assessment was shared by the
representative of the United Nations Department of Safety and Security (UNDSS).'
'6.2 At the outset, the formal position of the FFM team, as instructed by the Director-General, was that security of the mission should be the responsibility of the Syrian Arab Republic.'

Loading the blame gun.