Syrian Rebels Claim Bashar Al-Assad Used Napalm in Recent Attack

Syrian opposition groups claim President Bashar al-Assad recently used napalm gas on Daraya, which is six miles southeast of Damascus.

The civil defense volunteers told the media that “the Assad regime dropped four barrel bombs containing napalm on Tuesday afternoon.” It took all day and night for the volunteers to subdue the fires.

“The wounded were treated under the light of the fires,” explained the commander of the defense team. “There were massive fires and the civil defence was completely paralysed in dealing with them.”

Hamish de Bretton-Gordon, the former commanding officer of the UK Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear (CBRN) and NATO’s Rapid Reaction CBRN battalion, viewed footage posted online of the attack.

“It is likely that it is napalm,” he declared. “Napalm seems to fit the bill.”

The Russian government, one of Bashar al-Assad’s few allies, condemned United Nations members pushing a resolution to investigate if Assad used chemical weapons, even though their ambassador voted for it.

“This problem was successfully resolved,” complained Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, adding, “Sometimes publications come out that there could be undeclared chemical weapons in Syria. This is all being checked, here we must avoid unfounded accusations. We have every basis to consider that Syria will continue cooperating closely.”

The UN hopes to find out who was responsible for the deadly chemical weapon attack on Ghouta, a suburb of Damascus, in August 2013. The U.S., United Kingdom, and France have made clear they believed it was President Bashar al-Assad’s forces. Over 1,300 people died in the attack, including women and children. People claimed they witnessed “regime fighter planes were flying over the area after the bombardment.” Videos “showed rows of bodies” dressed in pajamas, as the first attack occurred in the middle of the night. A year after the attack, Human Rights Watch released a video and claimed the evidence proves the Syrian government was behind the attack.

Syrian doctors with the Syrian American Medical Society (SAMS) described alleged chlorine attacks between March 16 and June 9 to the U.S. Congress in mid-June. Dr. Mohamed Tennari was one doctor who offered testimony from an incident on March 16: “As soon as I left my house, I could smell a bleach-like odor,” he explained. “When I arrived at the hospital, a wave of people had already begun to arrive. They were all experiencing symptoms of exposure to a choking agent like chlorine gas.”

Tennari encountered Waref Taleb and his family in the hospital, where they all passed away.

“One of the barrel bombs fell through a shaft in their home filling the ventilation with chlorine as it broke open,” he said. “Their basement became a makeshift gas chamber.”