Russia Claims Syrian ‘White Helmets’ Are Planning ‘False Chemical Attack’ in Syria

The Russian Center for Reconciliation of the Opposing Parties in Syria, an organ of the Russian Defense Ministry, said Sunday it has “received information that militants from the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham terrorist group are plotting a provocation with the use of toxic agents in the western areas of the Idlib governorate.”

The deputy chief of the Russian center, Alexander Karpov, claimed the Syrian White Helmets are involved in the plot and have already delivered six tanks of toxic gas to Jisr al-Shugur, the city in Idlib where the attack is supposed to occur. 

“According to our information, militants are planning to stage a false chemical attack, with casualties among the local residents, ahead of the presidential elections in Syria,” Karpov claimed. 

Karpov predicted the attack would be blamed on the regime of Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian dictator who is rather heavily favored to “win re-election” in the farcical presidential vote to be held this Wednesday.

Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) is a Syrian terrorist militia formed during the early days of the civil war in 2011 under the name “Jabhat al-Nusra” or the Nusra Front. Although it had support from the Islamic State and its late leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi when it was formed, the Nusra Front was allied with ISIS’ rivals in al-Qaeda.

The group renamed itself a few times in 2016 when attempting to convey that it was no longer affiliated with al-Qaeda, eventually settling on the name Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (“Organization for the Liberation of the Levant”) in 2017 after absorbing several other terrorist gangs. 

HTS is among the most powerful groups still operating against Assad in Syria. In April 2021, its leader Abu Mohammad al-Jolani insisted it poses no security threat to the Western world and is “not a staging ground for executing foreign jihad.” 

The White Helmets, formally known as Syrian Civil Defense (SCD), are a volunteer rescue organization that has long been targeted by the Assad regime and its Russian patrons with a disinformation campaign that portrays them as secret al-Qaeda operatives.

The White Helmets were founded by a former British army officer named James Le Mesurier, who died under murky circumstances in Istanbul, Turkey, in late 2019. The Russian government pointed to Le Mesurier’s involvement in the organization as proof the White Helmets were a political propaganda operation created by British intelligence to discredit Assad and his Russian backers.

The White Helmets were celebrated for saving tens of thousands of civilians caught in the crossfire of the Syrian civil war, a humanitarian record that reflected poorly on the Assad regime for putting so many civilian lives at risk. Worse, the White Helmets accused Assad of using chemical weapons, so the Russians sought to flip the script by accusing the White Helmets of staging chemical attacks.

The Russian Defense Ministry and its “center for reconciliation” in Syria have been pushing the narrative of White Helmets preparing to stage a chemical weapons attack since February. The original version of the Russian story said the SCD brought “400 liters of chemicals” into the Idlib region to help Hayat Tahrir al-Sham conduct a “false flag operation involving up to 200 people.” The Defense Ministry claimed the plot was supported by unnamed foreign governments and the perpetrators “received their training in Europe.”

Karpov pushed almost exactly the same conspiracy theory exactly one month ago, on April 24, when he claimed Hayat Tahrir al-Sham was “plotting a provocation in the Idlib de-escalation zone in order to accuse Syria government forces of the use of chemical weapons.” He also implied the White Helmets were involved in the plot somehow.