Robert Parry: Treating Anti-Syria Charges as Flat Fact

[marmar]

from Consortium News:


Treating Anti-Syria Charges as Flat Fact
October 23, 2013

Exclusive: More than two months after the chemical weapons attack near Damascus, President Obama has still not released any proof to support his allegations blaming the Syrian government. But the New York Times has embraced the accusations as flat fact, a replay of the run-up to invading Iraq, reports Robert Parry.

By Robert Parry


With the blessing of the New York Times, the Obama administration has succeeded in cementing a dubious conventional wisdom about the Syrian government’s alleged use of chemical weapons last Aug. 21 – without presenting a shred of actual evidence.

In a front-page story co-written by Michael R. Gordon, who also co-wrote the infamous “aluminum tube” article falsely accusing Iraq of building nuclear centrifuges in 2002, the Times included the U.S. allegations about Syria’s chemical weapons use into its storyline as flat fact, not a point in serious dispute.

The Times reported on Wednesday that the State Department warned the White House in June that Syrian officials would see inaction on initial chemical weapons incidents – that the U.S. government was also blaming on the Syrian government – as a “green light for continued CW use.” The Times then wrote that the State Department’s warning “proved to be prophetic. A devastating poison gas attack on Aug. 21 killed hundreds of civilians.”

The story continues in that vein, accepting as indisputable fact that the Syrian government was behind the Aug. 21 attack on a suburb of Damascus despite significant doubts among independent analysts, UN inspectors and, I’m told, U.S. intelligence analysts. ....................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://consortiumnews.com/2013/10/23/treating-anti-syria-charges-as-flat-fact/

[Purveyor]

1. Thank you for posting. kick +1