Die Welt: Sudan/Syria testing Chem weapons in Darfur?

[aerocontrols]

Could some forum member who reads German check Die Welt tomorrow to see if this story is accurate? This 'preview' story is by AFP, supposedly.

Does Die Welt actually report this tomorrow?

Is Die Welt generally considered reliable? Sounds to me like we neocons have gotten to them.

MattJ

 

[CapelDodger]

Is Die Welt generally considered reliable?

Die Welt is a newspaper created by Herzl with the express intent of promting Zionism. But that was a long time ago. The story - as I'm sure you've noticed - in long on unnnamed sources and short on other citations. For all I know it's accurate, but the thing that make it smell for me is the way it brings Syria into the prominent story of Darfur (which justifiably demonises the Sudanese regime. ) and WMD. In Israel, Sharon has to keep cranking-up the violence because he was elected to stop terrorism and, of course, he hasn't, so he has to keep escalating.

Syria and Lebanon are intimately connected subjects. Sharon has another political impetus, the reaction to "disengagement". The people he needs to appease are the same people that demand an Israel that extends to the Litani, and regard the withdrawal from Lebanon (not Sharon's doing) as a failure of national will.

Ergo, Sharon intends to reprise his glory days by re-invading Lebanon, and Syrian perfidy has to be the justification. Perhaps.

 

[aerocontrols]

Die Welt is a newspaper created by Herzl with the express intent of promting Zionism. But that was a long time ago. The story - as I'm sure you've noticed - in long on unnnamed sources and short on other citations. For all I know it's accurate, but the thing that make it smell for me is the way it brings Syria into the prominent story of Darfur (which justifiably demonises the Sudanese regime. ) and WMD. In Israel, Sharon has to keep cranking-up the violence because he was elected to stop terrorism and, of course, he hasn't, so he has to keep escalating.

Syria and Lebanon are intimately connected subjects. Sharon has another political impetus, the reaction to "disengagement". The people he needs to appease are the same people that demand an Israel that extends to the Litani, and regard the withdrawal from Lebanon (not Sharon's doing) as a failure of national will.

Ergo, Sharon intends to reprise his glory days by re-invading Lebanon, and Syrian perfidy has to be the justification. Perhaps.

My mind boggles. Truly.

 

[zenith-nadir]

My mind boggles. Truly.

I have given up trying to make sense out of Capel Dodger's zionist-phobia-rants. Seems everything including Die Welt is a zionist plot.




Meanwhile back on earth...UPI is quoting the Die Welt story as well. Die Welt: Syria used chem weapons in Sudan - September 15, 2004

Syrian special forces used chemical weapons in June to kill dozens of people in Darfur, Sudan, the German newspaper Die Welt reported.

At least five planes from the Syrian civil airline Syrian Arab Airlines flew Syrian chemical weapons experts into Sudan to carry out the attack.

True or not true? I am skeptical for now but not dumb enough to dismiss that truth is sometimes stranger than fiction.

 

[CapelDodger]

Die Welt was created by Theodore Herzl explicitly as a vehicle to promote zionism. That's simply a matter of public record. Whether or not is still sees itself in that role I can't say, and haven't.

UPI is quoting Die Welt; so what?

As to minds boggling, reality can be pretty weird. The idea that Sharon might try to defuse opposition to withdrawal from Gaza by attacking Syria and/or Lebanon isn't actually that bizarre, is it?

 

[Blue Monk]

CapelDodger is correct about Theodore Herzl.

His bio can be found here in the http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/Herzl.html]Jewish Virtual Library.[/url]

Herzl convened six Zionist Congresses between 1897 and 1902. It was here that the tools for Zionist activism were forged: Otzar Hityashvut Hayehudim; the Jewish National Fund and the movement's newspaper Die Welt.

Edited to add: This is not meant to imply anything concerning the accuracy of the report, only to note that this is an established fact.

 

[CBL4]

Apparently there are/were two newspapers called Die Welt. As CapelDodger says Herzl founded a Zionist paper with that name.

According to Britannica "Die Welt was established in 1946 as a four-page semiweekly by British occupation authorities in Hamburg" and is one of the most influential papers in Germany. http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?tocId=9076527&query=axel springer&ct=null
Since Herzl died in 1902, these clearly are different papers.

I do not know anything about the modern one reliable or slant.


CBL

 

[aerocontrols]

As to minds boggling, reality can be pretty weird. The idea that Sharon might try to defuse opposition to withdrawal from Gaza by attacking Syria and/or Lebanon isn't actually that bizarre, is it?

You'll have to forgive me if I can't follow you from Darfur to Syria to Lebanon to Israel to Gaza.

MattJ

 

[demon]

Ah, those good old reliable chaps, the "unnamed western security sources"...always willing to step up and try and try again! Probably the same guys who reported the Niger connection with Iraq...

On the one hand, neither the government of the Sudan nor the government of Syria is run by adherents of anything like justice and human rights...but if I can introduce a third hand, neither is the government of Syria run by impetuous fools.

Syria has had a strategically defensive chemical weapon capability since the 1970's developed to counter Israel's conventional military superiority.

Initially, chemical weapons were imported but during the 1980's, Syria began manufacturing them. The Syrians are believed to hold stocks of mustard gas, tabun, and sarin which has been successfully weaponised. There have also been attempts to weaponise VX, but it's not known whether this has succeeded. All this information, by the way, comes from the CIA.

One of the problems I have with this report alleging that chemical weapons have been tested on the people of Darfur in a joint Sudanese/Syrian military exercise, is that chemical weapons are old weapons. There's a wealth of information about their effect on people so there's no need to test to find this out. What Syria would be far more interested in testing, however, is its delivery systems.

Bashar al-Assad's government would need to be insane to carry out such tests. The country's already under US sanctions; it's constantly berated by the US for not doing enough to prevent the mythical "foreign fighters" slipping across its borders into Iraq and Israel regularly violates its airspace.

If this story was true, I'd have expected it to be all over the Israeli press - Israel is itching to strike Syria and any chemical weapons testing furnishes the perfect excuse for pre-emptive action.

I notice that the report doesn't describe the injuries allegedly caused by chemical weapons. To evaluate these claims such injuries need to be compared with the known effects of the chemical weapons Syria possesses.

All in all, I'm inclined to doubt the story.

 

[aerocontrols]

All in all, I'm inclined to doubt the story.

Me, too.

 

[Blue Monk]

Apparently there are/were two newspapers called Die Welt. As CapelDodger says Herzl founded a Zionist paper with that name.

According to Britannica "Die Welt was established in 1946 as a four-page semiweekly by British occupation authorities in Hamburg" and is one of the most influential papers in Germany. http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?tocId=9076527&query=axel springer&ct=null
Since Herzl died in 1902, these clearly are different papers.

I do not know anything about the modern one reliable or slant.


CBL

I stand corrected.

 

[CapelDodger]

I stand better informed.

 

[CapelDodger]

from aerocontrols:

You'll have to forgive me if I can't follow you from Darfur to Syria to Lebanon to Israel to Gaza.

It's pretty straighforward. Tracking backwards, withdrawal from Gaza is a politically contentious issue, with the opposition coming from nationalist-religous factions. Much of the opposition is wedded to a maximalist Greater Israel (which is why they oppose withdrawal) which puts Israel's god-given borders to the north of the Litani river. These elements opposed the recent withdrawal from Lebanon, and see it and a less-than-total annexation in the West Bank as signs of national moral decline. "Treason" is no longer being muttered, but shouted. A re-invasion of Lebanon would appear to be an easy way of placating them a little, and persuading them that Sharon has not abandoned the maximalist dream. Such an invasion needs a pretext, which is where Syria comes in.

Damascus has never accepted Lebanon (a creation of the French under their mandate) as a legitimate entity, and has played a major role in the territory since independence. Syrian perfidy can therefore serve as the pretext for an invasion of Lebanon. Associating Syria with the atrocities in Darfur serves to promote the demonisation of Syria in Western eyes (particularly Israeli ones). Preparing the ground for invasion.

Perhaps. Time will tell.

 

[CapelDodger]

from demon:

I notice that the report doesn't describe the injuries allegedly caused by chemical weapons. To evaluate these claims such injuries need to be compared with the known effects of the chemical weapons Syria possesses.

Intriguingly, such evidence was available from the Iranians during the Iran-Iraq War, but continued to be regarded as "unproven allegations" by the US and UK until the day after Saddam invaded Kuwait. At which point they (and Halabjah) suddenly became well-known facts.

And "yellow rain" in Cambodia faded off the radar.

 

[zenith-nadir]

You'll have to forgive me if I can't follow you from Darfur to Syria to Lebanon to Israel to Gaza. MattJ

It's all part of capel's delusion that the world moves to the evil machinations of zionists - who didn't found the Die Welt in question after all - but who still plan to take over southern Lebanon as forseen in the grand "zionist maximalist dream".

And you're right aerocontrols, it has nothing to do with Dafur, Sudan or Syria... except to derail the thread in order to promote Capel's anti-zionist agenda.

 

[aerocontrols]

from aerocontrols:It's pretty straighforward. Tracking backwards, withdrawal from Gaza is a politically contentious issue, with the opposition coming from nationalist-religous factions. Much of the opposition is wedded to a maximalist Greater Israel (which is why they oppose withdrawal) which puts Israel's god-given borders to the north of the Litani river. These elements opposed the recent withdrawal from Lebanon, and see it and a less-than-total annexation in the West Bank as signs of national moral decline. "Treason" is no longer being muttered, but shouted. A re-invasion of Lebanon would appear to be an easy way of placating them a little, and persuading them that Sharon has not abandoned the maximalist dream. Such an invasion needs a pretext, which is where Syria comes in.

Damascus has never accepted Lebanon (a creation of the French under their mandate) as a legitimate entity, and has played a major role in the territory since independence. Syrian perfidy can therefore serve as the pretext for an invasion of Lebanon. Associating Syria with the atrocities in Darfur serves to promote the demonisation of Syria in Western eyes (particularly Israeli ones). Preparing the ground for invasion.

Perhaps. Time will tell.

Apparently I was too subtle. I understood the theory, I just believe it's a sign that you may not be wholly sane.

MattJ