Israel twice struck chemical weapons facilities in Syria over the past two years in a campaign to prevent Syria from renewing chemical weapons production, the Washington Post reported on Monday.
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The accuracy of the report, which cited unidentified current and former US and Western intelligence officials, was confirmed to Reuters by a person familiar with the operation who declined to be identified by name or nationality.
The IDF declined to comment.
There was no immediate comment from officials in Syria. Syria's government denies using chemical weapons. In 2013 it promised to surrender its chemical weapons, which it says it has done.
Repeated investigations by the United Nations and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons concluded that Syrian government forces used the nerve agent sarin and chlorine barrel bombs in attacks between 2015 and 2018 that investigators said killed or injured thousands.
Israel has acknowledged conducting airstrikes in Syria against Iranian deployments or weapon hand-overs to guerrilla allies.
But, the newspaper reported, on June 8 Israeli Air Force jets hit three military targets near the cities of Damascus and Homs, all linked to Syria's former chemical weapons program.
In March the previous year, Israel targeted a villa and compound tied with the procurement of tricalcium phosphate (TCP), a chemical that can be used in nerve agents, the report said. The Post quoted Western intelligence officials who said that the TCP was ultimately intended to be used by the branch of the Syrian military that oversaw chemical weapons production until "at least" 2014.
The same officials said that prior to the airstrikes in March 2020 and June of this year, there were signs that the regime was poised to relaunch the manufacture of chemical weapons.
Repeated investigations by the United Nations and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons concluded that Syrian government forces used the nerve agent sarin and chlorine barrel bombs in attacks between 2015 and 2018 that investigators said killed or injured thousands.
Israeli officials have voiced concern about the possibility of Syrian chemical weapons falling into the hands of terrorist groups.
The report also noted that both the Trump and Biden administrations were notified about the strikes and the intelligence that prompted them shortly after they took place.
i24NEWS contributed to this report
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