Syria: Obama clears key hurdle in Senate

A SENATE panel has voted to give President Barack Obama authority to use military force against Syria in response to the deadly chemical weapons attack.

US president Barack Obama outlines the case for military strikes in response to Syrias use of chemical weapons. Picture: AP

The vote in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee last night was the first in a series as the president’s request makes its way through congressional panels before coming before the two chambers of Congress for a final vote.

The decision aids the White House’s push to win congressional backing for a strike in advance of the full Senate, which is expected to vote next week.

Obama’s top advisers yesterday took the case for action to the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, where the support seen in the Senate will be harder to secure.

The resolution would permit Obama to order a limited military mission against Syria, not exceeding 90 days and involving no US troops on the ground for combat operations.

The Senate committee vote was 10-7. It marked the first time lawmakers have voted to authorise military action since the October 2002 votes giving President George W Bush authority to invade Iraq.

Two Democrats, Tom Udall and Chris Murphy, joined Republicans Marco Rubio, John Barrasso, James Risch, Ron Johnson and Rand Paul in voting against the measure. Udall said he was “horrified” by Assad’s attacks on his own people, but did not want the US becoming embroiled in Syria’s war. “I’m voting ‘no’ because this policy moves the United States toward greater involvement in the Syria civil war,” he said after the vote.

The White House last night praised the Senate Foreign Relations panel for quickly approving the use of military force.

“We commend the Senate for moving swiftly and for working across party lines on behalf of our national security,” White House press secretary Jay Carney said in a statement.

Obama, who was visiting Sweden before he attends a G-20 economic summit with Russia later this week, said the international community’s credibility is at stake in the debate over a military response to the use of chemical weapons in Syria.

The administration says a sarin gas attack by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s forces outside Damascus last month killed 1,429 people.

Assad’s government has denied being behind the attack.

The administration needs to persuade a Republican-dominated House of Representatives that has opposed almost everything on Obama’s agenda since the party seized the majority more than three years ago.

The top Republican in Congress, House Speaker John Boehner, has signalled key support, saying the US has “enemies around the world that need to understand we’re not going to tolerate this type of behaviour”.

Secretary of State John Kerry, Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Martin Dempsey, were trying to make their case in a public hearing before the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

Kerry said that when chemical weapons were used in Syria last spring, Obama did not have a “compelling” enough case to push for a US military response.

He added that US intelligence can prove Assad has used chemical weapons at least 11 times, and said North Korea and Iran were watching the US closely.

Assad ordered chemical gas attack, claim German spies

A Hezbollah official has said Syrian president Bashar al-Assad ordered the poison gas attack in Damascus last month and that he considered the move a mistake which showed he was losing his grip, according to German intelligence.

Participants at a confidential meeting of German MPs said the head of the BND foreign intelligence agency told them it had intercepted a phone call believed to be between a high-ranking member of the Lebanese Shi’ite militant group and the Iranian embassy in Damascus.

“The BND referred to a phone call they had heard between a Hezbollah official and the Iranian embassy in which he spoke about Assad having ordered the attack,” one of the participants said yesterday. In the phone call, the Hezbollah official says Mr Assad’s order for the attack was a mistake and that he was losing his nerve, the participants reported the BND briefing as saying. Both Iran and Hezbollah support the Assad regime. A BND spokesman declined to comment on the briefing.