Whose Hexamine?

Adam Larson aka Caustic Logic

April 20/21, 2021

(kind of rough - edits 4/23, adds 4/24)

This is largely simmered down from a previous post and is less complete, but includes new points and thoughts, and I hope added readability.

The Hexamine Shell-Game, Recap

So as luck would have it, in their response to peaceful protests in 2011, President Assad and his brainwashed minions walked into one self-made trap after another, vis-a-vis international human rights norms. They started with shooting protesters and castrating young boys, and quickly turned to sectarian massacres - Alawite Shabiha death cult hacking up Sunni families in their homes and leaving their bodies for the freedom fighters to document, like in Taldou, Al-Houla. By late 2012 Assad and his Shabiha were convincing people less and less that they were truly behind those crimes. People like Channel 4's Alex Thomson were starting to air doubts and to pass on competing claims that Jabhat al-Nusra and their ilk were behind these heinous crimes (See Aqrab, Haswiyeh, both in December, 2012). 

So as luck would have it, Assad decided it was better to kill in ways only he could - barrel bombs, any thing from the air, chemical weapons, especially sarin. Enough with the swords and hatchets. Shocking, yes, but too ambiguous. 

As luck would have it yet again Assad's forces used a very unusual and distinctive method of producing sarin, one extra-sure to be traced back to them. And so Assad freely used it over and over, even against his own troops several times. As far as we know (?) no other state uses hexamine (copy-pasting hexamethylenetetramine) in its production of Sarin, past or present. Yet Syria does, even now, long after claiming to surrender its program. And the Sarin that keeps turning up there has Hexamine, so it must be theirs, not any from any other state nor from any terrorist lab.

Or so we've heard. (Sarcasm mode off for the moment. )

As far as I can tell, here's how we came to hear that:

Nov 24, 2013: CW expert Jean Pascal Zanders lists the chemical precursors Syria had just declared to the OPCW: Under category heading "Sarin" are listed three compounds: hexamine, isopropanol and hydrogen fluoride. Explained, maybe: "[…] The EOI’s list of compounds consists mainly of chemicals that play a role in the startup of the development or production of chemical warfare agents or are intermediate-stage precursors. I have grouped them according to the type of warfare agent in a separate table. […]" 

By what method those were grouped under sarin is unclear. Hexamine shouldn't normally belong (see Kaszeta, below). My guess: it had turned up in the sarin being used in Syria, and Zanders wanted that to be made by Syria's recipe, so he decided on this recipe and then listed the ingredients accordingly.

As declared to OPCW, per the actual REQUEST FOR EXPRESSION OF INTEREST (EOI) of 20 November 2013 (PDF), hexamine and isopropanol are listed under "organic chemicals" while hydrogen fluoride is listed separately under "inorganic chemicals." The "type of warfare agent" each was related to production of must be explained somewhere else. Until I see otherwise, I'm sticking with my guess that Zanders just wanted it that way.

Just a few weeks later, the same idea gained traction. Dan Kaszeta is a CW expert, or a former US Secret Service man who knows such experts, a lot about CRBN response, other relevant bits and pieces, and mainly - like Zanders - he knows the right thing to say, politically, so he gets to be a touted "expert" rather than "propagandist." He wrote via Higgins/Brown Moses Dec. 14, 2013: "I consider the presence of hexamine both in the field samples and in the official stockpile of the Syrian government to be very damning evidence of government culpability in the Ghouta attacks." He assumes it's being added to Syria's binary sarin. FWIW the volcano rockets used in Ghouta were not binary, and there was never any evidence they were.

"It would have been informative if the UN and OPCW had explained why they considered hexamethylenetetramine (‘hexamine’)" as relevant to declare and have destroyed. Again, they didn't clarify by listing it under "Sarin," as was just suggested. To his credit, Kaszeta doesn't cite Zanders' list as if it mattered, and instead replicates that inexplicable listing with his own brand of detective work.  

"I do not think that hexamine’s normal uses ... do not [sic] merit its inclusion as a chemical of concern by the OPCW." He does not think it does not belong (other than by a manufactured mystery he'll solve). And indeed it probably does belong in a more normal way. As WhoGhouta would soon remind this supposed CW expert, heaxmine is the traditional stabilizer for sulfur mustard (mustard gas), which was a Syrian program of interest. That will corrode metal canisters badly, but it was found long ago a bit of hexamine added - maybe to scavenge the excess acids? - helped it have a longer shelf life. Thus "hexamine is not a smoking gun." 

So Kaszeta ignored or was unaware of the most logical reason hexamine would be included, then decide on a useful alternate reason that let him blame the government for these sarin attacks. He found it quite a unique thing they did there in Syria: "7 weeks of research on this subject reveal no public domain evidence of hexamine being used in this way in other Sarin programs."  Just the one. IF the one, and he was pretty sure. 

And the New York Times couldn't miss the chance for a big story on December 18: Experts say hexamine may be the smoking gun, citing Kaszeta's faux deduction that let Higgins have a promotional scoop along the way, probably a couple of "oh yeah, sure" experts with intel backgrounds agreeing. I don't have a subscription.

June 2014: UN mission head Ake Sellstrom is said to agree Hexamine was used in Syria's sarin program: "It is in their formula, it is their acid scavenger." Audio is said to prove he said that, without any contradictory qualifiers, and so case closed. Dan Kaszeta says so.

Back to Zanders, August, 2014: "Analysis of their contents by the OPCW confirmed sarin as their payload. Moreover, the filling displayed all the characteristics of sarin as produced by the Syrian government, the principal telltale sign being the presence of hexamine.” The cylinders in question: tested in June, 2014, after they were "allegedly" used against SAA troops in Jobar on 8/24/13, almost a year earlier. That happened, as we now realize, about 400 meters from the probable - and opposition-controlled - firing spot for the sarin rockets that hit East Ghouta on 8/21/13. 

It seems hexamine turned up in all that stuff; the sarin in E. Ghouta would show hexamine, just like the stuff used against troops and civilians in Khan al-Assal in March, and just as would the stuff released on these SAA conscripts in Jobar. Zanders explained in a comment at the same post "The hexamine presence was confirmed in several discussions I have had over the past two months with people closely following the Syria dossier, including government officials, diplomats and scientists." Assad must have gassed his own troops, or faked all of that, or whatever. Trusted officials and the type of "scientists" tipping off this Zanders character say so. Or so says Zanders.

In 2017 the UN-OPCW Joint Investigative Mechanism would add a wrinkle - besides hexamine, two specific impurities they say were found in the actual DF Syria had declared and also in the Khan Sheikhoun attack, at least. 

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-syria-crisis-chemicalweapons-exclusiv-idUSKBN1FJ0MG

https://libyancivilwar.blogspot.com/2020/03/a-sarin-blame-shell-game-hexamine-to.html

It's likely that too is a non-specific a clue, because those impurities are very common, or because the terrorists were given Syria's DF, or a reverse-engineered version of it, based on samples stolen years ago and handed to a foreign intelligence agency. For example, as Joby Warrick recently informed us - sometime before 2001, CIA double-agent "Ayman" handed over what sounds like completed liquid sarin produced by the Syrian CW program he worked for. Interesting details: 

"His laboratories would make a form of binary sarin: two stable liquids that could be stored separately and blended only at the last minute. One of the two liquids was ordinary isopropyl alcohol. The other, a toxic brew called DF, contained all the other ingredients, including an exclusive additive — which Ayman helped discover — that helped ensure that the sarin lost none of its potency during the short interval between the mixing and the arrival at the target." 

Someone will say that additive was hexamine, but I doubt that - unless the additive part was added by his handlers years after Ayman's death by firing squad for treason.

2018's information offensive didn't expand much apparently expanded on the chemical matches. The previous findings for Hexamine and the two DF impurities were repeated as valid, but no clearer reason to implicate Syria's military alone was given. Importantly, it seems (?) the whole impurities package  was expanded laterally - the usual "attack a had the same sarin as attack b" - existing appearances of blame tapped into to cover for any shortage of relevant evidence. redone in the light of matching "signatures" (plural - not just hexamine, but still including it)

Anthony Deutsch, Reuters, 1/29/18: “We compared Khan Sheikhoun, Khan al-Assal, Ghouta,” said one source who asked not to be named because of the sensitivity of the findings. “There were signatures in all three of them that matched.” Eliot Higgins echoed the sentiment in June 2018: "The presence of hexamine at every confirmed Sarin attack shows the hexamine is part of the Syrian government’s manufacturing process" The fact that it's being used is all the proof we need. Well, that plus the seemingly knee-jerk and often absurd findings of government guilt in case after case. 

What if Hexamine Meant Something Else?

As I've said before, even if hexamine really was part of Damascus' sarin formula, that’s more like a recipe than a fingerprint. Fingers can even be cut off, but it's easier yet for others to copy the recipe, or have their own that’s just similar. 

Absolute proof that opposition forces had sarin still seems lacking, but it's quite likely they did. And among all those who'd acknowledge the possibility, none of them could tell you how it was made, what it did and didn’t have in it, or how it compares to the stuff being used. It's still quite possible they did have sarin, and it used hexamine and DF with those same impurities, because it's the exact stuff used, in every single case.

In his Brown Moses piece, Dan Kaszeta acknowledged that it was possible for terrorists to have come up with a formula for sarin involving hexamine. However, "the likelihood of both a Syrian government research and development program AND a non-state actor both coming up with the same innovation seems negligible to me." Since he had just faux deduced the former, he had no choice but to caps-lock AND and then reject the latter. Obviously we're not repeating that stunt here. 

I don't always believe what Seymour Hersh's intelligence sources say, but when I do ... for his LRB article "Whose Sarin?" this one sounds quite credible in telling him: 

"An intelligence document issued in mid-summer dealt extensively with Ziyaad Tariq Ahmed, a chemical weapons expert formerly of the Iraqi military, who was said to have moved into Syria and to be operating in Eastern Ghouta. The consultant told me that Tariq had been identified ‘as an al-Nusra guy with a track record of making mustard gas in Iraq and someone who is implicated in making and using sarin’. He is regarded as a high-profile target by the American military."

From his record making mustard gas, Ahmed would know about hexamine’s stabilizing properties, and might make an unusual choice to use it in his sarin. An odd new sarin appears – not exclusively but mainly in E. Ghouta – by Mid-March 2013 at latest, and it uses hexamine. US intel heard the terrorist Ahmaf was making it right there in E. Ghouta by summer at the latest. They heard he was doing it for Al-Nusra Front, who could distribute it nationwide and further if they wanted. No one knows what it would look like, and someone’s sarin kept turning up and getting Damascus in deeper and deeper trouble. The link to Syria's stocks remains far from proven, and still the only clear thing hexamine links to is to many, most, or all of the disputed sarin incidents over the years. 

Ahmed was a "high-profile target" for the U.S. in Iraq, but didn't get killed there, was operating in Syria, and like every foreign-backed militant there, was off-limits for Syrian government forces, as far as Washington had a say. And he might have been the one person central to getting that "red line" crossed. 

Helpers would be involved, of course, in terrorist groups and western governments, the media, etc. At right: a Jabhat al-Nusra "policeman," Northern Syria, April 21, 2013 with one of the exact, specific, unknown grenades otherwise said to be Syrian military make, filled with hexamine sarin and reportedly ... dropped from regime helicopters ... in cinderblocks ... that emit white smoke and also glow as they fall ... and then burst into piles of white powder and plastic bag scraps on impact. See here.

Why use hexamine? Just knowing about it from prior use is no great reason to reach for it in a sarin recipe. It's impossible to say, but from what I know, here's one possibility: As I gather, hexamine is an amine, one of the kind of impurities that lend the unusual characteristics to the sarin used in Syria: a yellowish color, corrosive properties (burns the eyes and airways), and an odor most often described as "foul" and "strange" - like rotting corpses but different, hard to place. I imagine it's a bit synaesthetic - a smell that's almost a different sensation. Soldiers in the August 24 attack described, per the UN report, "a foul and strange odour" and "a badly smelling gas."

The smell aspect always struck me as interesting from a psychological standpoint. I've read somewhere survivors describing the paralysis, loss of sight, and suffocation of severe sarin exposure as feeling like the angel of death is crushing you. If one's goal is to terrorize with the stuff, making it burn and smell like disgusting death might just be a desirable effect. This Ziyaad Tariq Ahmed - or whoever makes this stuff - might even be proud of his innovation and give it a cool nickname like "stench of death." 

A Brief History of DUUHHHH (and strange, foul smells)

Sarcasm back on for a recap of what all "Assad" has done with this unique hexamine sarin.

* The same hexamine sarin first appears, that we know of, at Khan al-Assal, Aleppo 3/19/13 – 1 soldier and 19 civilians killed - gov reports terrorist sarin attack, demands a probe. (smell: some say chlorine-like, others said sulfur-like) 

* Same 3/19/13: Oppo. reports sarin attack in Ateibah, killing 5 men, a baby (a foul smell) - abortively reports a CW attack in Homs as well, and oppo. says regime hit themselves in Khan al-Assal, with a fighter jet or a scud missile  (reliable accounts differ), missing the nearest rebel target by over 1km, maybe on purpose. Alleged: coordinated regime CW attacks in Damascus, Aleppo, and Homs.

* April-May-June, Syria's request: Western powers tack on opposition allegations incl. Ateibah that need investigated just as badly, slow the process digging for as many as possible - dismiss sarin claims re: Khan al-Assal (eg SSG's clear findings a sarin simulant was used), play them up in other cases

* 4/29/19 sarin grenade attack, Saraqeb (“It was a horrible, suffocating smell.") One woman dies in the ambulance en route to Turkey, with a super-fatal dose that should have killed in minutes - no one else comes close to dying.

* "rebels" re-take Khan al-Assal in June, precluding investigation there (agreement on which was nearly achieved at the time), massacre captive soldiers, possibly witnesses, steal the sarin samples there (? SyGov later unable to produce samples to OPCW)

* US intel has sarin samples from an attack somewhere sent in, supposed match w/government stocks/hexamine/etc. found (?). Chain of custody, whatever, UN investigations eventually decided the Khan al-Assal attack used sarin with the same impurities as in other attacks. Reasonable cause to believe the Syrian government attacked their own troops and civilians - in a mostly Shi'ite village just being re-populated after a brief occupation by sectarian "rebels" 

* 8/18/13: UN-OPCW inspectors finally arrive - again, originally on Syrian invitation - to investigate Khan al-Assal, plus Ateibah, and a Dec. 23, 2012 incident in Homs city thought to involve sarin - 1st reports differed 180 on miosis & atropine, pointing to sarin OR incapacitant BZ - some reported it was "pungent-smelling" - rockets and bombs are cited, but so are "canisters" or "grenades" maybe lobbed from a regime car that drove by the "street battles" - 1 "FSA" fighter and 6 civilian men rep. killed by the gas - the day after 7 SAA troops re. killed by a yellow gas (no smell rep) down in Daraya.) 

http://libyancivilwar.blogspot.com/2017/02/what-happened-in-homs-december-23-2012.html

http://libyancivilwar.blogspot.com/2017/11/what-happened-december-6-and-22-2012-in.html

* Assad allegedly distracts them using the same sarin to kill hundreds right next door (smell: "something like vinegar and rotten eggs" or "like cooking gas" (if propane is meant, then that will be Ethyl Mercaptan: "Most people describe the smell as either rotten eggs or rotten cabbage")) – eventually helping prove he did Khan al-Assal too, hitting his own troops  

* Obviously on Aug. 24, gas his own troops again and hand the proof over again 

* and adding he did this again on Aug. 25 in Daraya, soldiers and sarin handed over just to be ignored in the rush to attack Syria (smell: "foul," "bizarre"). Another CW attack on SAA troops in E. Ghouta, on August 22, didn't seem as likely to be sarin-related.

* Then Assad paused in sarin use after the red line threat failed to materialize; after trying so hard to get bombed out of power with these brazen attacks and false-flag failures, he suddenly wanted to appear as if he’d handed it all over?

* 2014-2017: Assad resorts to killing - implausibly - with small air-dropped cylinders of chlorine gas that had bizarre and mutable properties 

* He quietly sarin-attacks his own soldiers again at least in Daraya, Feb. 2015, OPCW confirmed – just out of old habit – no one cared. (smell: "like burning nylon") 

* Likely did the same back on 8/29/2014 in Jobar - twice in a day, incapacitating soldiers in both cases, leading to capture and execution for many in the 4PM incident - reportedly just 2 of the 15 soldiers involved escaped back to base. At least as I read it. Anyone else? The UN-OPCW heard from the two survivors of the 4PM incident, and 20 survivors of the later 6PM incident, but sadly had to dismiss the reports of the day's singular "incident" based on the 2 "discrepant" stories they heard (one or both must be made up) and so so "The FFM was not able to identify a cohesive narrative" - let alone a credible or true one. 

And as the Fact-Finding Mission knew from its facts in Syria "the smell of sarin is most frequently described as a sweet smell of apple or pear" - just like reported over and over by both sides in all these sarin incident. WHEREAS the soldiers described something way different: "a particular odour which some compared to the smell of dead animals or corpses and others reported as similar to rotten eggs. Still others reported that they had never experienced anything similar before and couldn’t compare the smell to anything." 

Some others who maybe couldn't compare it to anything tried anyway, and came up with "chlorine," as some did at Khan al-Assal. Another sign it's all made up! Except at Khan al-Assal it turned out to be sarin. Still, fresh and fruity was the correct answer! At least on that occasion. 

The FFM did allow that soldiers in whichever version might be true MIGHT have been exposed, briefly, a little bit, to "some type of non-persistent, airborne irritant secondary to the surface impact of two launched objects." If they blacked out and got captured and killed just because of some basic irritant, that's their problem. No one's getting "held to account" over pansy stuff like that. And besides, it was probably all made up. Right? No realistic detail or anything.

* 2017: then Assad breaks out more of the same sarin in April, 2017, alongside chlorine in confusing combinations but with a uniquely Russian or uniquely Syrian binary sarin bomb, to kill some 80-100 civilians in Khan Sheikhoun, and a few in some preceding test incidents mostly in Al-Lataminah, maybe just to see if Trump had a more relevant "red line" kind of deal - he did. The miles-long plume of sarin fog coating town from at least two points quite far from the one identified sarin crater ... reportedly "it smelled like rotten food" "a foul smell ... a strange smell. I can’t put my finger on it." a "really disgusting odor," a "stench." Others reported a chlorine smell, and many say chlorine, or chlorine and sarin were used. One Lataminah sarin incident on 3-30 had clear reports of no smell, and another one went completely unmentioned, until after it was noticed that bizarre contradictions in another one almost required such an event - then it was oh yeah, the 3/24/17 sarin attack, we forgot about that. (and as Andrew alerts me, 3/24 even has an even-more forgotten 2nd CW attaack later in the day to explain other oddities)

- Actually everyone forgets because ISIS, but Assad also killed something like 100+ in an ISIS place (Uqrabiyat, Hama) with sarin in December 2016. Seriously, it seems no one remembers that. I barely do. Smell: "Some also said that there was a strong odor, although they could not describe it, while others said that they could not detect any." Statements were made. No one wanted to come bail out ISIS. I don't think OPCW ever did an investigation.  HRW did include it in a report, in some detail.

* Last confirmed sarin: 4/4/17. No more in the following entries:

* Pause, then Nov. 2017 Harasta, next to Douma: in grenades or artillery shells, used Against: Ahrar al-Sham fighters, civilians - no deaths - symptoms: miosis, spasms, weakness, loss of consciousness, "excessive salivation," breathing problems, red eyes, "restlessness" - secondary contamination - reported as organophosphate, not sarin, because there was "a stench that does not exist in Sarin gas." This seems to be what US SecDef Mattis referred to  in Feb. 2018, saying he didn't see good evidence for sarin use recently (since Khan Sheikhoun, 4/4/17). 

http://libyancivilwar.blogspot.com/2018/03/alleged-cw-attack-in-harasta-nov-18-2017.html

* Saraqeb, 2/4/18 just after Mattis clarified that, Assad attacks with chlorine-sarin cylinders, later corrected by the IIT to just-chlorine with new, sarin-like symptoms reported and/or experienced, and some random background sarin complicating tests - (activists initially reporting a sarin-chlorine attack must be confused, IIT decided in correcting them, as that makes no sense) - it effected (as IIT confirmed) just 12 confirmed people: 8 people (militants pretending to be civilians, IIT doesn't specify) in a shelter, 3 "SCD" White Helmets sent to help them, one other person in the whole town, likely one of three we've heard from affirming the attack - all seemingly close relatives of the affected militants. 

https://libyancivilwar.blogspot.com/2019/11/the-nonsense-gassing-of-militants-in.html

* Assad was smart enough to wait a year plus three days after Khan Sheikhoun before before he did that kind of big sarin massacre again in a non-ISIS rebel place: in Douma, the last and lost "rebel" bastion threatening Damascus, sarin and chlorine cylinders killed some 180+ civilians, leading to swift US-led military strikes - then when sarin couldn't appear for whatever reason, the chlorine alone just killed 42+, which itself is astounding. How the other 140 actually died: never explained. I guess they just didn't? Some insiders who should know say 187 were in fact killed, and they still seem to think it was sarin. 

https://libyancivilwar.blogspot.com/2019/04/douma-chemical-massacre-187-killed.html

* And Assad's brilliant sarin strategy is laid bare. Right?

Add 4/24: thanks to "Gumby JD" (tweet) another twist in that strategy: 

To believe a defected CW program expert Abdel Salam Abdul Razaq*, Syria's program made sarin that was pure, colorless, odorless - no hexamine, clearly. It evaporates quickly, he says. And so they used it regularly, by December 2012 (Times of Israel - and it's not clear who error it was to call mustard gas a nreve agent). But (news to me) the fingerprint hexamine evaporate much slower, so in mixture, it makes the sarin  more likely to be found and verified (Kane via BBC). That's the stuff Assad allegedly used in 2013, to cross Obama's red line, with inspectors right there. He allegedly delayed them, and bombed the area to "erase the evidence." But he couldn't just stick with his old formula?  

* (who would later join the US-backed moderate Noureddine AL-Zenki group, Al-Qaeda allies, child beheaders and app. users of CW with Abdulrazaq their designated denier of that)

Mapping Sarin-Related Activity in Jobar, 21-24 August, 2013

February 22, 2020
incomplete
last edits Feb. 25

Likely launch site for 21 August's "volcano" rockets
Who was in control?

Initially, the August 2013 Ghouta chemical massacre was blamed on the Syrian government partly from the "fact" that the rockets though to deliver sarin nerve agent were fired from a military base fully under government control. That basis was destroyed (in January, 2014) by the work of MIT scientists Richard Lloyd and Ted Postol's finding the rockets could not have flown nearly the required distance (nearly 10 kilometers); all activity in the easten area would be within 2km, or about the area HRW happened to fill with the compass to prove their fake point. So things were left hanging and remain that way. The big question that emerged and never clearly answered: if the blamed rockets could only fly about 2km, then from whose side of what font-line were they fired?

The real question is who fired them, but … (the "volcano" rocket seems to be a government weapon despite DIY appearance - but copies could be seized, or fabricated in a different DIY process - these options have never been ruled out. In government hands its main use had been as an incendiary, fuel-air, or conventional explosives, mainly or totally in the Damascus area - except the handily red-numbered ones that tend to appear in connection with alleged sarin attacks, before and including 21 Augusr.)

... the area alone might be able to prove that, as the original claims tried to do. I always stayed uncertain; loosely following the work of others at the time (including "Sasa Wawa", Eliot Higgins, Charles Wood, others), it seemed like the firing spot would be roughly font-line either way, and lines can be penetrated. The review I just made only clarifies this point for me, but also narrows down the straight map reading. The security scene remains somewhat uncertain, but this below is pretty well-agreed by everyone for this small area, on 23/24 August.

Probably all this area had been opposition-held until offensives over the summer, with the bus station only cleared during August (Bellingcat has some apparently good review). So the green area would likely be a bit smaller and less established three days earlier, except at Thome checkpoint, which should have been active to some time on the 21st (probably after the chemical attack called in around 2 AM, but possibly taken out earlier, as in to allow the rocket launchers to pass west undetected). For all these reasons - and because it can hardly change the status of the firing spot - I'm not going to try and guess-draw what the situation was in the first few hours of that day.

Setting the firing area (so far)
I see people around leaping to erred conclusion, hopping back off them or staying out of pride, and sometimes I do that (only the former, I hope). This seems like a good subject to practice the opposite approach and crawl to the conclusion. This still isn't gospel, but my try at placing the best results yet, when I decided to re-visit the issue in 2017, and was lucky to have Michael Kobs and others step in (partial coverage here). One person involved was Chris Kabusk, who had worked with Lloyd and Postol, and had some handy tips like prior mappings, computer models, rare images. Kobs kicked my ass, and was able to get usable ranges for 5 impacts, in a graphic I show below (dubbed: roof, embedded, garage door, sheeps, wall).

Note embedded (also "impact #4" to the UN-OPCW) and garage door ae both lines, not ranges, and the same basic line. That almost seems too lucky, and I didn't verify garage door (placement or direction), but I'd guess that was good work like the rest and that red line is pretty exact at 314º, serving as the best guide. (as I recall roof was easy to get a broad reading for, sheeps and wall were a bit tricky with deflection involved, and the other field impact was so tricky we couldn't agree if it fit at all or showed a second firing direction more like 344º. )

The river/creek dividing red and green, in Kobs' graphic, runs across the widest pat of the yellow diamond shape, with just the tip in government turf. That also roughly marks the volcano's outer range. The best fit should be quite close to that line, on whichever side.

My old version to summarize was never meant to be exact, but was more inadequate than I realized, to be replaced with the area indicated above (and again at right) unless/until that's improved further. Considering the established maximum range of the "volcano" rocket of ~2 to 2.25km and where the paths best intersect, there's a fairly long but narrow area centered on a clear NW direction of approximately 315º bearing from impact #4. I let the other clues pull Kobs' line one degree clockwise, and add some wiggle-room (2-3 degrees on each side) for good measure. The bigger variable is distance out, and that's hard to set by visuals alone. Considering open areas needed (white-shaded), and rooftops being only so likely a place, across the river in government turf is no fit for distance and a lack of such areas, unless it was on the bus station's roof. But logically, using close to maximum range makes sense, as it puts them launch closer to, arguably in, the green area. Allowing a wider and longer box (gray), the bus station's lot is a possible fit at the farthest range. There are some streaks with arcs that appear, and seem worth some review (I don't know they would have an innocent explanation). In a pinch perhaps that adjacent field would fit?

But again whichever side of the river it might be pinned to eventually, this spot is not so good for proving blame; there's a crossing right there (yellow) into the bus station grounds or, for the other side, from there straight into that black boxed area.

What possibly happened there: Liwa al-Islam alleged launch video - strange case, a number of details and theories … it's not certain they even show the actual launches, so it's not clear if the area needs to share the seen details, and which details: the truck with rocket is in a field, apparently oriented near-parallel with its furrows, but it's not fired in that scene. One firing is seen (detached, with (same?) truck parked aside), apparently next to a row of trees, maybe with a pole (composite view I just made at right). And why did they light this up to be seen, just so disputed 3rd parties could stumble on and leak the video? Etc. People have been over this, probably best at the old Who Attacked Ghouta blog (first explained here, enhanced views and further discussion here - but the "geolocation" here is based on picking open areas along a firing line that didn't pan out in general - some commenters thought it was filmed clear across the country by regime stagers, and that's possible, AFAIK.)

24 August alleged sarin attack  
This is now covered in a page at A Closer Look On Syria. As related in a Dec. UN-OPCW report "on 24 August 2013, a group of soldiers were tasked to clear some buildings near the river in Jobar under the control of opposition forces," or so they were told. Around 11AM they seemed to be winning a clash when "approximately 10 meters away from some soldiers, an improvised explosive device (IED) reportedly detonated with a low noise, releasing a badly smelling gas." It's not clear from what direction it was supposedly launched. The bad/foul smell is the same in all other credibly described sarin cases. 10 soldiers were effected badly enough to evacuate to a field medical point "with breathing difficulties, blurred vision and with strange symptoms not further specified." Four of them were barely conscious.  The report continues to describe symptoms and treatments consistent with sarin exposure, blood tests said to show it, later OPCW work to verify those samples and confirm sarin still in one soldiers' blood a month after. They were too cautious to say how the sarin got there, not confirming the militant attack story, just passing it on. (See also SW report analysis)

So allegedly, terrorists were launching sarin 3 days after the Ghouta sarin attack, and the sharp tip of that point is the location. The report's Figure 7.2:

This maps out as shown above, something like 300-400 meters east of the apparent launch spot for the Ghouta massacre's alleged sarin rockets. (note a dated image was used here - the one I've used became available later, and shows the actual scene one day earlier)

Opposition CW Facility
"The United Nations Mission was also presented with two metal canisters discovered by Government soldiers during the offensive operations in Jobar on 25 August 2013 in the immediate aftermath of the incident and in close vicinity of the site of the alleged incident. These presented similar characteristics with the IEDs claimed to have been used to disperse the chemical agent in the Jobar incident on 25 August 2013"
But the incident was on the 24th, so it's not clear if these were found on the 25th or on the same day that's just given wrongly in this paragraph.

Jean Pascal Zanders:
http://www.the-trench.org/syrias-cw-declarations/
"They had an internal fill capacity of up to approximately 4 litres (see figure below). The two metal canisters are the ACW Syria declared to the OPCW."
(ACW = abandoned chemical weapons, referred to by UN chief Ban Ki Moon here: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-syria-crisis-chemicalweapons/two-abandoned-cylinders-seized-in-syria-contained-sarin-u-n-idUSKBN0FC1U420140707)

The UN-OPCW report gives several reasons to disregard the findings - e.g. sarin traces at the lab were useless because there had been mine-clearing operations, they couldn't verify custody of the evidence, what was in the lab vs. planted there, etc. Zanders would hear from people involved the sarin in the two ACWs proved the government had made it, must have planted it, and attacked its own soldiers with it, if anyone attacked them at all. (January 2016 - https://www.the-trench.org/syrian-soldiers-exposed-to-sarin )

I wanted to map this, but nothing I've seen gives or easily allows a geolocation. Some videos and a photo of OPCW inspectors give some clue, but not enough for me. "Close vicinity" is ok for now.

Tohme Checkpoint
Bellingcat early article in 2014:
"To the south of the underpass checkpoint, between Zamalka and Jobar, is Tohme checkpoint. The checkpoint is mentioned in a number of videos posted before and after the August 21st Sarin attack, and on August 22nd the checkpoint was reportedly destroyed by the opposition, … This video, published on September 6th by Orient News, mentions Tohme as a staging point for tanks used directly after the August 21st Sarin attacks
"On the eve of the chemical attack on Zamalka, rebels observed the presence of more than 15 armoured vehicles at Tohme checkpoint. Immediately after the chemical attack these vehicles made a breakthrough and reached a strategic point near Zamalka Bridge, exploiting the rebels’ busyness with helping the victims of the chemical attack.
The regime’s capture of the Southern Bypass would have enabled them to completely separated Jobar from East Ghouta."

I pondered the imagery and clashing locations - one map Bellingcat cited (right) has Tohme indicated as regime-held, along with the highway in between. On the night of 20/21 August, probably so (my map is for 3 days later). But it's placed far south, once scaled - at the (pedestrian bridge?) near the bottom edge of my new map, beneath "technologies." You can see how different that is from the better placement I have.

Bellingcat gives a different spot where local roads pass under the highway. Somehow I thought it should be on the highway, where only the purple-marked vehicles stay parked to check the few vehicles breaking the apparent rule of no civilian traffic here. At the underpass makes sense. There seems to be an object blocking the road previously, and there were apparently soldiers based in those buildings, which were reportedly bombed sometime ON 21 August, and the buildings do seem different + damaged when seen on the 23rd.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gt7kRZiGwio
Tohme buildings were stormed in Zamalka in response to the massacre and killed the shabiha

"With the help of God Almighty" Tohme checkpoint was destroyed on August 21, 2013 in a joint attack by Al-Bara Brigade and the Al-Nusra Front - "blown up by Al-Bara Brigade through a tunnel, and then another explosion was detonated by BMB, booby-trapped by the Al-Nusra Front, on August 21, 2013, and on August 24 2013, the Al-Bara Brigade stormed the buildings. Surrounding the bombing, killing the remaining regime forces and combing the buildings, seizing some weapons and ammunition, and thank God. In response to the chemical massacre of about 2AM on 21 August, completed on 21 August suggests some quick tunneling, or a pre-planned "response."
Survivors held out for thee days until al-Bara mopped them up and seized some weapons on the 24th. Four dead soldiers are seen, mostly missing their shirts, seeming variously executed and then deliberately burned. One appears shot in the chest and also has his head missing (appears more torn off than cut off?), then all the skin burned off his upper body.

Tohme Attackers
We know a bit about Jabhat al-Nusra.

Liwa al-Bara - "enmity brigade" - formed in early 2012 by Abd al-Nasr Shmeir, a captain who defected from the Syrian Army - it was allied with al-Nusa Front, would later form a coalition called Faylaq al-Rahman - Qatari-backed, "moderate" (not global-jihadist OR seeking an Islamic state in Syria), but remained allied with Al-Qaeda affiliate al-Nusa Front though its name changes. Faylaq al-Rahman would become the dominant force in inner East Ghouta (Jobar, Zamalka, to Kafr Batna sometimes ally but frequent enemy of Saudi-backed Liwa/Jaysh al-Islam, especially in 2016, following the death of JaI founder Zahran Alloush.

Aaron Lund: "In August 2012, [Shmeir] headed an armed group known as the al-Bara Battalion, which made headlines by kidnapping forty-eight Iranians on pilgrimage to the Sayyeda Zeinab shrine; Shmeir claimed that they were Iranian intelligence officers. The Iranians were released in October that year in a murky deal that involved a prisoner exchange and reportedly also a large ransom payment.53 These funds seem to have helped Shmeir remain independent of Alloush and develop the al-Bara Battalion into the much-larger Failaq al-Rahman network, which was created in late 2013."
https://tcf.org/content/report/into-the-tunnels/

2016 contention and clashes:
http://now.mmedia.me/lb/en/NewsReports/567063-damascus-rebel-group-beset-by-internal-rift
http://now.mmedia.me/lb/en/NewsReports/566833-damascus-rebels-jaysh-al-islam-running-assassination-cell


https://alshahidwitness.com/different-actors-fighting-ghouta/
"The group controls much of central and western parts of east Ghouta – Jobar, Zamalka, Ayn Tarma, Madirah, Kafr Batna, and Marj al-Sultan. The group’s leader is Abd al-Nasr Shmeir, a captain who defected from the Syrian Army in early 2012.
Faylaq al-Rahman is allied with Hayy’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which is mostly made up of members of Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, the Syrian al-Qaeda affiliate (also known as Jabhat al-Nusra). The current bout of rebel infighting largely originates from the hostility between the HTS and Jaish al-Islam."

On the White Helmets = Al-Qaeda Debate

Adam Larson (aka Caustic Logic)
February 10, 2020

The following is an opinion piece that does not necessarily reflect the view of it some readers will form, especially when reading it quickly. The target audience is people on both sides of this debate, and my aim - it's difficult to do - is to stat narrowing the divide between the sides. It was split off from a split-off pat of  a rebuttal to something, doesn't matter at this point.
---
I have not studied the White Helmets themselves as much as I could have, so I speak from a position of limited knowledge. And I don't speak to it that often either, partly lacking much to say (that I actually know) and maybe just to be "different."  But I will now step on out there with this collection of thoughts everyone can hate in their own way.

I personally find the aggressiveness and prevalence of attacks on the White Helmets to be somewhat counter-productive. The criticisms are valid; the issue I mean is only one of perceptions. Much of the public - and more so their political and thought leaders - still regard them as unambiguous heroes, following on massive efforts to enshrine that view and sideline any challenges to it. So naturally, in this unnatural situation, they'll see repeated charges of an extreme character as propaganda targeting good guys, probably organized by the same bad guys who already routinely bomb the heroes just for rescuing people (insult to injury and all that). The way attacks are amped-up every time the WH win an Oscar or whatever is only natural, but also might feed into this problematic disconnect.

What might help is a clearer establishment of incontrovertible points along the debate spectrum that all sides have to agree to, to start narrowing this gap. The bigger problem is on the side that rejects all evidence of wrongdoing to maintain their sterling image of the "Syrian Civil Defense," who have "saved 100,000 lives" and done 0 wrong. They really need to work on that, but as usual any progress would have to be led by the awake people among us setting the example, even knowing it probably won't be followed.

The debate has been "Are the White Helmets terrorists, yes or no?" Maybe we can get to more people on both sides agreeing the answer is not binary and total like that, and shift it to debating the proportions; does that formula apply closer to 1% or to 99%? I'd guess it's a lot closer to 99% but either way it's probably somewhere on that scale ignored in the yes-no debate. Might it vary from place to place or at different times? For example do we know they've never rescued anyone? I don't believe so. So we could use that (as I do) to acknowledge they might be rescuers to some degree, AND terrorists (or terrorist enablers) to some degree. They might save a cat stuck in a tree, deliver food to an old lady, AND assist in a beheading or facilitate the kidnapping of an entire village, besides any number of more banal activities between these extremes.

Pause for an example of trying too hard to negative effect: did we ever prove "baby Aya" was an extremely realistic doll designed with facial abrasions and a grimace of pain, that the WH used for a fake rescue video? Was the audio truly proven altered, or did some paid people just say that? It seemed to me it fit the video pretty well. Does her mouth really not move because she's a doll, or dead? Was it perhaps because her jaw was broken? Did that get ruled out? A lot of effort, some fundraising, was going into some stupid project about that, what many would reasonably see as literally dehumanizing a Syrian child just to score some pretty minor points against the WH. Minor? Yes. At great risk to one's credibility, the hope was to maybe prove ONE rescue video was staged. It makes limited sense, there is no such doll, and it runs these risks. Another question anyone supporting that project might ask themselves: how well has it worked at convincing the other side vs. just pissing them off? How much better or worse would it be if they ever brought the alive baby Aya back on camera with scars visible in the same spots? She could appear with her possible father and the WH rescuer, whom he'll praise for saving his girl, who IS NOT A DOLL, YOU PRO-ASSAD LIARS! (his words, imagined). There's also the question of just HOW she actually came to be injured. buried in rubble. How much progress was made to figuring that out? These are the kind of questions some of us could stand to think through more carefully, in my humble opinion.

But we know the White Helmets operate freely in areas ruled by the off-and-on Al-Qaeda affiliate al-Nusra Front (later JFS, HTS) and other extremist groups, and never seem to report any of their crimes. But so far the other side finds that okay based on their view of things, which includes almost no reason to suspect serious crimes to BE exposed.*

* After all, from 2014 forward, these have been the guys fighting ISIS! Before that they were briefly allies of ISIS who fed them a starting membership, and before that "bad cop" came along, the biggest worry HAD been … Al-Nusra front! They now get to be the "good guys" - not just the "good cop" in a massive and perhaps accidental set-up. So yeah, they're "moderate" ... in their pursuit of Islamist, terrorist, criminal and/or genocidal intentions. The "moderation" seems to be geographical; the "Nusra" (victory) this front sought ONLY referred to Syria, roughly (second and third names clarified that). They're aiming it just at the Syrian people, not at the West, not now, under the current banner(s) of "Jabhat al-Namechange".

Still, we can all kind of agree JaN is at the least … maybe not totally good? Potentially problematic? Enough clear cases are probably established to prove at least some cross-over membership between the White Helmets and JaN and other groups of the same basic character, and several undeniable manifestations of very common ideological sympathy, which gets closer to the point. There is probably zero crossover with secular groups or any non-Sunni members, I imagine? That SHOULD be a red flag to everyone. The rescuers have also been caught assisting in public executions by Islamists, celebrating over executed and dismembered Syrian soldiers, etc. These all bear repeating as needed. Their likely assistance in staging chemical attack scenes, which might involve mass murder in gas chambers, is a crazy-sounding notion that's emerged from the evidence anyway, time and again and again back to 2012. And I would not be surprised if the alleged role of some White Helmets in kidnapping and organ harvesting were true and not even exaggerated. Points like these obviously can't be ignored, even if they're not such good "selling points."

Nuances aside, the people they're accused of being - and at least partly ARE - rank among the worst that ever lived. A genocidal Al-Qaeda terrorist isn't any better just because he's also got that helmet, because he can brag he's not with "ISIS," or because his terrorism is "alleged" - or even poorly alleged at times - as well as being horribly real.

Finally, what I think underpins their undue popularity more than anything else is what they're being compared to - a genocidal regime backed by a great world power, raining death in a thousand forms upon its own people - wiping them out, crushing their spirits, with barrel bombs, chemical bombs, Shabiha thugs in-home stabbing massacres, shooting protesters, their own soldiers and police, false-flag assassinating their own officers just to blame "terrorists," mass kidnapping and detentions, mass torture, strangely selective starvation embargoes of Islamist-held areas, mass rape, mass stab-shoot-burn-bombing of babies specifically, as often as possible, always denying it brazenly, after leaving all the evidence for activists to load up in their trucks and show the "world community" who ask no questions and just add it to this run-on sentence of a fake chiaroscuro painting that's got all this looming like a 9/11 dust plume above a small but defiant man in tan, blue elbows, a bright light from heaven beaming down, shining off a spartan White Helmet.

That is a nice painting, bound to win awards, hearts, and some weaker minds with little effort. But we should be more interested in reality here, and some 95% of that canvas is filled with horrors that are partly or even mostly invented. Correcting this painting, to me, is a higher priority than attacking that little man in the lower right corner, giving people undue reason to paint you in as one of the swooping demons.

Worse yet, however many claims are untrue, most of them involve genuine deaths and unnecessary suffering inflicted on innocents, including women, children and babies. When and if the "Assad regime" is NOT to blame for this … who is? The White Helmets would be keeping that from us in however many cases they shared in falsifying the blame. That is - we can't be certain how widely they engage in such lies, but where they do they also tend to cover for genuine crimes by their foreign-backed "moderate" Islamist partners.

With that, I step back out of the White Helmets discussion for now.

More on the Alleged Chlorine attack of 25 March, 2017

Re-Considering the IIT's Nine Unsolved CW Cases
More on the Alleged Chlorine attack of 25 March, 2017
November 27, 2019
rough, incomplete
updates to ...Dec. 5

Note: this is my second and far better post on this alleged chlorine attack on a cave hospital in Al-Latamnah, Hama, but was originally half-written as part of this post regarding the alleged sarin attack in the same town the day before.

Comparison with Douma, 2018
OPCW FFM report S/1636/2018, 13 July 2018 https://www.opcw.org/fileadmin/OPCW/S_series/2018/en/s-1636-2018_e_.pdf
1.9 The alleged incident of 25 March was widely reported in the media as targeting an area where an operating field hospital was located and in which one “barrel” cylinder fell inside the main entrance hall of the hospital and a doctor lost his life.
/5.44 "...Due to the impact, the head of the cylinder cracked releasing a gas inside the hospital. The gas was described by witnesses as yellow, with a pungent and irritating smell, and since the hospital was carved inside a rock formation, the gas was rapidly dispersed in the rooms of the cave."
5.45 "The signs and symptoms reported by the casualties shortly after the dispersion of the gas include shortness of breath, moderate to severe cough, mucosal membrane irritation, blurred vision, lacrimation, expectoration, and vomiting. People located close to the entrance escaped immediately through the emergency exit."

But when the same kind of chlorine cylinder is said crash into an apartment building in Douma, on 7 April, 2018, and where the OPCW was able to verify no sarin or anything was added to the chlorine, the given story was far different. As we heard, the 50-60 people in the basement 3 floors below the impact were chased out by the sinking gas, ran up to the street, then back inside and up, into the denser gas, then dropped dead or paalyzed. And thus 35+ people died - or close to 200 by a strangely credible alternate tally. Here at the Latamnah hospital, it spreads horizontally, through a space of unclear size, but limited by how much carving they did. People react more normally, by reports, all fleeing the gas to fresh air, with no one blacking out or dropping dead on the way. And so all staff and patients lived, except those involved in that dubious alleged surgery. These were said to require rescue, which would be abnormal, but then we hear they died only the way to the hospital or later in the day, or never - none of them instantly. Neither story is truly plausible, but vis-a-vis the effects of chlorine, the hospital incident is far more realistic.

Narrative discrepancies
One vs. four chlorine cylinders:
S/1636 explains one cylinder crashed into the hospital entrance, and three others landed in various spots, including one about 50 meters to the northwest of the hospital entrance.

But to Human Rights Watch for their "death by chemicals" report, Dr. Mahmoud al-Mohammad, the manager of the hospital] said "A helicopter dropped two barrels. … One barrel with explosives fell about fifty meters from the hospital, the other hit the roof of the hospital.[18]" Two other bombs of whatever kind might also have been dropped and he didn't know about it, but we seem to have a disagreement on the one at 50 meters.

WH Hazmat: "Two barrels of chlorine gas" were dropped. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9MCiIMFG1uU

Attack time:
A Syria Direct report heard it happened "at 1:30pm" citing "Abadah al-Mansour, the hospital’s spokesman"
HRW report: "around 3 p.m."
The OPCW FFM's S/1636: "at about 15:00."

Visually, shadows are fairly long and from near due west, in the few WH photos published. Just before DST kicks in, this should probably be around 3 PM or later, not close to 1:30. But it's impossible to say from the pictures what has happened before and how long it took. Sometimes the outside view is the one that got hushed up because it was a clue to the reality of events.

One assistant wounded, or two? Again the spokesman to Syria Direct has the outside view ...

To the extent providing a photo of a cylinder impact counts as a narrative detail, a certain White Helmets guy seems to have the outside view on how many chlorine cylinders crashed inside the hospital. ...

Symptoms
S/1636, 5.45 The signs and symptoms reported by the casualties shortly after the dispersion of the gas include shortness of breath, moderate to severe cough, mucosal membrane irritation, lacrimation - all good. Less consistent, blurred vision, vomiting.

Syria Direct: "“most of the injured suffered from fainting, red eyes and shortness of breath”, the Hama Civil Defense reported." Chlorine does not make you pass out.

The Fatalities
Dr. Darwish died, and it was from chlorine, he'd have badly burned eyes, damaged lungs, pulmonary edema - he'd suffocate on fluids. Even with medical help, death can occur after hours or days of struggle and the best care available, if the initial damage was severe enough. I'm still not convinced that is what killed this man. His eyes look tired, but not reddened or swollen. Otherwise, it is hard to really say from just an image like this.

As for the other two reported to die - a first responder (not the treating nurse?) and the boy they operated on. HRW: "Dr. al-Mohammad, the hospital manager, said that the attack killed three people due to chlorine exposure: Dr. Ali Darwish, the hospital’s orthopedic surgeon who was conducting a surgery at the time of the attack, the patient in surgery, and one first responder," and "Abd al-Munaf Faraj al-Saleh, the head of Syria Civil Defense in al-Lataminah, confirmed that the attack killed three people." HRW heard the assistant lived but "was still receiving treatment in Turkey as of April 8."

But in the OPCW report, it says "The patient was anesthetised and intubated to protect the respiratory airway. ... According to accounts, the surgical patient was only mildly affected due to the previously mentioned airway protection. However, Dr. Darwish and his assistant were severely affected. ... Dr. Ali Darwish, the assistant, and the patient were rescued by the SCD and were also transported to MF-A ...Critical patients such as Dr. Ali Darwish and the assistant were immediately transferred to other hospitals. Dr. Ali Darwish died on the way to Medical Facility C (MF-C). The assistant was transferred to a hospital in a neighbouring country."

The likely boy victim by deduction: http://www.vdc-sy.info/index.php/en/details/martyrs/186770#.Xd0SDndFyP8
Ayham Saedo Hamadeh age 13, Shepherd, from Lattamna, killed 3-25 by "shelling." (No deaths from chemicals are reported for this incident -
http://www.vdc-sy.info/index.php/en/details/martyrs/186769
"warplane shelling" cited for Dr. Darwish). Was Mr. Hamadeh tending his sheep when he was hit by a rocket or mortar shell, prior to dying in the chlorine attack?

As seen on Facebook, perhaps already dead, but among suffocating patients arrived in Turkey. Tubes still in, eyes look possibly swollen, but pretty unclear. What did they allegedly do for eye protection? Why was this surgery so goddamned important, allegedly?

We hear consistently that Dr. Ali al-Darwish was an orthopedic surgeon, so he worked with the musculoskeletal system by training. This is important work - sewing up injure arms and legs, feet and hands, and more. But it's generally not life-saving work. That's what he should have been doing, and we don't hear any different, though it's possible he was working past his expertise in something that was life-or-death. Otherwise - and even then - he exercised very poor judgment in continuing the procedure. Abadah al-Mansour, the hospital’s spokesman praised the selfless choice: “He refused to leave so he could save the patient ... He paid the price for that with his life." But he also paid with the life of the boy he was 'trying to save' from... an injury that was probably not life-threatening. That's not giving your lie to save one, it's taking it plus another through idiotic choices, besides leaving an assistant - or two, according to the spokesman - in critical condition. Well, they didn't assist Dr. Darwish very well by suggesting they leave and try the surgery later. Can you see the three of them standing there in the gas, eyes burning, barely able to see though the tears, coughing and choking, doubled over puking sometimes, but still fast at work with the scalpels and so on? It's absurd. In fact, the choice of these men to stay is so poor it's highly questionable it was ever made. There may be a true story of these deaths that remains concealed.

The boy might have suggested they leave, but he was reportedly "anesthetised and intubated to protect the respiratory airway," probably left unconscious and helpless. The likely victim, by deduction, listed at VDC: Ayham Saedo Hamadeh age 13, Shepherd, from Lattamna, killed 3-25 by "shelling." (No deaths from chemicals are reported for this incident - "warplane shelling" cited for Dr. Darwish). Was Mr. Hamadeh tending his sheep when he was hit by a rocket or mortar shell, prior to dying in the chlorine attack? So he was probably knocked out right away, and the grown-ups wanted them all to stay. Tehn, even when it got truly intolerable, they never did chose to leave - eventually it seems they passed out or foamed at the mouth or whatever nonsense, so the White Helmets had to go in and rescue them. "5.48 ... Dr. Ali Darwish, the assistant, and the patient were rescued by the SCD and were also transported to MF-A."

The first responder: not specified as a White Helmet, a "first responder" was also killed, as the FFM heard it. This is mysterious. It's not specified if he died from a first response (like from secondary contamination, as with sarin?) or just standing in the wrong place (no impact deaths mentioned) or stayed well past his first responding to slowly die in the hospital, maybe helping with that surgery or for some other unexplained reason. There's no clear match (perhaps no match at all) for this victim at the VDC listed for 25 March or the following two days (checking men from the area killed by 'warplane shelling" "shelling' or CW).

Jaysh al-Izza commander: The spokesman for this ruling militant group said, in the STEP News video related below, the "chlorine gas and other toxic substances" used at the hospital "led to the martyrdom of Dr. Ali Darwish and the military commander of Jaysh Al-Izza, Hamidou Lahdiri." A 25 March tweet also suggests he died from the gas, naming and showing two "martyrs, God willing: - Dr. Ali Darwish, and Abdul Hameed Al-Hudairi, both explained by "the regime's warplanes and Russia are bombing with poisonous gases. God is with us."

But other sources disagree. While most sources don't say how he died (just that he was a "hero" and "the finest Mujahid" and had Hamidou as a nickname), he's listed by VDC as Abd al-Hamid Ahmad al-Hdairi ( Arabic: عبد الحميد أحمد الحضيري), FSA, age 37, from Lattamna but killed in "North Hama countryside" by "shooting" done by Syrian armed forces. This sounds like an explicitly different story with a locale, but then "shooting" sometimes seems to be the generic cause of death for any "FSA" fighter where the cause is unknown or meant to be obscured. In a linked video he's seen dead, washed and wrapped for burial. There are no injuries from the neck up, which is all we see, and he has sort of purple lips. That moderate cyanosis probably means prolonged suffocation prior to death. Maybe he was shot in the lungs, or maybe he died like these others are saying, suffocating fom chemically damaged lungs.

It was a bit confusing to find another 37-year-old Hudairi man from Latamnah dying a week earlier: I thought HAMAH NOW on Mar 19, 2017 must have had a different name and an earlier death for this hero: "Mohammad Abdul Qader Al-Hudhairi, 37 years old, died from the city of Latamna due to ..." Shooting? Chlorine + mystery gas? It cuts off and the link is dead, and comes up nowhere else I found. But the VDC helps with a seperate listing for Mohammad Abd al-Qader al-Qasem al-Hdairi, 37, from Latamnah, killed by bombing over in Khan Sheikhoun on the 19th. A smiling young child is actually shown, with an older man's face (his?) half-cropped off, and looking different from the fighter's.

This would be quite a coincidence, and it may not be one; the VDC only lists 15 people of this name dying in the whole war (Arabic list, all but one hailing from Lattamna. Five of these were killed at once shelling, 19 Octber, 2016 with an Abdul Kareem al-Hadhiri family hit: this name appears on 4 children killed that day: khaled, 10 - another Khaled? age 5 - an infant girl Sundus - Ahmad, age 12 And a woman named Zamzam Hudairi died 4 days later Due to her wounds sustained by the shelling on 19-10-2016. No one else appears until these two 37-year-old men a week apart, and then just one more in 2017, one in 2019, end list. This might suggest some family targeting in two phases, but that could also be too imaginative.

Now, recalling the unexplained first responder - he could be a White Helmet in a van, like the one we see impacted and burned (below). But that appears to be a militant van and area, so maybe that's where "commander" Hudairi was? Maybe he was called a first responder because he was also a White Helmet (not that we hear) or just because that seemed like a passable story for the van impact near the hospital. Or perhaps the militant and responder are two distinct men who both died in this event, and had that poorly explained. That would make four deaths if so.

Sarin
Traces: f/c - or see here.

Hints: March 25: Shajul Islam seems to claim the attack this day (penetrating the cave hospital in Latamnah) was by chlorine, and by sarin, in the same tweet (in the video, he reported chlorine like most did, but the text claims sarin - via Qoppa999 shortcut). Then on the 26th he claimed "I am so unwell now. Not sure what it is. I have been treating so many patients from chemical attacks this week without any sort of protection for myself or others around me. We just don't have any." We knew of two chlorine attacks by this point, one of them on this day, and no sarin ones. Chlorine causes no secondary exposure, which he seems to be hinting at. He's more explicit with this Facebook post and video of the same day: "URGENT! We are getting so many patients with gas poisoning. This attack is from Al Lataminah in Northern Hama. This seems very toxic and has killed a doctor ( Ali Darwish) who was treating the patients. We have seen chlorine gas attacks, but this is not the same. The patients are dying very fast. We now strongly suspect its Sarin Gas. CAN YOU HELP US." (ACLOS)

A spokesman (or leader? unnamed?) of Jaish al-Izza (speaking in front of their logo) also said "chlorine gas and other toxic substances" were used. He also says "this is the first time they target the hospital with chemical gases of this type, toxic gases of a new type with chlorine," causing the death of Dr. Darwish and a fellow commander of Jaish al-Izza. He's not clear if this is the first time that possible sarin was used in the area, just the first time at the hospital. But he doesn't say anything to directly support the alleged sarin attack elsewhere in the same town just the day before that (and this would probably have effected fighters of the same group, so he'd hear about it).

Now, he doesn't specify this other chemical made the chlorine more deadly, but it's odd how a few people knew to specify something else when nothing else has been accepted as used, and yet sarin traces did turn up. It seems plan A was to claim sarin mixed in on the 25th, and a later plan B was to concoct an event the day before to explain its presence.

Mapping the 4 alleged impacts 
Impact #1 is the famous one of the four alleged impacts that pierced the roof and got inside the hospital. Here's the FFM's image to show how it fits on the satellite map. The actual location is on the west edge of Latamnah. (coordinates: 35.19.32N, 36.36.43E)

The impact they agree on is questionable but possible, depending. It would take a lot of force to penetrate a couple meters of soil - or more like one meter? - and then reinforced concrete. Dropped from a helicopter it might have enough force - also perhaps fired straight up from the ground, for a maximum fall back to the earth might do it, especially if it had extra weight added somehow... (this capability isn't proven, but is often suggested - they have some way or launching these things with a Hell Cannon of whatever). So it remains uncertin whether this is all from such an impact, and also just what that would mean.

(enhanced area and red lines to show possible rebar grid faintly visible)

(as seen from below - note beyond flash-illuminated concrete jumble are gaps of earth color, app. lit by natural sunlight)

5.59 The impact location of the hospital as indicated by witnesses are shown in Figure 13. The first cylinder (1) pierced the rooftop of the ER at the entrance of Ltamenah Hospital. The second cylinder, third cylinder, and fourth cylinder fell to the ground at the respective distances of approximately 50 meters northwest to the hospital, 200 meters east to the hospital, and 100 meters to 150 meters south to the hospital. Witnesses reported that vegetation appeared burnt for about 100 metres from the impact points."

Mapped out here, roughly: impacts 3 and 4 should be in or near those red circles, which are at other dug-in areas, likely connected to the same underground complex. This goes to suggest a regime bombing plan to punch gas into the ER, and flood the exits as well. And also to drop a bomb on a random spot a bit NW of the entrance - or perhaps at the other entrance, if they mean north...
FWIW 25 March wind rep. still or to the east. Darksky gave 4m/s to the west.

Impact 2 is important - no clear marks appear close to 50 MW of the hospital entrance, comparing Google Earth images from Feb. 20 and April 2 of 2017. The impact might be invisible or unclear from that level - the damage should be minimal if it were just a chlorine tank (recalling the hospital manager claimed an explosive bomb landed there). Larger craters further out predate the February image. It's claimed an explosive barrel and/or a chlorine cylinder landed around here, but visually it could be nothing did ...

"5.60 Based on the analysis of the digital evidence gathered by the FFM from different sources, including witnesses, the FFM could account for three cylinders and three craters/impact points. Three of the craters/impact points are shown in Figure 14." They aren't shown very well, but it's better than nothing.

As the hospital impact into the roof (1) is shown first (left)*, logically the others show … two of the other three, seemingly unspecified, but likely in numerical order. The second scene that witnessed some fire-like burning has a steep rise very nearby - a wall or a cliff - to cast that even shadow. This area might be dug into a cliff, perhaps north-facing. That could be impact 2 (if northwest meant north) … but that area is shown in a photo, and it doesn't look like any burned impact area is back there:

So impact 3 is even better suggested for that second image. If they're in order, the other would be impact 4, and the important impact 2 - that might be an explosive "barrel" that left no mark and/or was the spot people washed off sarin the day before (see below) - this is the one that couldn't be seen or clarified.

* this is debatable, but the debate is lame. This is a dep hole into dirt, a narrow section of gray stuff, and then open black space - the ER as more widely seen from below. In fact along the edges of the gray layer (the concrete) can be seen faint lighter sections at right angles to each other and to the visible building lip/outer wall there on the right. That's rebar, as a better quality image would prove.

Aaaand, FWIW, sorry - whatever the shown cylinder hit MIGHT have included rebar. That's worth something, but not a proof's prize. I don't even need to label what here looks like a sharp imprint of narrow-gauge metal rod, apparently after an impact with some earth had deformed the thing, flattening its impacting end. I'm NOT convinced this proves anything like the attack reported, but I have to acknowledge it suggests - at least - better-than-usual falsification of the evidence. I think that's the very couch in the entry they claim it came to rest on. Note also: brown liquid at lower left - this comes up in other cases and seems to be a real chlorine sign.

The other seen cylinder(s)
We hear of 4 alleged chlorine cylinder impacts, and see the important impact and cylinder fairly well, poor views of 2 other impacts, but little of the other cylinders. One that's clearly different was shown to HRW by WH member Abd al-Munaf Faraj al-Saleh as hitting the hospital on 25 March, as if it were THE cylinder in question (HRW wasn't sure, considered multiple cylinders likely, since it was reported). Strangely, it seems to be both inside a building and atop rubble it should have created. But by the distances cited and exterior impacts shown by the FFM, the other three should all have landed outdoors. we have to wonder where was this image taken? Is it misattributed? I've seen it before, but I don't recall if it was in a different context ...

It seems to have landed sideways like this to be so flattened, and its valve assembly is intact. There aren't any visible splits, but it might have released gas - the signs aren't clear to me one way or the other (possible brown residue).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rm1g5fSfDUE
Step News footage via SNHR video shows two further cylinders - one to go with the burnt patch outside, and the other also outside, and not at the torn up crater the FFM showed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9MCiIMFG1uU
Thiqa news agency video: the burnt cylinder? Hard to correlate any details, but logically there should only be one that was burnt - this is unusual. It seems that's because it crashed into this van parked just inside an entrance to a dug-in garage area, maybe while the engine was running, or whatever causes it to burst unto flames. Or someone deliberately burned it after the fact.

Seeing the widely distorted roof, the split of it on the near side, and the sharp dent in the window frame below that, it seems to me this thing came in - if it did - at a pretty sideways angle, not the nose-down position

Later, it would be pulled out, along with some identifiable parts - like the little wheels we've seen with its aerial harness, the main point of which is to make it come in nose-first.  That stuff would be  laid on the burnt ground, maybe after the van was towed away, or still parked nearby. Noting some mud atop the charring, this only makes sense. It was burnt, the moved to drop an end in the mud.

Above we noted the burnt patch was seen in the shade of a nearby wall, suggesting a dug-in area like this. Through the wreckage, we can see there's another cave on the perpendicular wall. Both walls are in the shade, at roughly mid-day, so neither faces south.

This almost has to be impact 4, at one of these two areas, as seen clearly in a Feb. 2017 image, then less so on 2 April. A week later, there's no clear sign of a wrecked van or a burnt patch, but they were probably in there somewhere.  The site of impact 3 seems to be just a quarry, with no signs of dug-in activity like this. Impact 2 was vague, but could be the dug-in area just north of impact 1. But in all views, that seems to have simple walls lacking cave entrances on all sides. Below: views from February and April, compared to the WH photo above, with the oblique wall stretched a bit: no sign of an entrance, but this is a bit fancy for a simple parking area and turnaround. Wall appearance with patching, etc. on the far face, topped with a straight, roof-like top, suggests there might be an egress here, that the people in that SAMS truck recently used.

We still have an apparent earth-impacting cylinder that's unplaced, and an impact with no cylinder also unplaced. We have enough seen to go with one exterior cylinder that's unplaced, now that #4 is roughly placed. We also have the 4th cylinder HRW showed, but it may not even fit in the accepted narrative. "The FFM could account for three cylinders and three craters/impact points," they explained, showing the 3 impact spots above. They seem to think only the one "pierced the rooftop" while "the second cylinder, third cylinder, and fourth cylinder fell to the ground at the respective distances" given and shown above. It sounds like they should all have landed outdoors. So the one WH Saleh showed - is this an unreported fifth cylinder while another remains unseen? Or is that the 4th cylinder? If so, we've never seen where it landed, just where it was set after they brought it inside someplace (why?) and happened to lay it on top of some rubble where something else crashed in or caused damage, besides the known damage at the entrance. Neither of those options makes a whole lot of sense.

Here's pretty much all of that in one graphic, plus a rough indication of where the sarin degradation products would appear. Here and forward I'll use cylinders A-D to describe those above, in the same order of appearance, to be clear that while cylinder 1 goes with impact 1, we don't know that 2 goes with 2 and so on. In fact there's no clear ordering for the cylinders by the FFM, and I think none shown past the one that's A here.

More Cylinder Oddities
This may all deserve its own post, but for now ...

Two further images of what I call cylinder C come from Aleppo Media Center (or an AMC) via Michael Kobs: https://twitter.com/MichaKobs/status/1165157431829291009 - this is after it was removed, I think, and set on ground that was burnt in the same fire (next to the van that's never seen, under where it was after they towed it?) Some possible salvage fom the van in the upper middle looks like ammunition boxes. In the rubble: the cylinder, intact with a dented side, valve snapped off.

To the left AND the right are two little bars with tiny wheels - these look just like the wheel-axles seen after 2018 chlorine attacks, as in Douma (visuals below). Said to be part of the aerial harness that lets it be rolled from a helicopter and then to have its fins help orient the bomb to fall nose-first. AFAIK this harness isn't alleged in 2017 chlorine attacks. No signs of this appear with the other 3 cylinders linked to this event. But this might be seriously alleged. There's also some kind of bar with bolt-holes possibly related, maybe from the van. A large tubular object in the foreground should be from the van (rear door hydraulic thing?). A few lighter pieces could relate. Why does the one with such a possible contraption have to land in a vehicle and turn it all into a mixed junk pile? Strange, that … So total illusion remains pretty possible.

On the left, an almost conical metal object - I think this is deformation, not its original shape. The metal may be too heavy and iron-like to be from the most impacted parts of the van (roof, etc.). Is it possible that's one of the tailfins or another element of the aerial harness that's suggested here? The other AMC photo zooms in on this piece, finding it interesting. It is. Another metal fragment, perhaps larger, is set behind it. There may be bits of metal strips and a bar in there as well.

Absent clear fins or other unmistakable features, this implication isn't clear. But the question could be raised thusly: IF this was fitted with the harness and fins, dropped from a helicopter with all that time to get oriented right … why did it hit the van sideways, as I noted above the damage suggests? 
(image for that if it keeps seeming like a good question). Answer: it wasn't so dropped or so fitted. I scanned the apparent impact position inside the van. Some debris in  there, but not a single sign of the harness it would be in. Not one fin, wheel-axle, long or curved iron slat or anything to suggest such a device. So IF this is the same cylinder-impact and there are serious harness fragments with it later, they WERE planted.

Andrew links me to more imagery, photos on Facebook from Thiqa News Agency. Image 1 there shows cylinder A, image 6 shows cylinder D from its split-open nose-end, with odd blue material where the nozzle was. For shortage of views at lest, I'll this one here. The other images of 9 total show WH hazmat teams suiting up, some gear they use, and a lab they use for their own analysis? (all saved here if they vanish.)

But regarding those related remnants, possible ones … image 4 shows the damaged van a bit more clearly. Image 5 shows a new angle and clearer view on the cylinder inside. From this, Andrew notes the possible wheel-axis in there, and how it's in the prior view as well. Image 5 is what adds a lot.

Looking closer and letting out the seams to identify possible parts … and took a while to cut them out on a dimmed background. Between the two views I see what could be tailfin corners, and similar slats, but with holes bored in them, and some curved stuff down in the floorboard - maybe the rim of one of the rings around the harness? A partial slat seems connected to it, but otherwise  he numerous strips down the side (one of which the wheels connect to) may not appear. These maybes are marked in red. But the wheel-axle appears clearly enough, and with a short section of tube welded next to it in the middle. This is a unique feature, but here with a hole bored in it. So for now I'm undecided if there's any harness used here. But the wheel axle says with 95% certainty that's what they're saying.

Wheel-axle comparison: That's what they're saying, isn't it?

Side-things: 'conical object and other material seen from the other side, still unclear, in STEP/SNHR Testimonies video v=rm1g5fSfDUE. This has metadata I don't usually see on downloaded videos - April 2, 2017 7:33 AM. Between hi-res video and photo views in Thiqa video: cave entrance: rifles in one view then moved, a big white bin w/open lid. Chicken coop inside that cave? An intact propane cylinder is still inside the van, maybe related to the fire? Poss. shrapnel marks in the interior metal right behind it? And there's an area I'll geolocate in a bit just for good measure.

… (more forthcoming)


Other
26 March Testimonies video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9MCiIMFG1uU
Michael Kobs nailed the geolocation. ... 99% certain lineup.
https://twitter.com/MichaKobs/status/1200538315377778688
https://twitter.com/CL4Syr/status/1200657075887431680
This is how we mapped it. Things lined up but seemed quite far away, and the angle of view was questionable.

Kobs nailed it, I thought, though it did look weird. Now I think Amin2511 nailed it, without the weirdness; the view faces north-northeast like I thought, and the matching features appear closer, more like they seem. The match for a pole on the red line is less clear; it may be close, small, and invisible from space. Orange house still has no certain match, but that's likely it.
https://twitter.com/amin251/status/1200894677353926657
https://twitter.com/amin251/status/1200915273706029056
https://twitter.com/amin251/status/1200986750853758976
https://twitter.com/CL4Syr/status/1201061959275167744
https://twitter.com/CL4Syr/status/1201070435875446784
The location may not matter, but after all this work ... there's the view lineup, and more importantly,
the details at the cave entrance that clarify the match.

This STILL puts it NOT at the stricken hospital - not that surprising as they say it was out of service, maybe not even the best place to meet for interviews. This view location also identifies a cave area we didn't know about before right in the middle of town. Here are the 3 locales in question on the map.

The video was uploaded on 26 March, probably shot earlier the same day. My download somehow has a date of 2 April, 2017 attached. That might be a clue or might not be. The content of what's said is of some interest, and a translation is pending included below.

From that, STEP News video's 2nd interviewee, a White Helmet who says "We are the northern countryside of Hama Latamna civil defense center 114" The Eastern Arabic number 114 is also seen on the flag behind the man interviewed in the other video. (Amin2511) So presumably, this centrally-located cave compound is "civil defense" center 114.

The exact White Helmets van seen here was also seen waiting to remove patients from the hospital the previous afternoon (top image at right). The man speaking is …(Saleh?) - likely this is his own boss man's van, so he headed up the rescue of those somewhat implausible vicitms and also handles this interview. On he door in red: perhaps "no weapons" ? That does sound like a special kind of WH ride.

As Kobs notes, the same man is also a leading face in the hazmat crew after the 30 March incident. (Combined images in tweet below)

Video Translations: Amin2511 crunched the consonants once again.

The geolocated 26 March interview, 2 speakers
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9MCiIMFG1uU

In the name of God the Merciful: The city of Latamna was targeted with chlorine gas on 25/03/2017 at three o'clock except quarter (2:45?) two barrels of chlorine gas targeted the field hospital, from a helicopter that took off from Hama Military Airport, headed north targeting the field hospital. Civil defense teams responded to the incident and evacuated more than 30 cases from the hospital. Three people were killed, including an (alternate?) doctor. The hospital was completely discontinued (put out of service) and one of the vehicles was burned. We noticed symptoms on civilians: redness in the eyes, fainting, vomiting, (foam) out of the mouth, difficulty breathing.

Yesterday the Al-Latamina field hospital was exposed to a chlorine gas raid that resulted in suffocation of medical staff and patients. Doctor Ali Darwish from the hospital staff was martyred. Here the strike place of the barrel of chlorine gas exploded in the heart of the hospital, inside the hospital.






STEP news video, 2 speakers
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_4rGKGuTc4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rm1g5fSfDUE

Jaish al-Izza spokesman? (that's their logo)
On March 25, 2017, the surgical hospital in the city of Latamna was targeted with chlorine gas and other toxic substances. This led to the martyrdom of Dr. Ali Darwish and the military commander in Jaish al-Izza, Hamidou Lahdiri. This is the first time they target the hospital with chemical gases of this type, toxic gases of a new type with chlorine.

In the name of God the Merciful: We are the northern countryside of Hama Latamna civil defense center 114. The city of Latamna is being bombed by Russian warplanes and regime airplanes
Yesterday, the regime's helicopter gunship targeted the Latamneh field hospital and took it out of service. This resulted in suffocation. About 50 injuries, suffocation, fainting and the death of Dr. Ali Dwaish (Darwish). One civilian died in the hospital. We transferred the injured to Kafr Zita Surgical Hospital and there were cases transferred to Bab El Hawa



Related
Hospital Mapping
An effort at visually mapping the hospital interior from video, by Michael Kobs
https://twitter.com/MichaKobs/status/1200331781200896006
https://twitter.com/MichaKobs/status/1200332117407928320
rev https://twitter.com/MichaKobs/status/1200506914767036416

And the exterior
https://twitter.com/MichaKobs/status/1200332117407928320

and the entryway with cylinder impact
https://twitter.com/MichaKobs/status/1200321483966468096

Hospital founders:
UC Berkely HRLab report translates a sign inside the entrance using rebel colors to declare “alLataminah Surgical Hospital - created and founded by Jaysh al-Ezza.” Google translate gives "army of pride" as the meaning of "جيش العزة"
https://humanrights.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/publications/hama_report-_final_190111.pdf

ACLOS: "A video cited below on the March 30 attack, declares that's the third chlorine attack in recent days, explaining "On Sunday, March 26, 2017, a medical official at the Al-Latamneh hospital told Smart that a number of civilians, including women and children, and fighters of the Izz al-Din al-Azza of the Free Army had been suffocated following the helicopter's flight for the second day in a row. Contains "chlorine gas poison". The first time was March 25, as addressed above. There's no other supporting claim for a March 26 incident.
http://acloserlookonsyria.shoutwiki.com/wiki/Alleged_Chemical_Attacks,_March_25-April_3,_2017#March_26.2C_Latamnah

Jaysh Al-Izza, Wikipedia - "Union of Glory" - it doesn't specify in the sidebar if they're Islamist or what, but a senior commander was disgraced football star Abdelbaset al-Sarout from Homs, an Islamist involved in sectarian massacre marketing from late 2011, who's been a media darling and only considered joining Islamic State. But he sided with Al-Namechange Front instead, the good cop half of the Al-Qaeda presence in Syria, and stayed so until he was killed in June, 2019 (WP for him).

Mr. Sarout and/or his associates are likely to be involved in staging these CW events on March-April, 2017, probably in conjunction with al-Nusra. They might also be subjected to attacks by their erstwhile allies. As explained above, Jaysh al-Izza claims one of their commanders, Hudairi, was killed along with Dr. Darwish in the 25 March attack.

Do they run the base in the south of town said to be gassed on the 24th and the 30th? Will try to find out. They may run a large base just south of the cave hospital. Running some 300 meters, it has several entrances, if maybe none for vehicles (or the doors close to look like cliff walls?). but a lot for foot traffic. It runs wide and deep, with apparent ventilation shafts hacked into the limestone (blue boxes here). We don't see this at the hospital, and it as noted they had poor ventilation - especially relative to the militants down the road? From Feb. 2017 Google Earth images:

Sources:

My first post: https://libyancivilwar.blogspot.com/2017/03/syria-chlorine-allegations-march-25.html

ACLOS wiki page on this and other incidents in the surrounding days and area: http://acloserlookonsyria.shoutwiki.com/wiki/Alleged_Chemical_Attacks,_March_25-April_3,_2017#March_25.2C_Latamnah

OPCW FFM report S/1636/2018, 13 July 2018 https://www.opcw.org/fileadmin/OPCW/S_series/2018/en/s-1636-2018_e_.pdf

Hosp. post-attack video:
https://twitter.com/MajidMajidy_1/status/866735036472713216
https://twitter.com/alihamed2016/status/847176627582849025

Syria Direct report
http://syriadirect.org/news/surgeon-killed-dozens-injured-in-suspected-north-hama-%E2%80%98chlorine-gas%E2%80%99-attack/

https://humanrights.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/publications/hama_report-_final_190111.pdf
CHEMICAL STRIKES ON AL-LATAMINAH MARCH 25 & 30, 2017
by students at the UC Berkeley Human Rights Investigations Lab (“HRC Lab”), so sharper than high-school kids by a bit. (got hospital location wrong, but everyone did)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1HY3ySGtrgM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rm1g5fSfDUE
Hama- al Latamina: testimonies on regime shelling using poison gases on latamina Hospital 25 3 2017 - 1:38, good cylinder views