‘Trump has no concern for Syrian gas victims’

US President Donald Trump’s ostensibly dramatic decision to order a missile strike on Syria was not based on his sympathy for victims of last week’s suspected gas attack, given his indifference to widespread human rights violations taking place in the US and other nations, says  J. Michael Springmann, a former US diplomat in Saudi Arabia.

Trump has “expressed his concern for the children of Syria based on what he got from White Helmets, a terrorist group that works only in conjunction with al-Qaeda and al-Nusra and other groups attempting to overthrow the legitimate government of Syria,” Springmann told Press TV on Sunday.

“He has no concern about the children of Palestine who have been gassed, bombed and charred with burning white phosphorus, which is impossible to extinguish,” Springmann said.

“He doesn’t care about the children or any of the people in Yemen, he’s working with the Saudis to destroy one of the poorest countries in the Arab world,” the former US diplomat added.  

Trump, who had long opposed military intervention in Syria, ordered the military attack on a Syrian airbase in Homs province on Friday.

The attack was launched just a day after he accused President Bashar al-Assad for last week’s suspected chemical weapons attack, which killed at least 70 people in the town of Khan Shaykhun in Idlib province.

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Foreign policy experts say the US bombing of Syria was done in part to deflect attention from the president’s growing list of problems at home, from the investigation of his campaign’s alleged ties with Russia to his failed healthcare legislation and blocked travel ban.

During his presidential election campaign, Trump had indicated that he would be less willing than some of his predecessors to conduct military operations against other countries.

In 2013, as a businessman, Trump advised former US President Barack Obama not to strike Syria after a sarin gas attack near Damascus was reported.

As a presidential candidate last year, Trump criticized Obama and Hillary Clinton, the former US secretary of state during Obama’s first term and Trump’s opponent in the election, for getting involved in foreign conflicts and waging wars in other countries.

Some of Trump’s far-right backers have rebelled after the military strike, criticizing the US president for abandoning his election campaign promises.

They blamed anti-Assad militants for staging a false-flag attack meant to be pinned on the Syrian government.

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