‘Obama nearing decision to arm Syrian rebels’

US President Barack Obama is prepared to arm Syrian rebels with lethal weapons, taking another step in support of the opposition after providing its ranks with training and nonlethal aid, the Washington Post has reported.

Washington last week announced it believed chemical weapons were mobilized and used in Syria, an act Obama said would change “how the United States approaches” the Syrian civil war.

While the administration was still pursuing a diplomatic solution to the ongoing conflict, it was also starting to plan for and discuss the option of shipping arms to opposition forces, unnamed officials told the paper.

Obama spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin following the apparent use of chemical weapons and asked him to reconsider Moscow’s support of Syrian President Bashar Assad, the article said.

Obama was expected to make a decision about arming the Syrian rebels within the next few weeks, before a meeting with his Russian counterpart scheduled for June, the report asserted.

The US has previously sent nonlethal support to the opposition forces fighting Assad. Last month the Syrian regime warned Jordan that it was “playing with fire” by allowing the US and other countries to train and arm rebels on its territory.

Syrian state television said leaks in US media show Jordan “has a hand in training terrorists and then facilitating their entry into Syria.”

One of the most powerful of the rebel groups in Syria is Jabhat al-Nusra, which recently declared its affiliation with al-Qaeda. Last December, the State Department designated the group a terrorist organization, and the administration’s opposition thus far to directly arming the Syrian opposition stems from concerns about the weapons ending up in the hands of Islamic extremists.

The American statement last week about the use of chemical agents in the Syrian civil war confirmed an earlier assessment by top IDF intelligence analyst Brig.-Gen. Itai Brun. “To the best of our understanding, the regime used lethal chemical weapons,” Brun said at a security conference in Tel Aviv.

While cautioning that it wasn’t yet clear which side was responsible for deploying chemical weapons, Obama hinted Tuesday that he would consider US military action against Syria if “hard, effective evidence” is found to bolster intelligence that chemical weapons were being used there.

“There are options that are available to me that are on the shelf right now that we have not deployed,” he told reporters, adding that the US wished to mobilize the international community rather than act on its own.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.