AMMAN, Jordan - The U.S. and several key allies looked again Wednesday for a strategy to end Syria’s civil war, their united efforts unable at the moment to stem the Assad regime’s military gains and Washington still unwilling to join those providing the rebels with lethal military aid.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said President Barack Obama won’t send American troops to Syria. But he made clear that the U.S. would give more aid to the rebels if the regime refuses to cooperate with an international effort - to be put together next month in Geneva - to form a transitional government.
“In the event that we can’t find that way forward, in the event that the Assad regime is unwilling to negotiate in Geneva in good faith, we will also talk about our continued support, growing support for opposition in order to permit them to continue to fight for the freedom of their country,” Kerry said.
Obama “has also made it clear that he intends to support the broad-based opposition, and he has taken no options off the table with respect to how that support may be provided, or what kind of support that might be,” Kerry said at a news conference with Jordanian Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh before a meeting with the foreign ministers of 10 close American partners.
Assad has said that he will not step down as a result of transition talks, and that Syria’s political future must be determined in elections.
A Jordanian-based Western diplomat, who insisted on anonymity because he is not authorized to speak publicly on the matter, said the Assad regime was proving more resilient than expected. He said his government was concluding the rebels might not be able to defeat it without greater and more direct assistance.
Some of that new resilience in the Syrian regime is because of help from Iran and the militant Hezbollah movement, he said.
Kerry warned those regime allies to stop providing assistance to Assad, saying such activity “perpetuates the regime’s campaign of terror against its own people.”
“We have to hope that Bashar Assad and his regime will understand the meaning of that and the Iranians and others will understand the meaning of that,” Kerry said. “The president will keep those options available to him short of American forces on ground.”
To that end, an administration official in Washington said the White House would soon notify Congress about an expanded package of nonlethal assistance to the Syrian rebels.
Details of the aid package are still being finalized, according to the official, who was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly and insisted on anonymity. But the package is likely to include armored vehicles and communications gear, two U.S. officials said.
As Kerry and his counterparts arrived at the meeting venue in Amman, about 250 pro-Assad demonstrators blocked the main entrance.
The protesters, a mix of Jordanians and Syrians, chanted “Death to America,” and, “Go home, Kerry we don’t want you here.”
The meeting took place a day after the Senate Foreign Relations Committee voted 15-3 to provide weapons to the rebels, the first time American lawmakers have endorsed the aggressive U.S. military step of arming the opposition.
In Syria, a key battle has been waged since Sunday over control of the western town of Qusair, which had been in rebel hands for more than a year. Qusair sits along a land corridor that links two Assad strongholds, the capital, Damascus, and the heartland of Assad’s Alawite sect along the Mediterranean coast.
Syrian troops backed by fighters from Lebanon’s Shiite Muslim Hezbollah militia have pushed into Qusair since the start of the offensive. Syria’s main opposition alliance, the Syrian National Coalition, on Wednesday urged rebel fighters from across Syria to converge on the town to help defend it.
The battle for Qusair has raised Hezbollah’s profile in Syria’s civil war. The Lebanese militia, one of Assad’s staunchest allies, initially tried to play down its involvement to avoid political backlash at home, but could no longer do so after dozens of its fighters were killed in Qusair this week, followed by funerals drawing large crowds in Lebanon.
Most of Lebanon’s Sunni Muslims back Syria’s predominantly Sunni opposition, while Shiites support the Assad regime, which is dominated by members of his minority Alawite sect,an offshoot of Shiite Islam.
Meanwhile, Israel’s air force chief warned Wednesday that tensions with Syria could escalate into a “surprise war” and that Israel needs to be ready.
The remarks by Maj. Gen. Amir Eshel echoed statements by Israel’s military chief of staff a day earlier.
“Isolated incidents can escalate very quickly and require us to be prepared in a matter of hours to operate throughout the entire spectrum … to utilize all the capabilities of the air force,” Eshel said at a strategy conference in Herzliya, near Tel Aviv.
Israel has been warily watching the Syrian civil war since it broke out in March 2011, concerned that the conflict could spill across its borders at any time.
Also Wednesday, the U.N.’s top Mideast envoy said there are mounting reports of chemical weapons use in Syria.
In response to these reports, Robert Serry told the Security Council that the United Nations is again urging the Syrian government to allow chemical-weapons experts into the country to investigate the allegations.
The Syrian government asked Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to investigate a purported chemical-weapons attack by rebels on March 19 on Khan al-Assal village in Aleppo, but insists that a probe be limited to that area. Ban is insisting on a broader investigation, including reports of a December chemical-weapons attack by the regime in Homs.
Serry gave no details on the new reports, or on who was responsible for the alleged attacks, but said the secretary-general remains “gravely concerned” about the allegations of chemical-weapons use.
Information for this article was contributed by Bassem Mroue, Bradley Klapper, Julie Pace, Matthew Lee, Jamal Halaby, Edith M. Lederer, Robert H. Reid and Albert Aji of The Associated Press.
Front Section, Pages 7 on 05/23/2013