President Donald Trump and PM Netanyahu (AP/Pablo Martinez Monsivais) (AP/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)
Netanyahu Trump

“The update given to the IDF before the attack in Syria is further proof of the strength of the relationship and depth of the connection between Israel and the US.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israel  “fully supports” the US missile attack on Syria overnight Thursday in response to a gruesome chemical weapons attack on innocent men, women and children earlier in the week, ordered by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

“In both word and action, President Trump sent a strong and clear message today that the use and spread of chemical weapons will not be tolerated. Israel fully supports President Trump’s decision and hopes that this message of resolve in the face of the Assad regime’s horrific actions will resonate not only in Damascus, but in Tehran, Pyongyang and elsewhere,” Netanyahu stated.

Close to 70 people died and at least 200 were wounded in the Syrian attack in the Idlib province. The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) reported that many people to either choked or fainted, with some foaming at the mouth. Photographs posted on social media showed rescue workers hosing down children, who were writhing in pain on the floor.

Israel was among the US allies informed in advance of the American strike, Channel 2 TV reported.

The US attack was a “suitable response to such unthinkable brutality, and an example to the entire free world,” President Reuven Rivlin declared.

“The American attack in Syria is an important, necessary and moral message by the free world, led by the United States, that the world will not tolerate the war crimes of the terror regime headed by Bashar Assad against innocent civilians,” Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman said.

“The update given to the IDF before the attack in Syria is further proof of the strength of the relationship and depth of the connection between Israel and its greatest ally, the United States,” he added.

Israeli Humanitarian Assistance

Although Israel refrained from becoming involved in the six-year-long Syrian civil war, the leadership, the IDF, hospitals and everyday citizens have been providing humanitarian assistance to innocent victims.

After news of the chemical weapons attack broke on Wednesday, Rivlin, calling it “a stain on all humanity,” demanded that the international community, “in its entirety,” come together to bring an end to “this murderous madness and ensure that such scenes will never be repeated anywhere.”

“I call on the leaders of the international community – and among them the leading powers – to act now, without delay, to stop these criminal, murderous acts taking place in Syria by the hand of the Assad regime, and to work urgently to remove all stockpiles of chemical weapons from Syrian territory,” he stated.

He pledged that Israel, “a people which survived the greatest of atrocities and rose from the ashes to be a strong and secure nation,” will do all it can to continue to aid “the survivors of the horrors in Syria.”

By: United with Israel Staff