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Apr 12, 2021 14 tweets 6 min read Read on X
The OPCW IIT has concluded its investigation in to the 2018 Saraqib chlorine attack, which we investigated back in February 2018 with @STJ_SYRIA_ENG. The OPCW IIT has concluded this is yet another chemical attack by the Syrian Air Force.
The OPCW IIT report is not public yet, but in the Bellingcat + STJ investigation we identified a number of details, such as the impact site of the munitions used, in a field in between buildings in Saraqib.
Photographs of the munitions used clearly show they're the same sort of yellow chlorine cylinders used in many other chlorine attacks in Syria.
Alongside the chlorine cylinders, metal fragments consistent with the metal frames placed around chlorine cylinders to turn them into improvised chemical bombs were also documented.
Bellingcat's investigation with @STJ_SYRIA_ENG can we read below, and we look forward to reading the full OPCW IIT report on the attack. bellingcat.com/news/mena/2018…
I also expect the usual suspects who dismiss chemical weapon attacks as being false flags will struggle with their theories around this one, as they probably haven't heard about it until today because it wasn't a big news event, and they only care about those ones.
The OPCW IIT report is now online opcw.org/media-centre/n…
Here's the summary of the findings, @tobiaschneider probably has something to say about the Tiger Forces and their use of chlorine.
Various debris found around the impact site related to the metal frame used with Syrian chlorine (although observed at the Douma chemical attack a few weeks later). For the nerds, the metal front plate detail is probably the most interesting.
Also nice to see how they show how evidence was collected, packaged and transported to the FFM, showing the packing tape wasn't altered after collection.
The OPCW IIT also tested the scenario that cleaning chemicals could have been used to create the presence of chlorine, no doubt to address the usual suspects who would claim that's actually what happened. Bad luck to those folks, I guess.
I'm impressed by the thoroughness of the OPCW IIT. They've clearly learnt the lessons of previous investigations, in particular how to address conspiracy theories about chemical attacks, and have pre-emptively addressed them. Plus included some handy graphics like this:
This report builds on the growing body of evidence that Syria's Tiger Forces are using chemical weapons, in particular chlorine filled munitions.
Also relevant to the the Tiger Force's use of chemical weapons is this investigation by Bellingcat, relating to the 2017 March Al Lataminah chlorine attack bellingcat.com/news/2020/04/1…

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More from @EliotHiggins

Nov 4
It's been brought to my attention that there's videos published on social media claiming I've made various statements about the US election, related to election integrity. These are part of a Russian disinformation campaign, and the quotes are fabricated, but it's nice to know the Russians hold the value of my opinions in such high regard.
I've previously discussed other videos in this campaign in the below thread:
More details of the campaign can be found in this thread
Read 10 tweets
Oct 22
🧵 1/7: The European Court of Human Rights has ruled in favor of Russian NGOs and media groups (including @Bellingcat), declaring Russia's "foreign agent" legislation a violation of fundamental human rights. The court found that the law imposes undue restrictions on freedom of expression & association.
2/7: The law requires NGOs & individuals receiving foreign funds to register as “foreign agents,” facing stigma, harsh reporting requirements, and severe penalties. This label implies foreign control—without proof—and misleads the public
3/7: The Court noted that the "foreign agent" label, linked to spies & traitors, damages the reputation of those designated and leads to a chilling effect on civil society and public discourse.
Read 9 tweets
Oct 15
It's currently 9:11am, this post has 3 views, and no retweets or likes on an account with 75 followers. Let's see how long it takes for it to get several hundred retweets, and a few tens of thousands of views. Image
In the last 15 minutes, that tweet just gained 15.7k views, 187 likes, with no retweets. Two other tweets with similarly fake stores, posted around the same time, with similar profiles, have also suddenly gain a couple of hundred likes and around the same amount of views. This is, in real time, how a Russian disinformation campaign is using Twitter to promote its fake stories.Image
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The thing is, nearly all of this engagement, apart from about 10 views and none of the likes, are entirely inauthentic. This doesn't help them reach genuine audiences, it's just boosting their stats so when they report back to their paymasters they can tell them how many views, likes and retweets they got, but they're all fake. It's effectively the people running these campaigns scamming their paymasters to make them think it's working, when it's not at all.
Read 4 tweets
Sep 25
A new fake Bellingcat story, from a fake video claiming to be from Fox News. What's interesting about this one is I viewed the tweet 10 minutes ago, and it had 5 views, and suddenly it jumped to 12.5k, then 16.2k views in less than 5 minutes, with zero retweets or likes. Image
To me this suggests there's a bot network being used to boost views of tweets used in this disinformation campaign.
In 90 seconds this tweet just gained 154 retweets, another sign of bot activity. Image
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Read 22 tweets
Sep 10
It's clear this is a coordinated attack from pro-Orban media which they really don't want being noticed outside of Hungary, but what they don't seem to realise is I'm now going to use what they did at every presentation I do on disinformation to audiences across the world.
What's notable is the accusations made against Bellingcat were all taken (uncredited) from an article publishing by MintPress claiming we've loads of intelligence agents working for us, which even the original MintPress article fails to prove.
Which to me just means I get to add a couple more slides to the presentation I'll be doing about this, to audiences made up of exactly the sort of people they didn't want to find out about this.
Read 5 tweets
Sep 5
State actors see alternative media ecosystems as a vehicle for promoting their agendas, and take advantage of that by not just covertly funding them, but also giving them access to their officials and platforming them at places like the UN.
A recent example of that is Jackson Hinkle going to Eastern Ukraine, then getting invited to the UN by Russia to speak at a press conference, and that footage being used by state media as evidence of "experts" rejecting the "mainstream narratives" on Ukraine.
A lack of transparency around the funding of the individuals and websites that are part of these alternative media ecosystems allows for state actors to get away with their covert influence, a clear example of which we've seen over the last 24 hours.
Read 5 tweets

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