The White House has warned Syrian President Bashar al-Assad that he will "pay a heavy price" if he goes ahead with an alleged plot to launch another chemical weapons attack.
The rare public threat is understood to have been ordered by President Donald Trump in a bid to deter the embattled Syrian regime from repeating the kind of toxic assault that left dozens of men, women and children dead in April.
In an ominous statement issued with no supporting evidence or further explanation,
White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said the US "has identified potential preparations for another chemical weapons attack by the Assad regime that would likely result in the mass murder of civilians, including innocent children."
He warned that if "Mr Assad conducts another mass murder attack using chemical weapons, he and his military will pay a heavy price."
The move sets the stage for a possible US strike on Syrian government targets, although Mr Trump may hold his hand if the Syrians shelve any planned sarin gas attacks.
Syria warning: President Donald Trump (AP)
Some senior American military officials were caught off guard by the late night warning, perhaps believing intelligence about potential chemical warfare should have remained classified and handled behind closed doors.
Mr Trump didn’t personally make any direct reference to the scare, but Nikki Haley, the American ambassador to the United Nations, said the possibility that Assad would use chemicals against his own people was being taken very seriously and she insisted that Syria’s allies should share the blame.
"Any further attacks done to the people of Syria will be blamed on Assad, but also on Russia & Iran who support him killing his own people," she tweeted yesterday.
Assad denied responsibility for an April 4 attack on the town of Khan Sheikhoun in the rebel-held Idlib province. Victims show signs of suffocation, convulsions, foaming at the mouth and pupil constriction.
Days later, Mr Trump launched a cruise missile strike on a Syrian government-controlled air base where US officials said the Syrian military had launched the chemical attack. It was the first direct American assault on the Syrian government.
Mr Trump said at the time that the Khan Sheikhoun attack crossed "many, many lines," and put the blame squarely on Assad's forces.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad (REUTERS)
Syria steadfastly maintained it hadn't used chemical weapons and blamed opposition fighters for stockpiling the chemicals.
Chemical weapons have killed hundreds of people since the start of the conflict, with the UN blaming three attacks on the Syrian government and a fourth on the Islamic State group.
Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, told the New York Times said that he did not recall such a precise, pre-emptive public warning against a foreign government regarding banned weapons ‘in at least the last 20 years.’
More often, such matters are handled in private diplomatic or intelligence communications, he added.
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