ENNISKILLEN, Northern Ireland - Global leaders at the G-8 summit called for peace talks to resolve Syria’s civil war Tuesday, but made no mention of arming the rebels or what should happen to President Bashar Assad.

“We remain committed to achieving a political solution to the crisis based on a vision for a united, inclusive and democratic Syria,” said a final communique.

The document made no mention of Assad, whom Western leaders have said in the past said must step down as part of a resolution.

However, in an indication of some agreement, it did call on both sides to commit to “destroying and expelling” al-Qaeda-affiliated groups and removing “any other non-state actors linked to terrorism.”

President Barack Obama echoed that concern, saying it was important to build a strong opposition in Syria that could function if Assad loses power.

Isolated at the G-8, Russia's Vladimir Putin had clashed with other leaders over the conflict and resisted their attempts to get him to agree to anything that would imply Assad should step down or that Russia should tone down its support for Assad.

Obama and U.S. allies want Assad to cede power while Putin, whose rhetoric has become increasingly anti-Western since he was re-elected last year, believes that would be disastrous at a time when no clear transition plan exists.

Russia has been Assad's most powerful supporter as his forces struggle to crush an uprising in which an estimated 93,000 people have been killed since March 2011. He can also count on backing from Iran.

The United States, Turkey, and European and Gulf Arab states support the rebels, who have lost ground to Assad's troops in recent weeks.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, speaking on the summit sidelines, said earlier that Russia had refused to accept any mention of Assad's fate in the communique.

"This would be not just unacceptable for the Russian side, but we are convinced that it would be utterly wrong, harmful and would completely upset the political balance," Ryabkov said.

Slideshow: Syria uprising

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A look back at the conflict that has overtaken the country.

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Russia and the United States agree the warring sides should be brought together to discuss Syria's future at a peace conference possibly as soon as July. 

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said the leaders’ talks on the issue had been more successful than anticipated, given the strong differences between Russia and the West.

"We have a very different outcome and much better outcome than I thought we were going to have," Harper told reporters. Before the summit, Harper had said he feared Putin's support for Syria would make a G-8 agreement difficult.

"I think this was a very significant move on the part of Mr. Putin and the Russians," he said.

The United Nations says 93,000 people have been killed in Syria and 1.6 million Syrians have fled abroad. Lebanon, the smallest of Syria's neighbors, has taken in more than half a million Syrian refugees.

Related:

• Obama and Putin cite differences on Syria but say they want violence to end
• Obama announces extra $300 million in aid for Syrians, refugees
• US military officials say help for Syria likely to escalate gradually

This story was originally published on Tue Jun 18, 2013 12:18 PM EDT

Muhammad Hamed / Reuters, file

Syrian refugees wait for treatment at a Doctors of the World medical center at the Zaatari refugee camp in the Jordanian city of Mafraq, near the border with Syria, June 11, 2013.

The U.S. is to give more than $300 million in additional “life-saving humanitarian assistance” to Syrians caught up in the country’s civil war, Barack Obama has announced, taking the total amount given since the conflict began to nearly $815 million.

The extra money will be used to pay for food, medical care, clean water, shelter and other relief supplies for people in Syria and some of the 1.6 million refugees who have fled to neighboring countries.

The president announced the extra money during a meeting with world leaders at the Group of Eight summit in Lough Erne, Northern Ireland, on Monday.

“The United States remains the single-largest contributor of humanitarian assistance for the Syrian people,” a statement on the White House’s website said.

“The United States supports and appreciates the countries hosting the 1.6 million refugees who have fled the brutal conflict in Syria, and commends host-nation efforts to provide protection, assistance, and hospitality to all those fleeing violence,” the statement said. 

“The United States recognizes the significant strains on host communities and the economic impact of providing refuge to such a large number of people,” it added. “We call on all host governments to continue to keep their borders open to those still fleeing violence in Syria.”

On June 7, the United Nations launched its “largest humanitarian appeal in history,” saying some $5 billion would need to be spent helping Syrian refugees in 2013. It said it expected half the population of Syria to be in need of aid by the end of the year.

More than $128 million of the money announced Monday will go toward helping people inside Syria, with the rest divided between refugees in Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Turkey and Egypt.

World Vision, an aid group working in Syria and neighboring countries, told Reuters that the money would help.

"The world has so far failed to keep up with the basic needs of people impacted by the conflict," said Nathaniel Hurd, a policy adviser with the group, urging other donor countries to follow suit.

Slideshow: Syria uprising

A look back at the conflict that has overtaken the country.

Launch slideshow

Related stories:

• UN launches 'largest humanitarian appeal in history' for Syria
• Moments of resilience, courage and even joy visible on the faces of Syrian refugee children
• 'The jungle': Syrian refugees endure crowded, lawless camp

President Barack Obama and his Russian counterpart — on opposite sides of a civil war but using delicate language about a difference of opinion — said Monday that they shared an interest in stopping the bloodshed in Syria, as the White House planned to announce more than $300 million in a new humanitarian aid package to go to the war-torn country and its neighbors. 

Obama and President Vladimir Putin met at the Group of Eight summit in Northern Ireland, their first time talking face to face in more than a year. 

The meeting came days after Obama angered Moscow by authorizing military help for the rebels fighting Syrian President Bashar Assad. The two-year conflict has left more than 90,000 people dead. Putin is Assad’s strongest ally. 

The newest round of humanitarian aid puts the total U.S. spending on relief efforts at $800 million. Less than half of Monday’s announced total will go to Syria, with the rest going to help neighboring countries who have taken on refugees, the White House said. The United States has contributed more to humanitarian aid during the civil war than any other country. 

“Of course our opinions do not coincide,” Putin said through an interpreter after the meeting with Obama. “But all of us have the intention to stop the violence in Syria.”

“Of course our opinions do not coincide,” Putin said through an interpreter after the meeting with Obama. “But all of us have the intention to stop the violence in Syria.”

Obama also chose careful words. He said that the two leaders “have differing perspectives on the problem, but we share an interest in reducing the violence.” Both presidents said they hoped to push the two sides in Syria to the bargaining table.

Putin criticized the West's position during talks with Britain’s Prime Minister David Cameron on the eve of the summit, saying that the rebels were cannibals.

"I think you will not deny that one does not really need to support the people who not only kill their enemies, but open up their bodies, eat their intestines, in front of the public and cameras," Putin said at a tense joint news conference with Cameron on Sunday.

Peter Muhly / AFP - Getty Images

Barack Obama, wife Michelle and daughters Sasha and Malia are greeted by Joan Christie, The Queen's official representative in County Antrim, upon arrival at Belfast International Airport, Northern Ireland, on Monday.

The two leaders did, however, say they were on similar pages when it came to North Korea and Iran. Both men voiced cautious optimism about the election of Hassan Rowhani in Iran, offering hope that he will work with the U.S. and Russia to resolve the problems surrounding the country's attempts to develop nuclear weapons. 

Putin and Obama also said they had agreed to increase interaction with North Korea.

Following the bilateral meeting, the two countries announced they would hold another meeting in Moscow in September around the time of the Group of Twenty summit.

Besides the United States and Russia, Canada, Japan, Britain, France, Italy and Germany are members of the G-8, a group of the world’s wealthiest economies.

Before he sat down with Putin, Obama delivered a speech on sustaining Catholic-Protestant reconciliation 15 years after the U.S.-brokered Good Friday peace accord. He spoke in Belfast's Waterfront Hall, a glass-fronted building that would never have been built during the city's long era of car bombs that ended with a 1997 Irish Republican Army cease-fire.

In his speech, Obama said that the peace achieved in Northern Ireland — part of the United Kingdom, unlike the Republic of Ireland just south of the border — after decades of violence known as the Troubles was an example for those struggling to end violence around the world.

"Beyond these shores right now in scattered corners of the world there are people living in the grip of conflict, ethnic conflict, religious conflict, tribal conflicts," he said.  "And they are groping for a way to find a way to discover how to move beyond the heavy hand of history — to put aside the violence. ... And they're wondering perhaps if Northern Ireland can achieve peace we can too. So you're their blueprint to follow."

The G-8 summit was being held just minutes from the town of Enniskillen, a small town with a painful past.  In 1987, militants belonging to the Irish Republican Army bombed the town's annual memorial ceremony for British war veterans. The attack killed 11 people and injured 63.

In a sign of how much has changed, last year Queen Elizabeth made history by walking across the town’s narrow high street between the Protestant and Catholic churches which face one another, 25th anniversary of the bombing. It was the first time the queen had ever set foot in a Catholic church on the island of Ireland.

Obama stressed that maintaining the peace was a constant struggle:

“Whether you are a good neighbor to someone from the other side of past battles -- that's up to you. Whether you treat them with the dignity and respect they deserve -- that's up to you. Whether you let your kids play with kids who attend a different church -- that's your decision. Whether you take a stand against violence and hatred, and tell extremists on both sides that no matter how many times they attack the peace, they will not succeed -- that is in your hands. And whether you reach your own outstretched hand across dividing lines, across peace walls, to build trust in a spirit of respect -- that's up to you.”  

Obama was traveling with his wife, Michelle, who spoke before him in Belfast, and their two daughters.

In the afternoon, Obama, Cameron and European leaders launched negotiations for the world's most ambitious free-trade deal, promising that the eventual agreement would create thousands of new jobs and speed-up growth in the U.S. and European Union.

“America and Europe have done extraordinary things together before and I believe we can forge an economic alliance as strong as our diplomatic and security alliances, which of course, have been the most powerful in history,” Obama said at a press conference announcing the deal. 

Meanwhile, a British newspaper reported Britain intercepted telephone calls and monitored computers used by foreign ministers taking part in two high-level international meetings. 

The Guardian said some delegates from countries in the Group of 20 -- which comprises top economies around the world -- used Internet cafes that had been set up by British intelligence agencies to read their emails in London in 2009. The report was published hours before leaders of the G-8 countries -- all of which are in the G-20 -- started the Northern Ireland summit.

Earlier this month, the newspaper reported details of surveillance by the National Security Agency (NSA) of phone records and Internet data in the U.S. The newspaper said the evidence was contained in documents that were leaked by the former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.

Northern Ireland's police appear to be leaving little to chance in ensuring security around the Lough Erne resort just outside Enniskillen, County Fermanagh. More than 3,500 officers were drafted in from mainland Britain to Northern Ireland, bringing the total number of officers on duty each day of the summit to 8,000.

Army engineers helped set up steel fences and coiled razor wire for miles around the resort's lone road entrance.  

Only 2,000 protesters were expected to travel to the remote resort for Monday night's main planned demonstration. 

NBC News' Emma Ong, Andrew Rafferty, Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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This story was originally published on Mon Jun 17, 2013 3:18 PM EDT

Anthony Devlin / Reuters

Britain's Prime Minister David Cameron and Russia's President Vladimir Putin hold a joint news conference in London on June 16, 2013. The two leaders met ahead of the G8 summit in Northern Ireland.

AMMAN/LONDON — Russian President Vladimir Putin, arriving in Britain ahead of an international summit set to be dominated by disagreement over the U.S. decision to send weapons to Syria's rebels, said the West must not arm fighters who eat human flesh.

In Syria, rebels fought back on Sunday against forces of President Bashar al-Assad and his Lebanese Hezbollah allies near Aleppo, where Assad has announced a campaign to recapture the rebel-held north after seizing a strategic town this month.

After months of deliberations, Washington decided last week to send weapons to the rebels, declaring that Assad's forces had crossed a "red line" by using nerve gas.

The move throws the superpower's weight behind the revolt and signals a potential turning point in global involvement in a two-year-old war that has already killed at least 93,000 people.

It has also infuriated Russia, Cold War-era ally of Syria, which has sold arms to Assad and used its veto at the U.N. Security Council to block resolutions against him.

Russia has dismissed the U.S. evidence that Assad's forces used nerve gas. The White House says President Barack Obama will try to lobby Putin to drop his support for Assad during this week's G8 summit hosted by British Prime Minister David Cameron.

After meeting Cameron in London, Putin said Russia wanted to create the conditions for a resolution of the conflict.

"One does not really need to support the people who not only kill their enemies, but open up their bodies, eat their intestines in front of the public and cameras," Putin said.

"Are these the people you want to support? Are they the ones you want to supply with weapons? Then this probably has little relation to the humanitarian values preached in Europe for hundreds of years."

The incident Putin referred to was most likely that of a rebel commander filmed last month cutting into the torso of a dead soldier and biting into a piece of one of his organs.

Both sides have been accused of atrocities in the conflict. The United States and other countries that aid the rebels say one of the reasons for doing so is to support mainstream opposition groups and reduce the influence of extremists.

DOUBTS OVER CONFERENCE

The U.S. plan to arm the rebels also places new doubt over plans for an international peace conference called by Washington and Moscow, their first joint attempt in a year to try to seek a settlement.

After meeting Putin, Britain's Cameron said the divide between Russia and the West over Syria could be bridged, although they disagreed about who was at fault.

"What I take from our conversation today is that we can overcome these differences if we recognize that we share some fundamental aims: to end the conflict, to stop Syria breaking apart, to let the Syrian people decide who governs them and to take the fight to the extremists and defeat them."

Britain has not said whether it too will arm the rebels, but the issue is contentious even within Cameron's Conservative-led government. Nick Clegg, the deputy prime minister from his Liberal Democrat coalition partners, said: "We clearly don't think it's the right thing to do now, or else we would have done it."

Under its new posture, Washington has also said it will keep warplanes and Patriot surface-to-air missiles in Jordan, an ally whose territory it can use to help arm and train rebel fighters. Washington has 4,500 troops in Jordan carrying out exercises.

Washington has not ruled out imposing a no-fly zone over parts of Syria, perhaps near the Jordanian border, although it has taken no decision yet to do so.

Jordan's King Abdullah rallied his own armed forces on Sunday, telling military cadets: "If the world does not help as it should, and if the matter becomes a danger to our country, we are able at any moment to take the measures to protect the country and the interests of our people."

Washington hopes its backing will restore rebel momentum after Assad's forces seized the initiative by gaining the open support of Hezbollah, Lebanon's Iranian-backed Shi'ite militia, which sent thousands of seasoned fighters to aid Assad.

Just a few months ago, Western countries believed Assad's days were numbered. But with Hezbollah's support he was able to achieve a major victory this month in Qusair, a strategically located rebel-held town on a main route from Lebanon.

FIGHT FOR ALEPPO

Since then, the government has announced major plans to seize the north, including Aleppo, Syria's biggest city and commercial centre, largely rebel-held for nearly a year. The United Nations says it fears for a bloodbath in the north.

Rebels say they are fighting back against government offensives in the north. An opposition operations room in northern Aleppo said fighters had destroyed an army tank and killed 20 troops at Marat al-Arteek, a town where opposition sources say rebels are holding back an armored column sent to reinforce loyalists from isolated Shi'ite villages.

"Assad's forces and Hezbollah are trying to control northern rural Aleppo but they are being repelled and dealt heavy losses," Colonel Abdeljabbar al-Okeidi, a Free Syrian Army commander in Aleppo, told al-Arabiya Television.

He said Hezbollah had sent up to 2,000 fighters to Aleppo and the surrounding areas, but expressed confidence the opposition would prevail.

"Aleppo and Qusair are different. In Qusair we were surrounded by villages that had been occupied by Hezbollah and by loyalist areas. We did not even have a place to take our wounded. In Aleppo, we have a strategic depth and logistical support and we are better organized," he said. "Aleppo will turn into the grave of these Hezbollah devils."

Battles were also fought inside Aleppo itself, where thousands of loyalist troops and militiamen reinforced by Hezbollah have been massing and attacking opposition-held parts of the city, driving rebel fighters back.

Opposition activists said the army was also airlifting troops behind rebel lines to Ifrin, in a Kurdish area, which would give access for a bigger sweep inside the city.

"For a week, the rebel forces have been generally on the retreat in Aleppo, but the tide has started turning in the last two days," said Abu Abdallah, an activist in the area.

Hezbollah's support for Assad, a follower of the minority Alawite offshoot of Shi'ite Islam, against mainly Sunni Muslim rebels has increased fears of sectarian violence spreading into neighboring countries.

In Lebanon, security sources said gunmen had shot dead four Shi'ite Muslim men in an ambush in the Bekaa Valley close to the Syrian frontier. It was not clear who was behind the shooting.

Lebanon is still rebuilding from its own sectarian civil war, fought from 1975-1990. Fighting between Sunnis and Shi'ites was also behind most of the violence in Iraq in the decade after the U.S. invasion of 2003.

Additional reporting by Laila Bassam in Beirut, Suleiman Al-Khalidi in Amman and Guy Faulconbridge, Costas Pitas and Andrew Osborn in London

Jason Reed / Reuters file

U.S. President Barack Obama shakes hands with Russia's President Vladimir Putin at last year's G20 meeting in Los Cabos, Mexico on June 18, 2012.

LONDON -- In the year since U.S. President Barack Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin last met face to face, tens of thousands of Syrians have been killed and hundreds of thousands have fled that country’s raging civil war. So Syria will likely monopolize what’s expected to be a short, one-hour bilateral meeting on the sidelines of next week’s G-8 summit in Northern Ireland.

There is some common ground – the U.S. and Russia both support peace talks in Geneva between Syrian strongman Bashar al Assad’s regime and the rebel coalition, though Russia has criticized the U.S. for insufficiently pressuring the rebels to commit. 

But Obama and Putin remain miles apart on what to do about Assad himself: the U.S. wants him removed from power as part of a U.N.-backed transition; Russia is set against any foreign military or diplomatic intervention into Syria’s internal affairs, including arming the Syrian rebels. 

It’s unclear whether U.S. intelligence reports confirming Assad’s use of chemical weapons against his own people will change Russia’s position. For its part, the White House has parlayed those findings into a decision to provide “military support” to the rebels. 

Understandably, aside from Syria, there won’t be much time left over for other problems weighing on the U.S.-Russian relationship. Here are just some of the more pressing issues the two world leaders should be talking about…

IRAN
The U.S. has imposed tougher sanctions against Iran, but Russia has balked, saying those sanctions have hurt diplomatic efforts to curtail Iran’s nuclear weapons program (if it indeed has one).  Russia continues to argue against an Israeli or U.S.-Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear facilities – some of which were built by Russia. So far the U.S. has failed to convince Russia to flex its muscles against its erstwhile ally.

ANTI-MISSILE DEFENSE
Going back to U.S. President Ronald Reagan’s Star War’s program, the Soviet Union – and then Russia – have seen any American anti-missile defense system, whether based in space, on land or at sea, as a direct threat to their own nuclear capability. The Obama administration may have eased some of the tension recently by canceling the final phase of its Europe-based missile-defense plans, no longer placing interceptors on the U.S. West Coast or Alaska. Without a formal agreement, both sides have agreed to disagree, knowing that the missile defenses themselves have yet to be built.

STRATEGIC AND TACTICAL NUCLEAR ARMS TREATY
This has always been the keystone to U.S.-Russian relations, but without agreement on missile defense, experts say making any fresh progress on nuclear weapons reductions will be unlikely.

During his State of the Union address in February, Obama proposed cutting the U.S. nuclear arsenal by one third, that is, down to about 1,000 deployed strategic warheads from the current level of 1,700, as well as a ceiling of some 2,500 tactical nuclear weapons. But Putin has, so far, resisted any talk of further cuts until the U.S. abandons its anti-missile shields.  Still, there has been a shift in tone of late which the two leaders may want to build on, even – potentially – announcing something of substance.

HUMAN RIGHTS
This is perhaps the thorniest issue on the U.S.-Russia agenda. Putin continues to crackdown on his opposition – and any dissent – with a series of draconian laws that have sent anti-Putin activists behind bars and labeled foreign-funded non-governmental organizations (NGO’s) into quasi spies or “foreign agents”  reminiscent of the Cold War days.

After the death, in prison, of Sergey Magnitsky, a Russian lawyer who worked for an American investment company, the Obama administration passed the Magnitsky Act, banning a number of Russians accused of human rights violations from traveling to the U.S. and freezing their U.S. assets.

In retaliation, Russia passed its own ban on Americans who had allegedly abused Russians, including some U.S. adoptive parents of Russian children who died in their care. That soon became a ban on the adoption of Russian orphans by any Americans.  The ban remains in place, preventing thousands of abandoned Russian children from finding loving families in the U.S.

COUNTER-TERRORISM 
By far, it’s the most promising area of cooperation. Both U.S. and Russian officials say that, since the Boston Marathon bombing, both countries have significantly improved their joint efforts in tracking potential terrorists. 

Revelations that Russia didn’t inform the FBI or CIA about phone calls made by bomber Tamerlan Tsarnaev to militants in Dagestan until after the bombings has led to a serious Russian rethink. Now the FSB, the successor agency of the KGB, is reportedly sharing secret transcripts, for the first time, with the intelligence agencies of its former enemy. Still, there’s much to do before overcoming deeply ingrained suspicions and mistrust.

There are other important topics to review together – the winding down of the war in Afghanistan and the search for peace in the Middle East – but more substantial talks beyond the deadly crisis in Syria may have to wait…. At least until the G-20 summit, this September, in St. Petersburg...coincidentally, Putin’s hometown.

Related: 

• US offers Syrian rebels 'military support,' alleges Assad used chemical weapons 
• 'Long overdue': Reactions to White House announcement on Syria 
• Russia's Putin shows off his English
• Putin's wife steps out of the shadows - to bid him farewell 

U.S. military officials said Friday that American help for Syrian rebels is likely to escalate gradually, beginning with basic equipment like body armor and night-vision goggles and shifting later to weapons and ammunition.

The officials told NBC News that providing the rebels with heavy weapons, such as anti-tank or anti-aircraft rockets, was not being actively considered. The gradual timetable could be accelerated if circumstances change, the officials said.

The details came a day after the White House said that it believed the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad had used chemical weapons, including the nerve agent sarin, against the rebels.

As a result, President Barack Obama decided to provide “military support” to a major opposition group in Syria, Ben Rhodes, the deputy national security adviser, told reporters.

The military officials told NBC News that the timing of the support was the decision of the White House and State Department, with the Defense Department providing some material and delivering it to the region.

The U.S. military could also provide the rebels with strategic and tactical combat training, most likely in Jordan, where some combat elements are already positioned for a previously scheduled exercise.

A Patriot missile defense system and as many as eight F-16 fighter jets will likely remain in Jordan following the exercise. Elements of a Marine Corps expeditionary force off the helicopter carrier USS Kearsarge are expected to arrive in Jordan soon.

Defense officials stressed that there was no consideration being given to using American ground forces. For now, they also rule out imposing a no-fly zone.

Earlier Friday, Syria said that the United States was lying about the regime's use of chemical weapons, while Russia called the claims unconvincing — a dramatic turn in the two-year conflict.

"The United States, in resorting to a shameful use of pretexts in order to allow President Obama's decision to arm the Syrian opposition, shows that it has flagrant double standards in the way it deals with terrorism," Syria's foreign ministry said.

Syria has maintained that "terrorists" are using the chemical weapons.

Russia, which has opposed sanctions and vetoed U.N. Security Council resolutions to put pressure on Assad, reacted with skepticism to the White House's announcement.

President Vladimir Putin's senior foreign policy adviser said Friday that the information the U.S. has "does not look convincing."

Yuri Ushakov said more U.S. military support for Assad's opponents would undermine joint efforts to bring together Syrian government and opposition representatives for peace talks. 

According to the United Nations' human rights office, the two-year-old war in Syria has killed almost 93,000 people, although it says the real number is likely to be much higher.

The United Kingdom, which says it provided evidence of chemical weapons use in Syria to a United Nations investigation, had not decided whether to arm the rebels, a government spokesman said Friday.

"Nothing is off the table," the spokesman said, adding that the U.K. was "in urgent discussions with [its] international partners."

On Wednesday, British Prime Minister David Cameron said he was eager to host the G8 summit next week in Northern Ireland. "We should use the G8 to try and bring pressure on all sides to bring about ... a peace conference, a peace process, and a move towards a transitional government in Syria," he said.

In an interview with the BBC on Friday, German Chancellor Angela Merkel urged the UN Security Council to "achieve a united approach."

But France raised the concern that a Security Council resolution, such as the establishment of a no-fly zone over Syria, would face opposition from some members. 

Slideshow: Syria uprising

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A look back at the conflict that has overtaken the country.

Launch slideshow

"The problem with this type of measure is that it can only be put in place with approval from the international community," French Foreign Ministry spokesman Philippe Lalliot said Friday.

NBC's Albina Kovalyova and Reuters contributed to this report.

Related stories:

• US offers Syrian rebels 'military support,' alleges Assad used chemical weapons
• First thoughts: What's the endgame for Syria?
• 'Long overdue': Reactions to White House announcement on Syria
• Analysis: A battle may be won, but war will rage on for Syria's Assad

The United States and its allies have concluded that the government of Bashar Assad has used chemical weapons in Syria's protracted civil war, leading President Barack Obama to broaden aid — including military support — to opposition groups.

The intelligence community concluded with "high confidence" that the Assad regime had used chemical weapons — including the nerve agent sarin — "on a small scale against the opposition multiple times in the last year."

"The intelligence community estimates that 100 to 150 people have died from detected chemical weapons attacks in Syria to date; however, casualty data is likely incomplete," said Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communications Ben Rhodes.

The use of chemical weapons crosses the so-called "red line" first established by Obama last year, which he said would prompt the administration to alter its posture. The administration said on Thursday that Obama had decided to broaden support to the Supreme Military Council, a principal opposition group in Syria, and Rhodes said that assistance "will include military support."

Rhodes declined to specify what kind of military support the United States would provide to the SMC, but noted that Obama had not decided to establish a no-fly zone, as some Republicans have demanded.

Rhodes cited the "great and open-ended cost" associated with establishing a partial or complete no-fly zone over Syria, seeming to suggest that the prospect of such action, for now, was unlikely.

He added: "We're looking at a wide range of types of support we can provide both to the political opposition and to the SMC on the ground. I'm not going to be able to detail every single type of support that we are providing, but it's suffice to say it's important to note that it is both the political and the military opposition that will be -- that is and will be receiving U.S. assistance."  

Slideshow: Syria uprising

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A look back at the conflict that has overtaken the country.

Launch slideshow

Reuters reported that Obama administration officials have said that any arming of the rebels would likely be limited to small arms and ammunition rather than anti-aircraft weapons.

Obama first laid out his "red line" in August.

"We have been very clear to the Assad regime, but also to other players on the ground, that a red line for us is we start seeing a whole bunch of chemical weapons moving around or being utilized," Obama told reporters at that time. "That would change my calculus. That would change my equation."

The president noted earlier this year that there had been preliminary indications of the use of chemical weapons in Syria. But he resisted taking action until he said the intelligence community could conclude with certainty that such weapons had actually been used by Assad.

To that end, Rhodes said that the United States and its allies had begun acting in April to assist the SMC by providing increased support in response to Assad crossing a "red line."

But Rhodes also noted that the United States had prepared for "multiple contingencies" — military, diplomatic, or economic — to help put pressure on the Assad government.

"We're going to make decisions about further actions on our own timeline," he said, later adding: "We're looking at a wide range of types of support we could provide."

The topic of Syria is sure to loom large next week as the leaders of the world's largest economies gather for the G8 conference in Ireland.

The Obama administration had come under pressure from hawkish Republicans in Congress to take a more active role in ousting the Assad regime, either by directly arming rebels, or by enforcing a partial or complete no-fly zone in Syria.

“I applaud the president’s decision and I appreciate it," Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., one such hawk, said Thursday on the Senate floor.

"But the president of the United States had better understand that just supplying weapons is not going to change the equation on the ground [or] the balance of power. These people – the Free Syrian Army – need weapons, heavy weapons to counter tanks and aircraft, they need a no-fly zone, and Bashar Assad’s air assets have to be taken out and neutralized. We can do that without risking a single American airplane."

Said Brendan Buck, a spokesman for House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio: "It is long past time to bring the Assad regime's bloodshed in Syria to an end. As President Obama examines his options, it is our hope he will properly consult with Congress before taking any action."

It’s not just Republicans who have directly or indirectly put pressure on the president for more action.  Former President Bill Clinton reportedly told McCain in a closed-press event Wednesday that he agreed with the Arizona senator about the need for Obama to act more forcefully to support Syrian rebels, saying Americans expect their presidents to be able to “see down the road” and set aside public opinion.

Slideshow: The lives of Syrian rebels

NBC News

People resisting the army of President Bashar al-Assad in northern Syria cope with loss and prepare for fighting.

Launch slideshow

But there are delicate considerations involved in the administration's decision to become more involved. Namely, the U.S. is worried about navigating a thorny relationship with Russia, which has been resistant to apply much pressure to the Assad regime.

Some U.S. officials have also expressed concern that arms supplied to rebels could fall into the hands of fighters who could eventually pivot to use those very arms against U.S. interests or allies.

And then there is the issue of scarce political appetite among most Americans for increased military involvement in Syria following more than a decade of war in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Just 15 percent of Americans said in June's NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll that they favor U.S. military action in Syria; only 11 percent want to provide arms to the opposition. A plurality of respondents -- 42 percent -- prefer to provide only humanitarian assistance, and 24 percent believe the U.S. shouldn't take any action.

NBC's Mark Murray and Carrie Dann and Reuters contributed to this report.

Related:

• 'Long overdue': Reactions to White House announcement on Syria
• Kids wage war in Syria, UN report says
• Analysis: A battle may be won, but war will rage on for Syria's Assad

This story was originally published on Thu Jun 13, 2013 5:17 PM EDT

On Thursday, the White House announced that the U.S. government plans to provide support to opposition groups in Syria after determining that President Bashar Assad's regime has, in fact, used chemical weapons against rebel groups.

Political leaders started praising the decision almost immediately.

In a joint statement, U.S. Senators John McCain, R-Ariz., and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said, “A decision to provide lethal assistance, especially ammunition and heavy weapons, to opposition forces in Syria is long overdue, and we hope the President will take this urgently needed step."

The two, however, said that "providing arms alone is not sufficient," and urged the president to "rally an international coalition to take military actions" against Assad.

House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, was also pleased with the decision and had a call for further action.

"It is long past time to bring the Assad regime's bloodshed in Syria to an end," said Boehner spokesman Brendan Buck. "As President Obama examines his options, it is our hope he will properly consult with Congress before taking any action."

And House Intelligence Chairman Mike Rogers, R-Mich., released a statement saying, "I am pleased that President Obama's Administration has joined the growing international chorus declaring that the Assad regime has used chemical weapons in Syria, crossing the red line drawn by the president last August."

But Rogers doesn’t want the assistance to stop there: “As I called for in a USA Today op-ed earlier this week," Rogers said, "the United States should assist the Turks and our Arab League partners to create safe zones in Syria from which the U.S. and our allies can train, arm, and equip vetted opposition forces."

Meanwhile, the Free Syrian Army — an opposition group made up mostly of defected Assad regime troops — was "happy."

"The leadership of the Free Syrian Army in Damascus and its countryside said it is happy about the  American statements on the situation in Syria," spokesman Musab Abu Kudada told NBC News.

And while saying that the U.S. should have taken this step earlier, Kudada warned, "We hope that the U.S. administration is aware of its responsibilities towards the Syrian people after these statements."

NBC News' Ammar Cheikh Omar in Antakya, Turkey, contributed to this report

Djilali Belaid / AFP-Getty Images, file

An image grab shows a Syrian boy holding an assault rifle as he is comforted by a rebel during fighting with government forces near the village of Azzara on June 28, 2012.

UNITED NATIONS - Syrian troops and rebels are recruiting children to fight in the country's civil war and some have been tortured by government forces for having links to the opposition, U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon said in a report on Wednesday.

The report issued after Ban's special envoy for children and armed conflict, Leila Zerrougui, visited Syria in December said thousands of children have been killed in the violence, "while thousands more have seen family members killed or injured."

The report also said children are recruited, killed, maimed or raped by government forces and armed groups in Afghanistan, Chad, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Somalia, Sudan, South Sudan and Yemen, as well as by armed groups in Mali, Colombia, the Philippines, Myanmar, Iraq and the Central African Republic.

The United Nations considers anyone aged under 18 to be a child.

Ban said that in Syria, torture and ill-treatment of children accused of associating with opposition forces was a worrying trend.

"There were a number of accounts of sexual violence against boys to obtain information or a confession by the state forces, largely but not exclusively by members of the state intelligence services and the Syrian armed forces," the report said.

"Child detainees, largely boys and as young as 14 years old, suffered similar or identical methods of tortures as adults, including electric shock, beatings, stress positions and threats and acts of sexual torture," it said.

Armed opposition groups, including the Free Syrian Army, were also accused of using children, generally aged 15 to 17 years old, both in combat and in support roles, such as ferrying food and water and loading cartridges, the report said.

"From accounts received, child association with the Free Syrian Army is often linked to an older relative facilitating recruitment or in instances in which the child has lost all members of his or her family," it said.

Ban said that the Syrian government and the National Coalition of Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces had assured Zerrougui that they were committed to working with the United Nations to stop the abuse of children's rights.

The report said that in Chad, while progress had been made and the army had a policy of not recruiting children, there were 34 verified cases child recruitment by the army in 2012.

"All 34 children appeared to have been enlisted in the context of a recruitment drive between February and March 2012, during which the army gained 8,000 new recruits," it said.

Chadian troops played a key role in helping French forces during a military offensive in January to drive out Islamist fighters who seized two-thirds of Mali.

Diplomats have said Chad is working with the United Nations to stamp out child soldier recruitment so the country can potentially be part of a peacekeeping force in Mali, which is set to assume authority next month.

The report said there had been a spike in grave violations against children by both government troops and armed groups in the Democratic Republic of Congo, amid a year-long insurgency by M23 rebels. U.N. experts accused Rwanda supporting M23 last year, but Rwanda denies the accusation.

Slideshow: The lives of Syrian rebels

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People resisting the army of President Bashar al-Assad in northern Syria cope with loss and prepare for fighting.

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This story was originally published on Thu Jun 13, 2013 5:01 AM EDT

DAMASCUS, Syria -- Two suicide bombers hit a central Damascus square Tuesday, killing at least 14 people, activists and the state media reported. Activists said one of the explosions took place inside a police station and that many of the dead were policemen.

Syrian state TV quoted a security official as saying 14 people died in explosions caused by two "terrorist" suicide bombers near a police station in the bustling Marjeh Square in the heart of the capital. The official said another 31 were wounded.

The state-run Ikhbariya TV station showed footage of broken shop facades and mangled cars in the central square as ambulance workers were seen carrying the wounded on stretchers.

Marjeh Square has been the scene of previous attacks this year.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which has a network of activists on the ground in Syria, said 15 were killed in the explosions, one of which was caused by a man blowing himself up inside the police station in Marjeh Square. The group said the other explosion occurred outside the police station. It was not immediately possible to reconcile the two accounts.

SANA via AP

A photo from official Syrian news agency SANA shows damage from one of two suicide bombings Tuesday.

Suicide attacks and car bombs have become common in Damascus. Tuesday's twin explosions in the capital are the first since government troops, backed by fighters from Lebanon's Shiite group Hezbollah, captured Qusair, a strategic town in the central province of Homs, the linchpin linking Damascus with the regime strongholds on the Mediterranean coast.

Following the capture of Qusair, Syrian state-run media and the Hezbollah-owned Al-Manar TV have said the regime is preparing an offensive reportedly named Operation Northern Storm to recapture Aleppo. The regime was also believed to be advancing on the central city of Homs.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but car bombs and suicide attacks targeting Damascus and other cities that remain under government control have been claimed in the past by the al Qaeda-affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra — one of scores of rebel factions fighting the forces of President Bashar Assad.

On Saturday, a suicide bomber detonated his explosives-laden car in the central city of Homs, tearing through an area largely populated by the regime's Alawite sect and killing seven people.

Syria's conflict started with largely peaceful protests against Assad's regime in March 2011 but eventually turned into a civil war that has killed more than 80,000 people, according to the United Nations.

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