Everything is in place, in real estate and in policy sometimes. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad lives in a very different geopolitical neighbourhood of yesteryear, but now-ousted counterparts in Tunisia and Egypt, and the leaders of Libya and Yemen teetering. It is a turbulent patch in the Middle East, inhabited by a mixture of ethnic and religious groups uncomfortable, often in the turmoil. Fear of the chaos and his eviction could free the instability is greatest advantage of Assad as he races to brutally crush an uprising by seven weeks before the rapid count mounted body of the forces of global leaders to act with force against him.(See pictures of the bloody protests Syrian).
Despite widely shared on the consequences of the change of regime in Syria, the international community is slowly hardening its position against the decision of the Ba'athist regime. The United States focused on new penalties to three senior figures, including brother Maher al-Assad the President, who heads 4 units of Division and the Republican Guard of the army to submit events in the city of the South of Dara' haswhere the current uprising began in mid-March. The European Union has agreed to impose sanctions on 13 senior Syrian officials, but remain divided on whether Bashar al-Assad himself should be censored.
The ambivalence of targeting Assad himself could be a product of the image of "Good cop" the young President has grown over its 11 years in power. According to this account, Al-Assad is good, humble and close to his people, but it is surrounded by the black sheep, special senior intelligence officers and chores of the regime that he inherited from his father, Hafez Al-Assad. This version of reality, Bashar has wanted for a long time implement reforms, but he had been hampered by the consequences of such developments as the terrorist attacks of September 11, the war in Iraq and the war of the Lebanon in 2006. Even if he sent tanks in cities and presided over the murder of nearly 600 protesters and arresting nearly 8,000 others, the history of the "good Bashar" emphasizes the fact that the leaders might cajole him again to curb the bain of blood. It suffices to Muammar al-Gaddafi the Libya choke his chai. (See what the Syria inmates can expect of the plan).
While the measures of the Syrian regime against pro-democracy demonstrators are quickly approaching brutality unleashed by the forces of Gaddafi, when protests broke out in Libya, nobody expects NATO to scramble its jets to protect the Syrianssays Shadi Hamid, Director of research at the Centre of the Brookings Doha. Western leaders still have a hope that "the traditional tools of diplomacy" will sway Assad, said Hamid. "I think there is awareness that when Gaddafi was delirious and not open to compromise, I still think there is a hope that pressure can operate on Assad.".
However, some - including the Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a friend of Assad and ally - seem to lose patience. The Turkish leader this week published a critique scathing actions Assad, he guard against "another Hama", a reference to the Syrian town bombarded to rubble in 1982 by Hafez Al-Assad after an Islamist insurgency there. At least 10,000 people were killed in the uprising, although the exact figure is not known. Ammar Qurabi, head of the national organization for the rights of man in Syria, says that the Turkish about-face came because "The Turks realized that the presence of this regime is a factor for the creation of instability in the region, the opposite of what the West think." (See how graffiti stirred the uprising).
Immediate problem Assad, however, is that brute force is not having the desired effect. Friday, tens of thousands of protesters demonstrated once again through the Syria after the prayers in the afternoon, despite the regime, having repeatedly demonstrated its willingness to open fire on them. All 21 people were killed in the city of Homs, in the Centre of the Syria, said of activists, and more than a dozen injured in what has become a regular cycle of protests, deaths and other events.
Both sides seem themselves were framed.
Although Assad spoke of reforms and abolished the 48 years old emergency law, his regime has continued to kill and arrest the demonstrators. Even if it amends the Constitution to allow multi-party and other concessions, many Syrians will want to pay for the blood, that he has made in recent weeks. Protesters are quickly approaching the point where they believe that their ceasing their actions offers no plu hope of physical survival than fighting. "The regime has turned in the crowd, protests have become the largest." "It's a lose-lose situation," said Hamid. "More law enforcement, even if it works, delete shreds last of regime legitimacy." Less repression may embolden the opposition and lead to a change of regime. (See the photos of the current crisis in Syria).
Which brings us to geography: the Syria is a pivotal State, which may be too strategically important to fail, because of ethnic and sectarian conflicts, collapse of the regime could precipitate in the tinderbox States, next door. The Syria is torn apart by war Iraq; to its west, low and unstable Lebanon. In the North, Kurdish regions rough of the contiguous long marginalized Syria and politically disqualify Kurdish Turkey. Southwestern lurk Islamists the Jordan, while Israel, occupying the heights of the Syrian Golan since the 1967 war, remains a hostile State. Damascus is also at the Centre of the so-called anti-American, anti-Israeli "resistance axis" Iran grouping, activist of the Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in the Lebanon groups, with the Syria.
The possible consequences of the Syria political measure are blurred, but potentially very dangerous. Decades of repression Ba'athist prevented the emergence of an organized democratic opposition. Assad opponents are a disparate group of aging intellectuals exiled Islamist and largely wary of figures of the former regime as Abdel Halim Khaddam, a Vice-President of long-standing service who has also held several positions in father Bashar. (Can Assad reform Government without causing its own downfall?)
Still, militants of rights say the fear of the unknown and geopolitical calculations are wrong reasons to maintain a tyrant in power. "If anything, the Syria is a source of instability in Iraq, Lebanon, in Palestine and said Qurabi." A weakening of the regime in Syria and its modification or reform so that it represents Syrian society, I think that will lead to positive change in the region. "Sometimes it takes a dramatic change to improve a difficult district.
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