A Syrian boy, with writing on his forehead that
reads "Syria is protected by God," stands in front of a picture of
Syrian President Bashar Assad outside the Syrian embassy in Beirut.
By Boris DOLGOV
ICF
February 01, 2012
The current situation in Syria
remains one of the most important components of the Middle Eastern and
international policies. Using Syria’s domestic crisis and pursuing their own
goals NATO, Israel, Turkey and the monarchies of the Persian Gulf are trying to
undermine the Syrian regime.
Since the beginning of the crisis in Syria I have made two trips
to that country as a member of international delegations in August 2011 and in
January 2012.
If we watch the dynamics of situation’s development over that period on the one hand we can state intensification of terrorist groups in Syria and on the other hand we see a broader people’s support of President Bashar Assad and a clear demarcation of political forces’ positions.
TERRORIST ATTACKS IN AND AGAINST SYRIA
In the last two months Syria has seen a number of terrorist attacks.
The terrorist attacked Syrian servicemen and military
facilities, law enforcement agencies institutions, blasts on oil pipelines,
railroads, murders and taking of hostage among peaceful citizens (In the city
of Homs insurgents killed five well known scientists), arson of schools and
killing of teachers (since March 2011, 900 schools have been set on fire and 30
teachers have been killed).
Terrorist attacks in Damascus became among the bloodiest. Two of
them were carried out on December 23, 2011 when cars loaded with explosives
went off in front of the buildings of state security service killing 44 and
injured about 150 people.
On January 6, 2012 on a busy street a suicide bomber attack
killed 26 and wounded 60. There were officers of the law enforcement agencies
among the victims but most of the victims were occasional by-passers.
STREET LIFE
In January 2012, Damascus has a more severe look in comparison
with summer of 2011. Security officers check passports on the way to the
airport, asking people what country they are from.
Entrances of many state institutions are protected with concrete
blocks. There are check points with sand bags near the police stations which
are protected by soldiers in bullet proof vests. Lifting gates which close
entrances to some of the streets are also by guarded by soldiers and young
people with machine guns ~ these are volunteers from pro-governmental youth
movements.
But everyday life has not drastically changed. There are no
servicemen, armed vehicles or document checks in the city. Damascus is still a
busy city, with no vacant seats in internet cafes and on weekends streets are
crowded with family couples and young people.
POPULAR SUPPORT FOR BASHAR ASSAD
After terrorist attacks in Damascus demonstrations with slogans
supporting Bashar Assad and condemning terrorists were held every day. Similar
demonstrations were organized in other large cities such as Aleppo, Homs, Hama,
Daraa, Deir az Zor. These demonstrations were covered by the Syrian TV.
During our stay in Syria we could move around the city freely
and speak with people as we liked but we did not see any single
anti-governmental rally. Most of the rallies’ participants were young people.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad waves at supporters during a
public appearance in Damascus on January 11, 2012 in which he vowed to defeat a
"conspiracy" against Syria.
The most massive rally which gathered tens thousands of people was held on January 1 in the center of Damascus. At that rally Bashar Assad addressed to the nation starting his speech with the words: “Brothers and sisters!” He was speaking about a thousands year long history, the need to fight terrorism and the support terrorists receive from abroad. Assad’s speech was received with real enthusiasm and there were no signs that this reaction had been staged.
The whole square (tens of thousands of people) shouted a popular
slogan “Allah, Syria, Bashar!” (“Allah, Syria va Bashar bas!”). On January 8,
in the memory of victims of terrorist attacks in Damascus a commemoration
ceremony was held in St. Cross Cathedral in Damascus.
SYRIANS KNOW WHO BRINGS ON THE TERRORISM
The Mufti of Syria Ahmad Badr Al-Din Hassoun, the metropolitan
of the Syrian Orthodox Church and the prior of the Catholic monastery spoke at
the ceremony. In their speeches they condemned
“the killers
and those who put weapons in their
hands
and sent them to Syria”.
The tragedy of the mufti of Syria, whose son was killed by the
members of the Islamist terrorist group after the mufti had refused to act on
the side of the foreign opposition, which goal was to overthrow Bashar Assad,
is a telling example in itself.
POLITICAL CHANGES, POPULAR POLITICS, PARTIES NOT AT WAR
After the adoption of a new law on political parties an active
process of their creation has been underway in Syria. Although formally the
constitution envisaged a multiparty system and seven parties were represented
in the parliament, in compliance with clause 8 the leading role belonged to the
ruling Baath party. Currently there is a wide discussion in Syria about this
clause. An official with the Syrian Foreign Ministry told us that in the new
constitution (on which the national referendum would be held in February), this
clause would be abolished if most of the public and political forces spoke for
it.
In his address to the nation Bashar Assad said that the new
constitution would be approved in March 2012.
The parliamentary elections are to be held in May-June 2012.
Along with the law on political parties new laws on general
elections, local administration and mass media were adopted. In compliance with
the new law in December 2011 elections to the local governments were held. But
because of the threat of terrorist attacks the turnout was only 42%, which was
confirmed by the Baath officials. Nevertheless, the local administrations were
elected and began to work. Under the recently adopted law new mass media are
being formed in addition to the current 20 TV channels, 15 radio stations and
30 newspapers.
At present there are three main trends in the Syrian patriotic
opposition ~ democratic, liberal and left, which is mainly a communist one. The
Syrian Social Nationalist Party is the most influential party among the
democratic forces. It is also the oldest party which was established in 1932.
As Iliah Saman, a member of the political bureau of the Syrian
Social Nationalist Party said, the party’s program is more conservative in
comparison with the Baath’s program. Nevertheless there are no differences of
principle between the two parties.
According to him, the policy of the US, France and England is the main destabilizing factor in Syria. He said that those countries were acting in the interests of Israel and had the goal to divide Syria into five state formations on the basis of religious and ethnical differences.
The liberal trend of the opposition is represented by the
recently registered secular democratic social movement led by Nabil Feysal, one
of the Syrian intellectuals, a writer and a translator. He is an outright opponent
of the Islamic fundamentalism, supporter of the liberal democracy. His goal is
to turn Syria into “Middle Eastern Denmark”.
The National Committee for the Unity of Syrian Communists is the
most influential component of the left (communist) trend of the opposition
within the country. Recently it has changed its name to the Popular Will Party
which is headed by Qadri Jamil, a prominent Syrian economist and the professor
at the Damascus University. He is the only representative of the opposition who
entered the committee on the design of the new constitution.
Jamil believes that the national dialogue and creation of the
government of the national unity (which would include representatives of the
patriotic opposition) is the only way out of the crisis. At the same time he
thinks that it is necessary to remove all the politicians who are not
interested in conduction of reforms from the government, to clean up the
opposition from destructive factors and to suppress its radical members who
tend to use violence.
The coordination committees are also significant political force
which has contacts with the Popular Will Party. These committees on the one
hand organize demonstrations demanding concrete reforms and better living
conditions on the other hand act as self-defense units which armed people
protect their districts from attacks of terrorist groups in particular from a
so called Free Syrian Army.
It should be noted that although in the beginning of protests in
Syria, part of the population, including intellectuals shared the opposition
discontent with the regime and supported demands on democratization now, after
intensification of terrorist groups, they tend to support the regime and the
reforms proposed by the government.
REPORTER KILLED LOOKING FOR NON EXISTENT AUTHORITARIANISM
A telling example of terrorist crimes was the shelling of a
quarter in Homs on January 11 which killed eight local residents. Giles
Jacquier, a reporter with France-2 TV, became one more victim of the attack. We
spoke with Jacquier shortly before his tragic death and he was convinced that
peoples’ protests were suppressed by the authoritarian regime in Syria.
He was looking for the opposition everywhere trying to make a
report.
On failing to find it in Damascus he moved with a group of Dutch
and Swiss colleagues to Homs. But in Homs he also met people who were
supporting Bashar Assad and demanding to protect them from terrorists. A group
of local residents and Giles Jacquier who happened to be near came under a grenade
thrower fire, which was a common thing in that district.
Commenting the tragic death of the French reporter Mother Agnes Mariam, who is the prior of the St James Catholic Cathedral in Damascus, said that there is no protesting opposition in Syria but only bandits who are killing people.
Many people we contacted in Syria including independent foreign
reporters told us about the information war against Syria.
Al Jazeera stage set complete with actors and directors. The same trickery that was deployed in Tripoli and parts of Libya!
AL JAZEERA CREATES A “HOLLYWOOD SYRIA” FOR PURPOSE OF DECEPTION
According to them, Qatari channel Al Jazeera, for example, in
order to broadcast a report on mass anti-governmental rallies in Syria made a
fake footage with the help of computer editing using dozens of atmosphere
players and decoration of Syrian streets, a kind of “Hollywood village”.
ED: On Syrian television, Thierry Meyssan revealed that Al-Jazeera just
created sets (copies of) of the Umayyads and the Abbasids squares
(Damascus). The channel also intends to reproduce the central squares of
four provincial towns. Qatar provides significant military effort in
Western military action against Syria.
As for the Syrian opposition abroad, its political part is
represented by the Syrian National council with the headquarters in Istanbul.
It is headed by Burhan Ghalioun, a Syrian-French political scientist at the
Sorbonne University in Paris.
It is quite a heterogeneous formation which comprises groups with different goals. They represent the Muslim Brotherhood and other Sunnite organizations, Kurdish separatists, Liberal-Democratic dissidents who usually reside in Europe and in the US.The armed opposition which conducted terrorist attacks in Syria is represented by a number of groups from a military wing of the Muslim Brotherhood to the Libyan radical Islamists and Al Qaeda.According to the information we receive from our Syrian colleagues there are training camps for insurgents in Lebanon and Turkey.
The officers of security services of NATO, Turkey and some Arab
states are in charge for the training and armament of the insurgents, while the
monarchies of the Persian Gulf provide the financing.
The future development of the situation in Syria depends in many
ways on the ability of the ruling regime to consolidate public forces and
conduct the announced reforms.
Other priorities are the liquidation of terrorist groups and
stabilization of the domestic situation.
In its turn this issue is directly linked to the development of
the global policies and will depend on the activities of the leading countries
of NATO, Turkey, the Arab League (which sent its monitors to Syria) Russia and
China.
As for Russia,
it firmly declares that
repetition of the “Libyan scenario”
in Syria
is inadmissible.
Boris
Dolgov is Cand. Sc. (History), Senior research fellow of the Centre for Arabic
Studies of the Russian Institute of Oriental Studies.
This is a very interesting piece,thankyou for sharing. It is amazing to see that you have actually placed inside of Syria and observed the truth, once again proving that media mostly speculates and the world is largely misinformed. What do you think about the future of Syria? Will the turmoil end with the government reforms?
ReplyDeleteFrom E. in Australia
I do not know but I doubt that when it is over the needs of the people will be served. They DO NOT want another Libya but that seems to be what they are getting. Turkey is the NATO tool to bring down war by baiting and lying and then, since Turkey is America's belligerent in the area and a member of NATO... expect war.
ReplyDeleteHowever China and Russia and Iran have other ideas... so... we don't know. The people of Turkey do NOT want war but how much say do the commoners ever have? One of the things about the Mavi Marmara when it was sunk. The 8 Turks assassinated were of the peaceful persuasion and against the actions that their government is now taking. So I think this has been in the planning for some time now.
Syria fights for all of us now. She must be supported.