Syria in the International Shadows

Here is a report from Washington Post Reporter Liz Sly about what is going on in Syria, where the "Arab Spring" has spread and an estimated 550 people have been killed by Syrian security forces.

As we know, Syria, a Sunni majority nation, is ruled by a dictator, Bashar al-Assad, who is an Alawite (Shia).  The ratio is about 74% to 13%, with Druze and Christians making up most of the rest.♠  This can lead to some tension, and in the event of a violent overthrow of the government, some untoward consequences.  As the reporter says:

In Syria, the fall of President Bashar al-Assad would unleash a cataclysm of chaos, sectarian strife and extremism that spreads far beyond its borders, threatening not only the entrenched rulers already battling to hold at bay a clamor for democratic change but also the entire balance of power in the volatile region, analysts and experts say.

The US has been quiet about Syria, and with good reason.

“For the Obama administration, the last thing they want, just at the time they’re withdrawing from Iraq, is a destabilized Syria that would lead to open season for jihadis to cross the border into Iraq,” said David Lesch, professor of Middle East history at Trinity University in Texas.

There are a lot of questions, including what will the Syrian Government do and who is behind the insurrection.  Reporter Sly tells us:

Syria has sought to portray its opponents as armed Islamic extremists intent on sowing sectarian strife, and indeed, the last time there was significant domestic unrest in the country was in 1982, when the Syrian army ruthlessly crushed an insurrection by armed members of the Muslim Brotherhood in the town of Hama, killing between 10,000 and 40,000 people.

Syrian activists bristle at the suggestion that their movement is dominated by Islamists, and say their revolution is no different from the one in Egypt, in which ordinary people spontaneously took to the streets to vent their frustrations with corruption, nepotism and the ruthlessness of the security forces.

In the mean time, former Washington Post Reporter Tom Ricks, from his blog The Best Defense links us to this blog post about a Syrian Father defending his daughter from Syrian Security Forces, "My Father the Hero", which is in very good English.

Revolutions are usually complicated.

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  Religion in Syria.