Wed. 27 Apr. 2011

INDEPENDENT Robert Fisk: If the rumours and conspiracies are true, then

President Assad's regime is on the road to civil war……...…1 Western intervention in Syria would make matters worse …..4

LATIMES Syria in chaos sends shivers in region ……………………….8

HAARETZ In Syria, the army's loyalty to Assad runs deep ……………12

SKY NEWS The West's Double Standards Over Syria ……………….…15

GLOBE & MAIL 'Monumental' crackdown by Syria's al-Assad well-planned

and deadly………………………………………………….18DAILY TELEGRAPH

Syrians stand alone ………………………………………....21JERUSALEM POST

Assad’s fall would be welcome ………………………….…22 US: Assad no longer potential peace partner for Israel …….25

WASHINGTON POST Tom Donilon’s Arab Spring challenge …………………….27 Global condemnation, but no action ………………………28

THE AGONIST Inside the Obama team’s “shift” on Syria ………………….33

UPI Syria accuses mass media of distortion …………………….35

SCOTSMAN Syria: Crackdown undoing work of country's first lady …...36

YEDIOTH AHRONOTH Syrian opposition ask world's help to stop Assad …………38

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HOME PAGERobert Fisk: If the rumours and conspiracies are true, then President Assad's regime is on the road to civil warIf the dead soldiers are victims of revenge killings, it means the opposition is prepared to use forceIndependent,Wednesday, 27 April 2011

Every night, Syrian state television is a horror show. Naked corpses with multiple bullet wounds, backs of heads sliced off. All Syrian soldiers, the television insists, murdered by "the treacherous armed criminal gangs" near Deraa.

One of the bodies – of a young officer in his twenties – has had his eyes gouged out. "Knives and sharp tools" appear to have been used on the soldiers, the commentary tells us. There seems no doubt that the bodies are real and little doubt that they are indeed members of the Syrian "security" forces – the word security needs to be placed in inverted commas these days – nor that the weeping, distraught parents in the background are indeed their families.

Pictures show the bodies, newly washed for burial, taken from the Tishrin Military Hospital in Damascus. Their names are known. Mohamed Ali, Ibrahim Hoss, Ahmed Abdullah, Nida al-Hoshi, Basil Ali, Hazem Mohamed Ali, Mohamed Alla are all carried in flag-draped coffins from the army's mortuary by military police. They are from Tartous, Banias, Aleppo, Damascus. When al-Hoshi's funeral cortege was passing up the Mediterranean coast road to the north, they were ambushed by "an armed gang".

It's easy to be cynical about these dreadful pictures and the gloss put on their deaths. Shooting at funerals, after all, has hitherto been the prerogative of the government's armed cops rather than "armed gangs". And Syrian television has shown not a single dead civilian or civilian funeral after the death of perhaps 320 demonstrators in more than a month. Another 20 were reported killed around Deraa yesterday.

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But these reports are important. For if the dead soldiers are victims of revenge killings by outraged families who have lost their loved ones at the hands of the secret police, it means that the opposition is prepared to use force against their aggressors. But if there really are armed groups roaming Syria, then President Bashar al-Assad's Baathist regime is on the road to civil war.

Hitherto, the demonstrators – pro-democracy or anti-Bashar or both – have been giving us the story line; their YouTube footage, internet descriptions, the stunning pictures of Syrian T-72 tanks powering through the streets of Deraa – not to mention the pathetic attempt to attack one with an empty glass bottle – have dominated our perception of the all-powerful dictatorship crushing its people in blood. And truth lies behind what they say. After the 1982 slaughter in Hama, no one is in any doubt that Syrian Baathists play by Hama rules. But their explanation for the daily series of macabre pictures on state television also lacks conviction. According to those bravely trying to telephone news out of Syria – although not from Deraa, where the telephones and internet have been completely shut down – the mutilated bodies are those of troops who refused to shoot at their own people and who were immediately punished by execution and mutilation by the shabiha, the "hoodlums" of Alawi fighters, and then cynically displayed on television to back up false government claims it is fighting an armed insurgency and that the people of Deraa themselves had invited the army into their city to save them from "terrorists".

Which sounds a little like the flip-side of the government's own propaganda. Of course, the Syrian authorities have only themselves to blame for their lack of credibility. Having cited "foreign plots" – the explanation of all the region's potentates when their backs are to the wall – the authorities have studiously banned all foreign journalists from entering Syria to prove or disprove these claims. The ministry of tourism has even been sent a list of Middle East correspondents by the ministry of interior to ensure that no reporters slip into Syria with a sudden desire to study the Roman ruins of Palmyra.

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Thus history is written in rumours which begin, I suppose, with the last words displayed on Syrian television's evening news: "Martyrs Never Die." Clearly they do expire, but which martyrs are we talking about? A good tale from Deraa – one without a shred of evidence so far – is that after tanks of the Fourth Army Brigade of Maher Assad (little brother of the President) stormed into the city, elements of the regular army's Fifth Brigade near Deraa – supposedly commanded by an officer called Rifai, although even this is in dispute – turned their guns on Maher's invaders. But the Fifth, so the story goes, has no tanks and includes air force personnel who are not allowed to fly their jets.

So are there now armed civilians – an oxymoron that seems lost on the regime – now fighting back in a systematic fashion? In Lebanon, whose capital is closer to Damascus that Deraa, there is growing fear that this bloodshed is only two hours away by road. Syria's friends in Lebanon are now claiming that the Saudis – allies of the outgoing government in Beirut – have been subventing the revolution in Syria.

One former minister produced on television copies of cheques for $300,000 (£180,000) supposedly carrying the signature of Prince Turki bin Abdul Aziz, the former Saudi intelligence head – and in that capacity once on good terms with a certain Osama bin Laden – and brother of King Abdullah, and given to Lebanese political figures to instil unrest in Syria. One of those accused of involvement by Syria is the former Lebanese minister Mohamed Beydoun. The latter has said that his accusers are guilty of "incitement to murder" and Prince Turki has indignantly called the cheques "false". But the Syrian-supported Hezbollah has now endorsed the claim and at least one Lebanese MP, Ahmed Fatfat, has at last uttered the fateful words. By these accusations against the "Future Movement" – the largest grouping in the outgoing government – he said, "the Hezbollah and its crew are preparing the way for civil war in Lebanon".

Now the Syrian media have pointed the finger at Lebanese MP Okab Sadr, stating that he had been arrested – along with "Israeli

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officers" – in the Syrian city of Banias. In fact, Mr Sadr is safe in Lebanon where he has emerged to say that the only reason he would go to Banias would be to give blood at the hospital to its inhabitants.

In the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli this Friday, pro and anti-Assad supporters plan to hold further and larger demonstrations after morning prayers. Many Lebanese in the north fear that in the event of a civil conflict inside Syria, Tripoli will become a "capital" of northern Syria, though whether it would be a rebel or an Assad stronghold is open to question.

Somewhat more disturbing right now – and much nearer the truth – is that Ali Aid, a rather tough character from the Jebel Mohsen area of the Alawi mountains of Syria, has left his son Rifaat in charge of his proto-militia movement. He has instead built himself a fine villa next to the Syrian-Lebanese border. The problem is that Major Ali Aid is living in his new home – which lies on the Lebanese side of the frontier.

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Western intervention in Syria would make matters worse There are good reasons why Britain and other foreign states should limit their involvement in the conflicts now raging in the Arab worldPatrick CockburnIndependent,Wednesday, 27 April 2011

The Syrian army is moving to crush in blood the protesters calling for democracy and the overthrow of President Bashar al-Assad and his regime. Unburied bodies lie in the streets of Deraa, the city in the south which has been at the centre of the popular revolt.

Will the government succeed? The chances for the moment look evenly balanced, with almost everything depending on whether or not demonstrators continue to march and rally all over Syria

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despite the savage repression. There is also the possibility of divisions in the army, though less so than in many other Arab countries.

The uprising against police states, both republican and monarchical, in the Arab world is entering its fifth month without a decisive victory by either the powers-that-be or the protesters. In Tunisia and Egypt the political and military elite felt that, if they got rid of their geriatric leaders along with their families and cronies, they might prevent radical changes in the political and social status quo. In Bahrain the monarchy, aided by Saudi Arabia and other Sunni Gulf states, destroyed the pro-democracy movement and is terrorising its supporters.

Syria is going down the same road as Bahrain. At the end of last week President Assad and his inner circle appear to have decided that such limited concessions as they were willing to make were only being interpreted as weakness. They gave orders to their security forces to shoot unarmed demonstrators and stamp out all signs of dissent on the streets.

Repression in Syria may work for the moment. The government has a core of support based on the Alawite minority, to which the Assad family and top military and political members of the regime belong. There are others who work for the state and fear change, as well as Christian and Druze minorities who do not believe opposition claims to be non-sectarian.

Overall, however, the police states in the Arab world, which have seemed so immovable for the past 35 years, are fighting to survive. Before about 1975 there was an era of army coups d'etat, but these stopped as ferocious multi-layered security agencies turned military dictatorships into police states. East European intelligence agencies gave fraternal advice on how this could be done.

There was more to total state control than just keeping the army in its barracks. Censorship of all forms of media was pervasive, as

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was control of all non-state agencies such as trade unions and political parties. Only the mosque retained some autonomy, which explains why opposition to autocracy so often took an Islamic form.

By this year the old ingredients of repression had lost something of their potency. Torturers and executioners still retained their ability to frighten. But regimes had lost their control over information and communications thanks to the internet, satellite television and even the humble mobile phone. One member of the Syrian opposition points out that when 20,000 people in Hama were slaughtered by the forces of President Hafez al-Assad in 1982 there was not a single picture of even one of the bodies. Today pictures of the dead and wounded in Deraa and elsewhere in Syria are transmitted to the rest of the world within seconds of being taken.

Of course governments can counter-attack and close down mobile-phone networks and ban journalists from operating in Syria. But 100 satellite phones distributed by an opposition Syrian businessman make total control of information almost impossible to establish. The role of the internet in the Arab awakening has been well-publicised, but that of satellite stations, notably Al Jazeera, is underplayed. The US has every reason to be embarrassed by this since Washington spent years claiming that Al Jazeera's criticism of US policy in Iraq after the invasion showed it must be linked to al-Qa'ida. An Al Jazeera cameraman was held in Guantanamo for six years so that US interrogators could find out more about the television station.

Britain, France and Italy have called for sanctions against Syria. But they should not do more because intrusive foreign intervention is likely to prove counter-productive. There are already signs of this in Libya. Justifiable action against impending massacre turns into imperial intervention. Nato air strikes against Colonel Gaddafi's tanks advancing on Benghazi have escalated into an air war, aided by foreign advisers on the ground, with the purpose of overthrowing the regime. In such an offensive the

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Libyan rebels, whatever their popular support and skill in media relations, may play only a walk-on part.

It is worth recalling that most Afghans were pleased when the Taliban collapsed in 2001 and most Iraqis were glad to see the back of Saddam Hussein in 2003. But it did not follow that the opponents of autocracy were united, had real support or were less corrupt or more competent than their predecessors. Nor were Afghans or Iraqis prepared to see foreign armies determine who should hold power in their countries.

People whom Western states claim they are trying to aid for humanitarian reasons are understandably sceptical about how altruistic their motives really are. Their suspicions will only be confirmed by documents published by The Independent giving details of talks between the British government and BP and Royal Dutch Shell in 2002 on how to avoid US companies excluding them from exploiting Iraqi oil reserves.

There is a further reason why Britain and other foreign states should limit their involvement in the conflicts now raging in the Arab world. It is true that the struggle is primarily between popular protests or uprisings against vicious autocracies. But these crises have at least some aspects of a civil war: there are tribes which support Colonel Gaddafi and there are Syrians who believe that the opposition is more sectarian and Sunni-dominated than is evident from their human-rights agenda.

It is right for Britain and its allies to protest at the butchery in Syria, though their criticism might carry more weight had they been equally vocal about torture, disappearances and killings in Bahrain. But this humanitarian zeal easily becomes a cover for wider intervention, because retreat is humiliating and therefore politically impossible, and the field cannot be left open to other competing interventionist powers. The outside world can mitigate, but should not try to change, what is happening in Syria.

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Syria in chaos sends shivers in region Syria's upheaval is showing the potential to affect issues as broad as Iran's conflict with the U.S. and its allies, and as narrow as water rights. It may ultimately change the balance of power.By Borzou Daragahi, Los Angeles Times26 Apr. 2011,

Reporting from BeirutUnrest roiling Syria, a linchpin state in the Middle East, is shaking the region in ways that even the revolution in Egypt did not, threatening to upend some longstanding alliances and encouraging neighbors to scramble for sudden advantage.

Already, the chaos in Syria is showing the potential to affect issues as broad as Iran's conflict with the U.S. and its allies, and as narrow as regional water rights.

Whether or not President Bashar Assad weathers the storm, the uprising is forcing countries in the region to formulate a response and may ultimately change the balance of power.

While few expected the revolt against Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak early this year to dramatically shift his country's generally pro-Western policies, Syria maintains a wider range of contacts with countries that include Iran and Russia. For decades, it has been a key player in volatile Lebanon.

It has its own unresolved dispute with Israel over the Golan Heights, but is also important to Israel and the United States because of its alliance with Iran and Hezbollah, a relationship that both American and Israeli officials have encouraged Assad to break.

Iran has been chalking up diplomatic victories as pro-U.S. Arab regimes such as Mubarak's have either fallen or been challenged by democratic movements this year. But now that trouble has come to Syria, Tehran has suddenly cooled to the Arab Spring.

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Syria serves as a political and military conduit for Iranian-backed militant groups in the eastern Mediterranean, including Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in the Palestinian territories. Regime change in Syria could deliver a cataclysmic blow to Iran's ability to project power in the region and threaten Israel.

"We are worried about the resistance against Israel," said Asad Zarei, a pro-government political analyst in Tehran. "If the changes in Syria happen in a way that the resistance is undermined, we are very worried."

Syrian authorities, facing their greatest security challenge in 30 years, continued an assault Tuesday on the southern city of Dara, where they had dispatched tanks and thousands of troops the day before. Troops who had cut off electricity and phone networks in an attempt to smother the protest movement reportedly opened fire on civilians.

Despite the intensity of the crackdown, protests were reportedly held in several cities. Witnesses said about 50 doctors held a demonstration in Aleppo demanding the release of all medical personnel and students arrested in recent weeks.

Over the weekend, as Syrian security forces mowed down scores of peaceful protesters in cities around the country, Iranian state media and prayer leaders cried out against oppression and injustice in a different Arab nation — Bahrain, which like Iran has a Shiite Muslim majority.

"Iran cannot remain silent in the face of the atrocities in Bahrain," supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Saturday. Khamenei said nothing about the carnage in Syria. Iranian state television reported that the protests had left 280 injured — all of them Syrian police officers.

Commentators in Arab countries suspicious of Iran's regional ambitions gloated over Tehran's obvious discomfort — supporting

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uprisings against secular regimes across the Arab world except the rebellion in Syria, which it insists is the result of a Zionist plot.

"Iran and Hezbollah destroyed whatever credibility Iran has left, when Iran let down the people of Syria by considering the movement of the people there a conspiracy," Hilmi Asmar wrote in the April 20 edition of Al Dustour, a Jordanian daily.

Some Iranians appear to be realizing that the government's official position is untenable, and are calling on Damascus to reform. "The Syrian regime should heed the demands of people in Syria and manage the current crisis in the country," former Iranian Foreign Minister Manoucher Mottaki was quoted as telling students Tuesday.

Countries close to Syria, such as Turkey, have responded by distancing themselves from the Assad clan. Syria has encouraged Turkey's increasingly assertive regional leadership in recent years because of its importance as a trade partner, its potential as a counterweight to the West and as an alternative to the relationship with Iran.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who was harshly critical of Mubarak, has long been a friend of Assad. He told a news conference Tuesday that Turkey was displeased by events in Syria. "During my conversation with Assad, I have conveyed our concern to him," he said, according to the semiofficial Anatolia news agency. "We do not desire an antidemocratic approach in Syria."

Syrian opposition figures and Turkish democracy activists appeared together Tuesday on Al Jazeera television live from Istanbul, Turkey's largest city, condemning Assad's regime.

"Why is Bashar killing his brothers?" a Turkish activist said during the program. "Is it because they want to live a free and dignified life?"

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Lebanon's political factions are carefully watching events unfold in their influential neighbor, which occupied Lebanon for decades. Syria strongly backs some Lebanese factions, including Hezbollah, while others consider themselves blood enemies of Damascus. Any change of political orientation in Syria could dramatically change Lebanon's balance of power.

"Everyone is trying to game out the Syrian crisis and try to take advantage of it," said Elias Muhanna, a researcher at Harvard University and the writer of a blog on Middle East politics.

Countries may also see an opportunity in Damascus' weakness. Neighboring Jordan recently decided to demand renegotiation of a water-sharing agreement from a river that traverses both nations.

"The amount of water in the Yarmuk River is constantly dropping; therefore, the agreement needs to be reconsidered," water authority official Saad Abu-Hammur told the Jordan Times on April 16, a day after widespread protests rocked Syria.

Analysts say Saudi Arabia may be considering using its diplomatic and political influence to offer Assad a way out of his predicament, but for a price: breaking his alliance with Iran, which is accused of stirring up trouble among Shiite minorities in countries such as Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.

"Watch to see if Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem suddenly takes a trip to Riyadh," said one analyst in Beirut, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The foreign minister of the pro-Saudi United Arab Emirates, Abdullah bin Zayed al Nahyan, met Sunday with Syrian officials in what one analyst described as a possible prelude to a rapprochement with Saudi Arabia.

On offer might be help slowing the flow of information feeding the revolt on the streets of Syria. The UAE hosts Saudi-owned Al Arabiya, one of two Arabic-language channels whose reporting

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has been inflaming passions across Syria, and owns the Thuraya satellite phone network used by pro-democracy activists to circumvent the secret police.

Other than possibly toning down news coverage, it remained unclear how much influence Saudi Arabia and its Arabian Peninsula allies, or anyone else, may have on events in Syria, which appear to have taken on a life of their own.

Muhanna said he didn't think the Saudis wanted to see a revolution in Syria, which could usher in a more radical regime.

"If they want to appear to be giving support to the Assad regime, it could help," he said. "It could quell more radical Islamic activists."

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In Syria, the army's loyalty to Assad runs deep Assad is still able to rely on the army, the same one that his father took care to nurture over decades - an army whose senior ranks are an inseparable part of the economic elite. By Zvi Bar'el Haaretz,26 Apr. 2011,

The regime in Syria has not yet collapsed. Like Muammar Gadhafi in Libya, Bashar Assad has adopted the slogan, "The regime wants to topple the people." Assad is sure that even if the Syrian army cannot deal with an external enemy like Israel it can deal with the enemy at home. The Fourth Division and the Presidential Guards that are under the command of his brother, Maher Assad, are killing protesters in Dar'aa while other loyal battalions are taking action against the demonstrators in Homs and Ladakiya.

Assad is still able to rely on the army or at least most of it. It is the same army that his father, Hafez Assad, took care to nurture over

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decades - an army whose senior ranks are an inseparable part of the economic elite. Both father and son bent laws and regulations on behalf of the army to ensure that its loyalty to the family would be at least as deep as its loyalty to the fatherland.

For example, in the '90s Hafez Assad banned the import of tobacco to the country so that the commanders who smuggled tobacco into Syria could enjoy a total monopoly. Officers were also permitted to buy dollars at the official exchange rate and to sell them at a "civilian" rate which was a great deal higher. Had a regular citizen done that, it would have been considered a crime.

The system of monopolies for army officers was handed down as an inheritance to the younger Assad who, unlike his father, was already born into the rich and ruling elite. His cousin, Rami Makhlouf, holds a huge slice of the oil, gas and tourism industries. But not only family members and heads of the Alawite community enjoyed, and still enjoy, the proximity to the rulers. It is enough to mention the former defense minister, Moustafa Tlass, or the chief of staff, Hikmat Shihabi, both Sunni Muslims, whose families still enjoy franchises that bring in huge sums. One of Tlass' sons, for example, is Syria's "sugar tycoon." Another owns a chain of hotels, one of them in the town of Hama where Assad's troops killed thousands of civilians in 1982.

Assad's attractive wife, Asma, is also a Sunni and belongs to Syria's economic elite through the family of her father, Fuaz Ahras. Many friends of Bashar Assad also enjoy a generous standard of living as a result of import licenses granted to them by the president and his aides. Some of them are known as "the five percent people" on account of the cut they take for deals which they arrange for foreign investors with the regime.

It would therefore be inaccurate to state that the struggle in Syria is between the Alawites and the Sunnis, between the minority that represents 12 percent of the population of 21 million Syrian citizens, and the Sunni majority that is oppressed and poverty stricken. Among the Alawite tribes there are also many who wish

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to see Assad and his regime toppled. In March, even before the mass protests began, the heads of four large Alawite clans published a manifesto in which they disavowed themselves of the Assad regime and of "all connections that were forcibly imposed on us during the period of President Hafez and his son, Bashar." Heads of large Alawite clans made it clear to representatives of the government that they would not agree to another massacre of the kind that took place in Hama in 1982.

The chasm with the Sunni population is naturally even wider. Assad, the son, had to pull Tlass out of the storeroom and send him to his birthplace, Homs, in order to calm the citizens. Tlass went there last week with a group of senior Syrian security officers to hear the complaints of the citizens against the regime. In the good old days, these citizens would have been charged in court or would have disappeared in the dungeons of a prison, but Tlass was now seen making copious notes of their complaints and ensuring them that he would raise them with the president.

The disagreements within the ruling family have also surfaced again with the uncle, Rifat Assad, and especially his son, Ribal, who warn of a civil war and have published interesting new facts about the Hama massacre. Ribal is now taking pains to clear his father's name of involvement in the massacre and placing the blame entirely on the late president, Hafez Assad, and on Tlass who was his defense minister.

Are these differences likely to develop into an internal revolt against the regime? So far the army has shown complete loyalty to the regime. But the army ranks are also filled with soldiers from different ethnic groups, with junior and mid-ranking officers whose loyalty to their families and home towns is now being put to the test. In contrast to 1982, the revolt now is taking place all over the country and the security forces' gunfire does not distinguish between families and social classes. Blogs by Syrian opposition members talk of exchanges of letters and telephone calls with these commanders that are aimed at persuading them not to shoot if they are ordered to fire at civilians.

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It is likely that the army's top brass will conclude that it no longer needs the Assad family to continue to manage the army or to get various benefits. In that case, Assad and his family, as well as the Baath party, are likely to become the army's scapegoats. Since there is no "alternative army", the opposition will be forced to conduct its affairs vis a vis the heads of the army and perhaps to make do with the not inconsiderable achievement of overthrowing the Assad family.

Meanwhile Iran is keeping mum and Iranian media have been prohibited from reporting on the events in Syria. Hezbullah too is keeping its mouth shut on the subject. While it is reporting the developments in Libya, Yemen and Egypt, it has "forgotten" Syria. The fall of Assad could constitute a significant change for these players, but it is not certain that Damascus would in fact change its policies toward them.

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The West's Double Standards Over Syria Dominic Waghorn,Sky News,26 Apr. 2011,

It took just two weeks for the International Criminal Court to begin investigating Gaddafi, his sons and commanders over allegations their security forces had attacked peaceful demonstrators.

More than six weeks into Syria’s unrest, Assad’s security forces are gunning down their own people in their hundreds and the west still has not moved beyond words of condemnation.

Last month the ICC prosecutor said he was examining claims 300 civilians had been killed in Tripoli, 257 in Benghazi and 124 in Zawiya. There are now reliable reports of around 400 civilians being killed by Syrian security forces.

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And yet so far the Assad regime seems immune from any referral to the ICC. For that to happen the UN Security Council would need to act and thus far there seems little appetite for action against the Syrian regime.

There have been plenty of words. William Hague tweeted more condemnation today.

The White House has had plenty to say as well, but done very little. White House spokesman Jay Carney said the following and remember he is talking about a regime now using its military to crush a popular uprising:

‘We are certainly looking at different ways to make clear to the Syrian government how appalling we find this behavior to be, and to encourage them - both as we have in speaking out against it, but in other means - to stop the violence and to move towards serious reform," he said.

So there it is. The White House wants the Syrians to move on from slaughtering their own civilians with tanks and guns and towards 'serious reform', as if it is all on the same curve.

Barack Obama’s spokesman also told reporters it is “up to the Syrian people to decide who their leader should be.” Fine if you are sitting in Washington. Less so if you are staring down the barrel of a T72 tank in streets of Deraa.

“Each country is different” spelled out Carney. You can say that again.

What makes Syria different, now that its military and security forces are gunning down unarmed civilians, just as the Libyans did?

The answer seems to be partly better the devil you know. Many in the west do not like the Assad regime much and are disappointed

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by it. But they know where are with it. It is the fear of the unknown that is keeping world leaders on the sidelines, when it only took a fortnight for them to get involved with Libya.

But those fears may be overstated.

Some argue Syria is a sectarian powderkeg in the most volatile region in the world with the potential to ignite sectarian conflict well beyond its borders. Others remain unconvinced.

And then there is the role Syria could play potentially in resolving conflict in the Middle East. The key word is potentially. The Americans have invested a lot in renewing ties with Assad hoping an Israeli Syrian détente could lead to progress between Palestinians and Israel.

But that argument holds less water now that Assad has begun killing his own people. If he survives he will need to re burnish his anti-Israeli credentials like never before to restore any credibility he has left.

There are two far more important differences between Syria and Libya.

Syria does not produce oil, well not nearly as much as Libya and not nearly as high quality.

And Syria does not present a huge immigration threat to southern Europe, unlike Libya.

Otherwise we are talking about the same situation. Frustrated masses fed up with a corrupt entrenched regime showing enormous courage confronting its killers in the streets and being killed in their hundreds. Only with Libya the west is prepared to act and with Syria it seems only to talk.

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'Monumental' crackdown by Syria's al-Assad well-planned and deadly PATRICK MARTIN Globe & Mail,26 Apr. 2011,

In a move reminiscent of his brutal father, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has dispatched his armed forces to try to snuff out the country’s five-week-old democratic uprising.

Thousands of Syrian troops backed by tanks and armoured personnel carriers stormed the southern city of Daraa on Monday, killing as many as 25 people, witnesses said. It was the first time the Syrian regime has resorted to such extreme measures against civilians in the current crisis.

“This is monumental,” said Barry Rubin, director of the Global Research in International Affairs Centre in Herzliya, Israel, and author of The Truth About Syria. “All the Arab regimes have a three-level priority of response,” he explained.

At the level one, “they hope the protests will go away and can be waited out.” At level two, “they respond with a mixture of repression and promises,” just the way Mr. al-Assad has, Mr. Rubin said. At level three, they resort to “heavy repression and killing people in order to destroy the protests and intimidate people from participation.”

“Assad has now gone to the third level,” Mr. Rubin said, noting that “even in the Shah’s Iran in 1978, as well as Egypt and Tunisia in 2011, the regimes did not go to level three because large elements in the elite did not want to do so.”

While Mr. al-Assad is not close to using the full power at his command, “they are no doubt experimenting to see what level of repression is needed,” Mr. Rubin said. “I presume they will try to suppress the south as an example to the rest of the country.”

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The assault began at dawn when 3,000 to 5,000 army and security forces swooped down on Daraa, with tanks taking up positions in the town centre and snipers deploying on rooftops, activists said.

“They have snipers firing on everybody who is moving,” a witness told The Associated Press by telephone.

The protests calling for reform began March 15 in Daraa, and several political figures from the area have stepped down to protest against the violence, no doubt drawing the ire of the regime.

Monday’s offensive was planned in great detail: Electricity, water and mobile phone services were cut; knife-wielding security agents conducted house-to-house sweeps; neighbourhoods were sectioned off and checkpoints set up. All of which suggests the regime plans to impose military-style control in the city.

For its part, the Syrian government announced the offensive was sparked by “calls for help from the inhabitants of Daraa … and destruction by extremist terrorist groups,” and that military units entered the city “to restore calm and security.”

The statement said that a number of Syrian soldiers had been killed in the effort and state-run television broadcast gruesome close-ups of dead soldiers, their eyes blown out and parts of their limbs missing, to back up assertions that they were under attack.

Syria has banned nearly all foreign media and restricted access to trouble spots since the uprising began, making it nearly impossible to get independent assessments.A group of activists said in a statement to the news media that “more than 25 people fell but no one could reach them because of the heavy shelling,” and that only seven bodies were retrieved.

They were identified by name and included a father and his two sons.

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As well, “the commander of the Third Army Corps, Kamal Ayyash, a citizen of Daraa, was arrested because he protested against the killings,” the statement said.

Britain, France, Germany and Portugal are asking the UN Security Council to condemn Syria’s violent crackdown and to urge restraint by the government, council diplomats told reporters.

Bashar Ja’afari, Syria’s ambassador to the UN, said the move would be a “violation of the UN Charter because it would happen without consultations with Syria.” Mr. Ja’afari called the proposed statement an “intervention in the domestic affairs of a sovereign member of the UN.”

He said he would not comment on allegations of violence against protesters.

In Washington, a spokesman for the White House said it deplored the “brutal violence used by the government of Syria against its people,” and that the administration was considering targeted sanctions to make clear that “this behaviour is unacceptable.”

“The United States is pursuing a range of possible policy options, including targeted sanctions, to respond to the crackdown,” said Tommy Vietor, spokesman for the National Security Council.

“The Syrian people's call for freedom of expression, association, peaceful assembly, and the ability to freely choose their leaders must be heard,” Mr. Vietor said.

Mr. Rubin said it is remarkable how little is being done to stop the Syrian attacks.

“This should go down in history alongside the indifference to the Warsaw uprising of 1944, the Hungarian revolt of 1956, and the indifference to Iran’s repression in 2009 as a shameful Western failure,” Mr. Rubin said.

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“In recent weeks, the Western countries have said that Mubarak must go, that Gadhafi must go,” he said. “But not a single one has said what should be shouted out right now: Assad must go.”

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Syrians stand alone Just as in Bahrain, this is a part of the Arab spring that the West will be content to leave to its own devices. Telegraph view,Daily Telegraph,26 Apr. 2011,

Next year sees the 30th anniversary of the Hama massacre, when Syria's president Hafez al-Assad used his army to crush a Sunni Muslim revolt. Ten thousand people died in what has been described as the "single deadliest act" by any Arab government against its own people. The decision of Hafez's son Bashar to send tanks into Dera'a – where the current anti-government unrest began five weeks ago – was clearly designed to send a brutal signal to insurgents that he has reverted to family type. More than 100 protesters were killed on Good Friday; the assault on Dera'a has cost the lives of dozens more. The ruler who once depicted himself as a reformer has evidently concluded that it is the iron fist that is the most effective response to popular dissent.

Crucially, he retains the support of the military. It was Hosni Mubarak's failure to secure the loyalty of his army that led to his swift demise in Egypt. And it is arguable that the West's uncertain response to the Libya crisis has also emboldened him. Muammar Gaddafi is still in place more than five weeks after air strikes began. More pertinently, Bashar knows that the chances of similar military deployment against Syria are zero. The West's relationship with the country is uncomfortably ambivalent. Despite Syria's friendship with Iran and its long record of sponsoring terrorist organisations such as Hizbollah, Hamas and

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Palestinian Islamic Jihad, it has also traditionally been seen as a stable presence in a volatile region.

Just as in Bahrain, therefore, this is a part of the Arab spring that the West will be content to leave to its own devices. There will be words of condemnation and no doubt the prospect of sanctions will be mooted, though we would be surprised if any of significance are imposed. In essence, the people of Syria are – tragically – on their own.

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Assad’s fall would be welcome The ouster of the Syrian president would significantly improve Israel’s strategic situation. Tzachi Hanegbi,Jerusalem Post,27 Apr. 2011,

Three months ago, the January 25 revolution broke out in Egypt. Since then, the flames of revolt burning across Arab capitals have refused to die out. Ousted Tunisian president Zine al-Abedine Ben Ali fled his country’s civilian protests and found refuge in the bosom of the Saudi royal family. Egypt’s deposed president Hosni Mubarak, forced to transfer rule to the military, is currently hopping between police investigators and the emergency room. Libyan President Muammar Gaddafi is leading a fight for survival in his country against the rebels who are reinforced by NATO air raids which almost certainly guarantee a future victory. In Syria, Bahrain, Yemen and Jordan, as well, tensions continue to rise. The effects of the volcano that erupted some 90 days ago, are still felt in Middle Eastern cities.

Events in Syria will have a more decisive impact than those in any other Arab country. While the implications of the turbulence in Egypt over the peace treaty with Israel should not be taken lightly, it is too early to tell where Cairo is heading. The military

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establishment has not transferred its rule and its connection to the West remains firm and authentic. It is very possible that Mubarak’s exit from the political stage will be a catalyst for further consolidation of this culture of political democratization, but will not lead to a change in political orientation. Meanwhile, the fall of Bashar Assad’s regime would result in dramatic regional change. Unlike many respected commentators, I believe that such a development would significantly improve Israel’s strategic situation.

CONCERN OVER the collapse of the Alawite minority rule is based on our longstanding truce with Syria, in place since 1973. I disagree with the approach that praises Assad for the quiet Israel-Syria border.

Although he has adhered to the restraint practiced by his late father, former president Hafez Assad, with respect to maintaining agreements such as the ceasefire in the Golan Heights, in many other areas he has led an adventurous policy which has placed him in direct confrontation with Israel. The calm northern border has provided him with a cover for militant, aggressive, and frustratingly effective activity on various fronts and against Israel’s interests.

Syria, via its proxies, spilled IDF blood in Lebanon for three decades. Israel’s forced unilateral withdrawal to the Israeli-Lebanon border was without any real achievement or value. Assad offered a safe haven in Damascus to senior leaders of terrorist organizations and allowed them to continue their terror activities, with unlimited freedom, from his capital.

The Syria-Iran alliance has provided Hamas and its satellites with financial aid, training camps, a supply of modern weapons and political backing. Sponsored by the intimate cooperation between Tehran and Damascus, a fanatic terror kingdom, armed to the teeth, was established on our southern border four years ago, and has since already exacted a tangible price from Israel.

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Hezbollah’s success in gaining unprecedented power in Lebanon can also be attributed to the Syrian president’s determination. In past years, Assad consistently rebuffed pressures from the Bush administration and refused to turn his back on Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah, despite threats and sanctions imposed on Syria.

Syria’s enthusiastic support for Hezbollah has turned it into Lebanon’s strongest organization militarily, and the most significant political force in the majority coalition, which is currently trying to establish a new government.

GIVEN THIS background – and we have not even mentioned the reports of Syria’s efforts to acquire nuclear weapons – it is difficult to support any position that allows for the Assad regime’s continued rule.

Those who disagree with an Assad departure are troubled by the possibility that his successors will deviate from the path of restraint that characterized him, and opt for a more provocative policy toward Israel.

The probability of this occurring is minimal, I believe. With citizens’ blood flowing in the streets, it seems more likely that Assad’s successors will first seek to sideline the devoted supporters of the hated duo, Nasrallah and Ahmadinejad. Syria’s opposition, like most of Syrian society, are members of the Sunni community.

If opposition leaders survive the conflict, overcome the current oppressive regime and fill key positions in Syria, they are unlikely to show a surplus of sympathy toward the Shias of Iran and Hezbollah.

To know what would really serves Israel’s interest, we should look toward the Islamic Republic. Nothing currently worries the ayatollahs’ regime more than the loss of Syria as its intimate partner in the “axis of evil.” Iran has invested enormous resources in maintaining this partnership, including a willingness to

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compromise on its own interests to satisfy Syria’s desires. Syria’s defection from the radical camp into the arms of the pragmatic Arab camp would leave Iran isolated and vulnerable.

Even Hezbollah leaders have recently found it difficult to sleep at night. Who is better aware of the grave impending damage should its extensive connections, carefully cultivated among the Syrian leadership, be severed? Intelligence, logistical and operational assets which have enabled them to maintain a balance of deterrence both against Israel and other power sources in Lebanon may all vanish.

Of course, it would be arrogant to predict at this stage the outcome of the processes of change our neighbors are undergoing. Things are as hopeful as they are dangerous. A positive surprise today can be revealed as a naïve illusion tomorrow.

Nonetheless, history has shown us more than once that events that were at first looked upon as wishful thinking, eventually became a reality. Perhaps at the end of this battle over Syria’s future, it will turn out that, contrary to the gloomy biblical prophecy, it will not be evil that will break forth from the north (Jeremiah 1:14), but rather, a blessing The writer is a former Kadima minister.

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US: Assad no longer potential peace partner for Israel Top US State Department official says it's difficult to pursue other diplomatic missions while Syrian regime violently puts down protests.Hilary leila Krieger,Jerusalem Post,27 Apr. 2011,

WASHINGTON – After two years of pushing Israel to reach a peace agreement with Syria, a top US State Department official indicated Tuesday the Obama administration is no longer looking at the current regime as a partner for such a deal.

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“It’s hard for us to stand by and see [President Bashar] Assad and his government engage in the kind of things they’re doing against their own people and to then think easily about how to pursue other diplomatic missions,” Jacob Sullivan, director of policy planning at the State Department, told reporters.

At the same time, he said that the US continues to believe it is important to engage with Syria in order to clearly communicate the US position on the actions Syria is taking in putting down opposition protests.

Sullivan said at this point there are no plans to withdraw the newly installed US Ambassador to Syria Robert Ford or otherwise cut off contacts. He noted that the Syrian ambassador in Washington had been summoned to the State Department after the most recent attacks on civilians, and that Ford had held several conversations with top Syrian officials in recent days.

But Sullivan said the US is also looking at the possibility of imposing sanctions on Syrian leaders and is consulting with international partners on this and other potential steps to halt the bloody crackdown Assad has ordered on opposition protesters.

“President Assad is on the wrong track,” Sullivan said, condemning the civilian deaths.

He added, though, that the US is focused on “diplomatic and financial” initiatives aimed at the Syrian regime rather than military intervention as has taken place in Libya.

He also repeatedly declined to label Assad an illegitimate ruler or call for him to go, as the US did in Libya with Muammar Gaddafi once the Libyan leader began to shoot at protesters rather than accede to their demands for reform.

“Ultimately, the future of Syria is up to the people of Syria,” Sullivan said.

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Tom Donilon’s Arab Spring challenge By David Ignatius, Washington Post,Tuesday, April 26,

Tom Donilon, President Obama’s national security adviser, has a reputation as a “process guy,” meaning that he runs an orderly decision-making system at the National Security Council, and as a “political guy” with a feel for Capitol Hill and the media.

Now, facing the rolling crisis of the Arab Spring, Donilon has had to transform into the ultimate “policy guy” — coordinating administration strategy for a revolution that will alter the foreign-policy map for decades.

U.S. strategy is still a work in progress. That’s the consensus among some leading Donilon-watchers inside and outside the government. The national security adviser has tried to shape Obama’s intuitive support for the Arab revolutionaries into a coherent line. But as the crisis has unfolded, there has been tension between American interests and values, and a communications-oriented NSC staff has sometimes seemed to oscillate between the two.

“The focus is more on how it plays than on what to do,” says one longtime friend of Donilon. He credits Donilon as “a very smart political person” who has brought order to the planning process. But he cautions: “Tom is not a strategist. He’s a pol. That’s the heart of what he is and does.”

Another member of the inner circle similarly credits Donilon as “very inclusive of all the principals in the decision-making process.” But he worries that this White House is too focused on “message management.”

The uprisings in Egypt, Bahrain, Libya, Yemen and now Syria all embody the tension between U.S. interests and values, and Obama

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has leaned different ways. With Egypt and Libya, the White House voted its values and supported rebellion and change; with Bahrain and Yemen, the administration, while sympathetic to reform, has embraced its interests in the stability of Saudi Arabia, Bahrain’s neighbor, and in a Yemen that is an ally against al-Qaeda.

The mix is pragmatic, which seems to suit both Obama and Donilon. Yet it sometimes frustrates ideologues on both sides who want a more systematic line. My instinct is that the White House is right to be pragmatic, and for that reason should avoid making so many public pronouncements: This is an evolving crisis, and each country presents a different set of issues; a one-size-fits-all policy approach would be a mistake.

The biggest test may come in Syria, where President Bashar al-Assad has launched a ruthless crackdown. Here, U.S. values and interests would seem to coincide in the fall of Assad, who is Iran’s key Arab ally and maintains a repressive, anti-American regime. But there are dangers: Assad’s fall could bring a sectarian bloodbath. So far, Donilon seems to be holding a middle ground to allow maximum U.S. flexibility.

In an interview in his West Wing office last week, Donilon outlined his basic strategic framework. It begins with Obama’s intuitive feel for these issues. Back in January when the Arab revolts began, Obama admonished his NSC advisers, preoccupied with other issues: “You need to get on this!”

Donilon cites four guidelines that have shaped the administration’s response ever since: First, the Arab revolt is a “historic” event, comparable to the fall of the Ottoman Empire or the post-1945 decolonization of the Middle East; second, “no country is immune” from change; third, the revolution has “deep roots” in poor governance, demographics and new communications technology; and fourth, “these are indigenous events” that can’t be dictated by America, Iran or any other outside power.

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Donilon also stresses that this process of change is just beginning. “We’re in the early chapters,” he says, warning that the United States should be careful not to take actions now that it might regret down the road, as situations change and new players emerge.

A useful reality check for Donilon was his trip this month to Saudi Arabia, which had been traumatized by Obama’s abandonment of deposed Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and America’s initial support for Bahrain’s Shiite protesters. Donilon met with Saudi King Abdullah for more than two hours and gave him a personal letter from Obama. The reassuring message, he says, was about “the bond we have in a relationship of 70 years that’s rooted in shared strategic interest.”

Donilon is preoccupied now by Syria. He doesn’t want to talk details of policy but says the administration will follow its basic principles of opposing violent repression and supporting reform. He says Assad made a disastrous mistake being “constipated” about change. As for a Libya-style intervention, Donilon seems dubious that a military option in Syria is available or advisable.

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Global condemnation, but no action, against bloody Syria crackdownBy Liz Sly, Washington Post,Tuesday, April 26,

BEIRUT — Syrian troops sustained their bloody crackdown against anti-government protesters in the southern town of Daraa for a second day Tuesday, drawing harsh condemnations but no specific plans for action against Damascus from U.S. and European leaders.

Reports from Daraa were sketchy because telephone lines were cut, the town was surrounded and the nearby border with Jordan

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was closed, but residents contacted by human rights groups indicated that government opponents were holding out in a mosque in the center of the town against an onslaught by government soldiers using tanks and armored personnel carriers.

According to Damascus-based human rights researcher Wissam Tarif, protesters were gathered in the al-Omari mosque in the heart of the old city and had turned it into a makeshift hospital for those wounded as government soldiers fired on them with automatic weapons and artillery.

Elsewhere in town, the streets were said to be deserted as tanks fired shells and snipers took up positions on rooftops, shooting at anyone who moved. The Associated Press quoted a resident as saying that the bodies of those killed were left unattended in the streets because the gunfire was so intense, citizens were unable to go outside to retrieve them. Human rights groups said in statements posted on the Internet that at least 35 people had died in two days of violence.

The deployment of the army Monday in the town that had become the epicenter of the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad’s government seemed to leave little doubt that Syrian authorities have resolved to confront the escalating protest movement with full-scale repression. Reports from the town said the unit involved was a crack brigade of the army’s special forces led by the president’s younger brother Maher.

With video footage showing tanks moving through the streets and plumes of smoke caused by artillery fire, the crackdown in the rural town is rapidly approaching Libyan proportions, with one crucial difference: The opposition movement in Syria is not armed.

At least 401 people have been killed in the six-week-old uprising, with an additional two dozen or so deaths awaiting confirmation from families, said Tarif, whose human rights group, Insan, has been monitoring the violence. Independent confirmation of the

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events was impossible because the Syrian government refuses to admit foreign journalists.

Thousands of people have been arrested since the protests began, Tarif said, and there were reports Tuesday of widespread detentions and a heavy troop presence in the Damascus suburbs of Douma and Moadamiya, and in the coastal town of Jableh.

‘Unacceptable’ situationThe escalating violence stirred the fiercest criticism of Damascus yet from world leaders, though there was no indication that the international community was ready to take formal action to condemn or sanction a regime whose collapse many fear could trigger widespread regional instability.

“The situation has become unacceptable,” French President Nicolas Sarkozy told a joint news conference in Rome with the Italian prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi. “You don’t send tanks, the army, against demonstrators. You don’t fire on them.”

Berlusconi added: “Together we send a strong call to Damascus authorities to stop the violent repression of what are peaceful demonstrations, and we ask all sides to act with moderation.”

In Washington, the State Department’s head of policy planning, Jake Sullivan, also condemned the crackdown, telling reporters that Assad’s actions were “completely inconsistent with those of a responsible leader.”

But he stopped short of saying that Assad had lost the legitimacy to lead, a comment used to describe Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi after he cracked down on protesters, and Sullivan said U.S. sanctions were an option only “under consideration.” The U.S. Embassy in Damascus is preparing to evacuate nonessential personnel, but the ambassador, Robert Ford, will remain, he said.

British Defense Secretary Liam Fox, in Washington to meet with his U.S. counterpart, Robert M. Gates, bluntly told reporters that

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there are limits to what the world can do to influence the outcome of domestic rebellions.

“We can’t do everything all the time, and we have to recognize that there are practical limitations to what our countries can do,” he said after meeting with Gates.

Gates also indicated that the United States has no immediate plans to toughen its stance. “Our response to each country will have to be tailored to that country and to the circumstances peculiar to that country,” he said.

U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon issued a short statement after a closed-door meeting of the Security Council, calling on Syrian authorities “to protect civilians.” But with China and Russia already expressing misgivings about the U.N.-mandated air campaign in Libya and unwilling to take further action against Middle Eastern leaders facing domestic opposition, imminent action by the United Nations also seemed unlikely.

Syria’s U.N. ambassador, Bashar Ja’afari, defended his government’s conduct, saying that Assad has instructed Syrian forces not to fire on civilians and that the government is committed to allowing peaceful demonstrations. He accused armed groups, including al-Qaeda, of infiltrating the demonstrations and opening fire on Syrian security forces, killing dozens of them.

Ja’afari rejected U.N. calls for an outside inquiry into the killings, saying the government has established its own investigation committee. “We don’t need help from anybody,” he said.

‘People are not afraid’Syrian democracy activists said they were anxiously hoping for a more robust international response, by way of encouraging ordinary Syrians to sustain their opposition in the face of the spiraling violence.

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Activists said the bloodshed would not deter further demonstrations and predicted that the crackdown would energize the protest movement.

“People are not afraid anymore of anything,” said Razan Zeitouneh, a human rights lawyer in Damascus. “They are just preparing for Friday,” the day on which protesters typically rally after noon prayers, “and we know we must pay a price for our freedom.”

But there have still been no major demonstrations in the capital, Damascus, or in Syria’s second-largest city, Aleppo, and some activists fretted that the intensity of the crackdown may halt the momentum that had seemed to be building, by discouraging ordinary citizens from joining the protest movement.The discrepancy between the international response to the violence in Syria and that in Libya, where NATO warplanes are waging daily bombing raids, is increasingly drawing criticism in Europe and may intensify pressure on governments to take action.“We are very tough vis-a-vis Gaddafi, and we say nothing vis-a-vis Syria,” said Jean-Christophe Cambadelis, a member of the French Parliament from the opposition Socialist Party. “It is incomprehensible.”

Sullivan, the State Department official, denied that there is any inconsistency in the U.S. positions on Libya and Syria. “We have to take each of the countries on its own terms,” he said.

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Inside the Obama team’s “shift” on Syria Josh Rogin The Agonist April 26

FP - The Obama administration is preparing a wide range of new actions to condemn the Syrian government's brutal violence against protesters. However, U.S. officials still remain skeptical

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that they have the leverage to significantly affect the unfolding crisis in the country.

For the first three weeks of the protests in Syria, which first broke out on March 15, the Obama administration debated internally how to react to while generally proceeding cautiously in public. Occupied with the Libya war and skeptical that Syria would reach the current level of unrest, the administration's policy was to issue carefully worded statements condemning the violence while encouraging Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to pursue reform and reconciliation.

Two weeks ago, however, the mood inside the administration changed in response to Assad's brutal crackdown and the realization that he was not listening to pro-reform voices from inside or outside Syria. After a series of deliberations, culminating in a Deputies Committee meeting at the National Security Council last week, a new policy course was set. In the coming days, expect a new executive order on Syria, a draft presidential statement at the U.N. Security Council, new designations of Syrian officials as targets of sanctions, and a firmer tone on the violence that will include references to Iran's unhelpful influence on Syria's crackdown.

The new sanctions will not target Assad directly and there will be no call for him to go.

"The days of just making statements are over and we are at a turning point," said Andrew Tabler, a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. "What that turning point leads to we don't know yet."Secretary of State Hillary Clinton came under criticism for her March 27 statement, "Many of the members of Congress of both parties who have gone to Syria in recent months have said they believe [Assad]'s a reformer."

But based on the information at the time, most inside the administration didn't feel she had said anything wrong. Multiple

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administration officials told The Cable that the administration had simply concluded, incorrectly, that the Syrian crisis would never grow this serious. That judgment informed their go-slow approach in responding to the protests.

But one month later, as the protest movement has gained strength and spread to cities throughout Syria, nobody inside the Obama administration is saying that now.

"A lot of people were wrong. The general assessment [inside the administration] was that this wouldn't happen, that Assad was too good at nipping these movements in the bud and also that he was not afraid to be brutal," one administration official said. "All of these things combined made this more of a surprise and made it much harder to deal with."

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Syria accuses mass media of distortion UPI,April 26, 2011

DAMASCUS, Syria, April 26 (UPI) -- Syrian officials announced Tuesday they were opening a legal investigation into foreign media outlets it said were instigating violence in the country.

Syria isn't allowing foreign journalists into the country during a period of heightened political unrest. Foreign media outlets such as CNN and al-Jazeera are relying on amateur video and unverified accounts to report on the conflicts in Syria.

The BBC aired video Tuesday showing tanks patrolling the streets of Syria as anti-government groups continue to put pressure on Syrian President Bashar Assad. Assad in recent weeks sacked his entire Cabinet, dismantled a controversial security service and lifted a state of emergency enacted in the 1960s.

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British Foreign Secretary William Hague in a statement called on Assad to order his security forces to stand down.

"I condemn utterly any violence and killings perpetrated by the Syrian security forces against civilians who are expressing their views in peaceful protests," Hague said. "This violent repression must stop."

The narrative provided from the official Syrian Arab News Agency differs, however. SANA has reported that armed thugs and foreign elements are responsible for much of the unrest in the country.

The news agency Tuesday reported that the country's bar association asked a legal committee to examine possible crimes allegedly committed by Arab and international media outlets. SANA said they are accused of instigating acts in Syria that could destabilize the country.

"The committee has begun collecting evidence and documents to support the lawsuits in front of the international and national competent courts against those who had made the unfair acts," the report stated.

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Syria: Crackdown undoing work of country's first lady Chris StephenScotsman,27 Apr. 2011,

AMONG the casualties of Syria's growing repression may be the carefully cultivated reformist image of the country's glamorous British-born First Lady, Asma al-Assad.Asma, a former international banker, has presented herself as the liberal face of her husband Bashar al-Asad's presidency since marrying him in 2000, counting Angela Jolie and Brad Pitt among her friends.

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She has graced the pages of Vogue and PariADVERTISEMENTs Match and has formed an alliance with the Louvre in her quest to save Syria's ancient treasures.

But this reputation faces the shredder as her husband's security forces mow down unarmed protestors across the country.

Asma was born in Acton, London, the daughter of Syrian parents. Her father worked as a Harley Street specialist and her mother was a noted diplomat.

After graduating from Kings College, London, with BSc in computer science and a diploma in French literature, she had begun to carve out a career working for both Deutsche Bank and J P Morgan in both London and New York when Bashar swept her off her feet a decade ago.

Al-Assad, who trained as an eye doctor in London, became first in line to succeed his later father, Hafez, when his older brother was killed in a car crash.

His succession duly followed in 2000 when official election figures gave him an eye-popping 97 per cent of the vote in a process opponents said was rigged.

Since coming to power, Presidentr Assad has continued to inist that he would end Syria's emergency rule and usher in full democracy.

In tandem, Asma placed herself at his side, holding a beacon for what she called "active citizenship".

This is in contrast to the wives of leaders such as Muammar Gaddafi, or Egypt's Hosni Mubarak, who have had virtually no profile outside their own countries, and even little within them.

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Observers have noted her penchant for appearing in public without a veil and wearing above-the-knee skirts, a clear indication in the region of "Western" sentiment.

Her work promoting children's charities and the restoration of Syria's rich artistic treasures saw outsiders drawn to her. Paris Match sighed that she was "the element of light in a country full of shadow zones," and earlier this year the Louvre confirmed it was working with her to set up a network of museums in Syria.

In February, Vogue gave her a lavish profile, enthusing: "Asma al-Assad is glamorous, young, and very chic - the freshest and most magnetic of first ladies. "

She told Vogue that her thirst for reform was "about everyone taking shared responsibility in moving the country forward, about empowerment in a civil society."

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Syrian opposition ask world's help to stop Assad Damascus opposition members plead with West to pressure regime into ceasing brutal crackdown on protesters. US, UK say military response in Libya does not dictate similar action in Syria by News agenciesYedioth Ahronoth 27 Apr. 2011,

Members of the Syrian opposition meeting in Istanbul on Tuesday pleaded for international help to persuade President Bashar Assad to halt a brutal crackdown on a popular revolt.

"Our friends in the West, in Turkey, in the Arab world, if they want to help us, then they can do that by... putting the clearest possible pressure on the Syrian regime to stop targeting civilians," Anas Abdah, the British-based chairman of the Movement for Justice and Development, told Reuters.

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Abdah was speaking on the sidelines of a gathering of opposition and rights groups organized by Turkish non-government organizations to highlight the Syrian people's plight.

"It looks like Bashar al-Assad has taken a strategic decision to crush a non-violent movement in Syria by ordering his brother Maher al-Assad... to go and storm Deraa city," Abdah said.

Double standard? Meanwhile, both the US and British defense chiefs dismissed the notion that because the international community responded to unrest in Libya with military force, the same should be done in Syria.

US Defense Secretary Robert Gates met Tuesday with his British counterpart Liam Fox, after which Fox said that the world's response to popular revolts across the Middle East and North Africa "must be tailored to the circumstances of each case."

In a joint appearance with Fox at the Pentagon, Gates made a similar point, noting that before the military campaign in Libya was launched, there was a diplomatic process that resulted in calls for action by the Arab League, the Gulf Cooperation Council and the United Nations.

Other Washington officials said that |at this time" the United States still prefers to exhaust diplomacy and possible sanctions against Syria.

"Our focus is... with respect to options in Syria, in the diplomatic and financial space at the moment," said Jacob Sullivan, director for strategic policy and a close advisor to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

"At the moment, we're not actively considering shutting down our embassy in Syria," said Sullivan. "We believe that our diplomatic lines of communication there offer an opportunity to communicate

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directly with the Syrian government in ways that we would like to continue to do."

Sullivan reiterated that the United States condemns the repression in Syria, saying the actions taken by Assad "are totally unacceptable" and "completely inconsistent" with those of a responsible leader.

The US, he concluded, "Will evaluate the effectiveness and benefits of the tools at our disposal," before making any further decisions.

As for the situation in Libya, Gates said that there had been some "momentum" in the Libyan conflict in recent days, but stressed that NATO forces were not targeting Moamar Gaddafi specifically. The comments come after Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin accused the coalition of exceeding its UN mandate to protect civilians, saying attacks on Gaddafi's palaces indicate the aim was to kill the Libyan leader.

Putin accused the nations taking part in the Nato-led operation of straying from the UN mandate to enforce a no-fly zone and protect civilians.

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Wall Street Journal: ‘The Syria Lobby: Why Washington keeps giving a pass to the Assad regime’.. (an important article but it needs subscription)..

Time Magazine: ‘Syria Crackdown Escalates: Assad Dispatches Tanks, Snipers to Dara'a’..

NPR: 'Israel Takes Wait-And-See Approach To Syria Unrest'..

AFP: 'Ex-CIA chief who led CIA from 2006-2009: Kadhafi was good partner'..

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Radio Netherland: 'Assad rules Syria like a Pharaoh''..

Reuters: 'France and Italy appeal to Syria to end repression'..

Haaretz: 'Report: Syrian security forces kill 35 in Daraa, cutting water, electricity and telecommunications'..

Haaretz: 'U.S. and U.K. defense chiefs rule out Libya-style intervention in Syria'..

Haaretz: 'Haaretz WikiLeaks exclusive / Israel Bank chief urged U.S. intervention to prevent collapse of Gaza'..

Jerusalem Post: ''Egypt-Israel gas pipeline attacked by armed gang''..

Haaretz: 'Activists: New Gaza flotilla in final planning stages'..

Jerusalem Post: 'Calls for sanctions grow as Assad steps up offensive'..

Guardian: 'Call for closed EU borders in wake of Arab protests'..

Independent: 'Secret police detain more than 500 as Syria defies Western threats'..

Washington Post: 'Obama administration refuses to assess Assad's legitimacy, clinging to policy of engagement'..

Wall Street Journal: 'Nations Face Quandary in Syria'..

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