[Arab News] Syrian hereditary President Bashir Pencilneckal-Assad
One of the last of the old-fashioned hereditary iron-fisted fascist dictators. Before going into the family business Pencilneck was an eye doctor. Also head of Syria's Baath Party, an old-fashioned fascist operation that's seldom described as one in the press...
went on the offensive in a much-anticipated televised address to the nation on Wednesday, avoiding any proposal for concrete reforms and attacking opposition protesters as pawns of foreign interference.
In his first address to the nation since the sweeping protests left dozens dead, Assad spoke for 45 minutes in front of Parliament, departing from his notes for most of his speech -- except at the start and when he addressed the issue of reform. Human Rights Watch says at least 73 people were killed in the past 10 days of demonstrations, violently suppressed by government forces.
"To say it was disappointing would be understatement. It was also provocative as far as Syrian people are concerned. He made no attempt to appear conciliatory to the Syrian people or make any concrete proposal for reform," Malik Al-Abdeh, who runs the Syria In Transition website from London, told The Media Line.
The speech is likely not only to disappoint opposition protesters, who have been demanding more political freedoms and a crackdown on corruption, but Syria's moderate friends, such as Turkey and Qatar, which have been urging him to loosen some of the most draconian aspects of his rule.
There were unconfirmed reports that festivities broke out at the Arab International University in Damascus
...The
City of Jasminis the oldest continuously-inhabited city in the world. It has not always been inhabited by the same set of fascisti...
immediately after the speech concluded.
"I see nothing new in this speech. Al-Assad spoke of reform but presented no elements to enable that reform," said Muhammad Al-Musfir, a political scientist at Qatar University in Doha. "He accused people of subversion (fitna). Is demanding reform subversion? That's news to me."
Assad had hinted that some of the opposition's grievances might be addressed in his speech. But he made no mention of lifting the state-of-emergency regime imposed in 1963. Nor did he refer to the civilians who have died in festivities with security forces.
Instead, he accused the protesters of serving the enemies of the country, using the word fitna, the Arabic for sedition and redolent with religious meaning, to describe the demonstrators.
"Some people consider what is happening to be a revolution, but we see it differently," Assad said. "The conspirators first began with incitement, which began a few weeks ago. They did not accomplish anything so they began to lie. They falsified information, sounds, pictures, everything. They then switched to the second axis -- the sectarian one -- and began sending text messages on mobile phones to one sect telling people to beware of the other sect."
The accusation that the opposition leaders have a religious agenda is likely to strike a nervous chord among Syrians, who are a mix of Mohammedans, Christians, Druze and Alawites. Sectarian tensions in neighboring Leb led to a protracted civil war in the 1970s and 1980s.
Syria has been ruled by the Baath party since 1963 and Assad succeeded his father, Hafez Assad, in 2000.
Against the hopes his speech had aroused, Assad sent other signals that he was gearing up for a fight rather than compromise. On Tuesday, tens of thousands gathered at Seven Sea Square in the capital of Damascus in a government-orchestrated protest. As he entered Parliament for Wednesday's speech, politicians chanted "God, Syria and Bashar only!" and "Our souls, our blood we sacrifice for you Bashar." His speech was interrupted by standing ovation.
"Every day, our enemies scientifically and in an organized way try to harm Syria's stability," Assad told the politicians. "They have chosen the wrong people (to conspire against) because this kind of conspiracy will not succeed."
Assad's tactics follow the trajectory of other Arab leaders -- violent crackdown on demonstrators, replacing the Cabinet and promising piecemeal reforms that don't address the fundamental grievances of the opposition. In Egypt and Tunisia, however, those tactics failed to stop mounting protests and leaders of both countries were forced to resign.
Nevertheless, Assad reiterated in his Wednesday address that Syria was different from other Arab countries beset by unrest. "Syria isn't isolated from the Arab world, and is influenced and influences. At the same time, we are not a copy of the other countries ... we in Syria have features that make us more distinct both internally and externally."
Both he and political analysts have cited his personal popularity -- unlike most of the region's leaders he is a relatively young 44 years old and has been in power for just 11 years -- and his strong hostility to Israel and the US as reasons why Syria may avoid the most severe turmoil.
Ironically, Assad has the quiet backing of the US and Israel, who worry that the president's exist would expose the country to a possible takeover by religious beturbanned goons.