Syria: The big regional war

Two years of revolution have turned Syria into the world’s biggest swamp. Its bloody fight has involved Iranians, Iraqis, Russians, Hezbollah, the al-Nusra Front, al-Ahrar, al-Qaeda followers, the Kurdistan Workers Party, the Popular Movement. It has also included the Free Syrian Army with all its brigades, and involved Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey, Jordan and soon Britain and France. There is a big regional war going on in Syria. It all started in the same week two years ago with a protest to condemn the clampdown on children then the desire to get rid of the humiliation and repression of the police state spread like a fungus and Syria was shaken by protests calling for the ouster of the last Arab dictator. Ever since, a very dear price has been paid: 100,000 dead, one million crossed the borders as refugees, and millions are rendered homeless and trapped inside, city residents fled to the countryside and countryside residents fled to caves and farms, minorities are retreating to their enclaves, and the war is going on. Nightmarish future, frightful past Despite the magnitude and depth of the tragedy, nobody wants to go back two years and the majority of Syrians agree on this. There is no return to the rule of Bashar al-Assad, for he will fall no matter the price. This is how Syrians think even though the future has become as nightmarish as the past was frightful. Even Russians realize that Assad’s regime is bound to fall, for the armed opposition has reached the depths of its strongholds. Russians are no longer willing to keep supporting the regime, but are rather pushing for a political solution that would protect their interests through providing their current allies in the current regime with a place in the new Syria. This, however, has become impossible. Hezbollah is one of the most deeply involved factions, for its forces are now fighting the biggest war in the history of the party that has always acted as the Iranian regime’s claw. Hezbollah is taking part in crushing the revolution of the Syrian people with 50,000 fighters, a number larger than that it used to fight Israel for an entire 30 years. Hezbollah’s cross-border involvement threatens to transfer the war to Lebanon, too. The north and west of Iraq are threatened with disintegration owing to the involvement of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who also supports Assad’s regime, in the war in Syria. Several wars are taking place on the Syrian soil and it was no exaggeration when Iranian officials warned that the fall of Assad would be no less dangerous than the fall of Tehran itself. In Syria, a revolution grew into a big regional war and is about to develop into an international conflict with Britain and France expressing their willingness to arm the Syrian opposition even if the European Union refuses to lift the self-imposed embargo on the two warring parties. Advancing slowly but surely What can we offer except humanitarian relief to millions of homeless Syrian? In the second anniversary of the revolution, there is no doubt that the revolutionaries are capable of toppling the regime. They are advancing slowly like a turtle, but are doing so surely and successfully. They will reach their goal despite the alliance of their enemies. What is more important in my point of view is the determination to gather Syrians in one political entity through which they can choose the regime and leaders they want. The Arab role is to get the opposition to take responsibility and accept a comprehensive regime that includes all the powers on the ground, whether civil or military and from all sects and regions. In most war-torn countries, foreign intervention used to bestow the international or regional legitimacy on the alternative regime in order to prevent division and civil wars. This is what happened to Kuwaitis abroad in the early 1990s when Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait and tried to eliminate the legitimacy of its regime. The same applied to Iraq following the toppling of Saddam Hussein and with all different factions agreeing to preserve the unity and independence of their country. The International Community failed to resolve several crises. Internal conflict in Yugoslavia drove the United Nations to divide it since it had originally been formed following the end of World War Two of seven statelets. The union disintegrated in the 1990s so that five independent states emerged and only Serbia and Montenegro remained united. Even though Syria is a historically united country, it might not remain so if the opposition fails to adopt a project that keeps it intact. It is no longer the toppling of Assad that constitutes the biggest challenge faced by the Syria people, but it is rather keeping the country as one single stable entity and evading the civil war of which Assad regime and its allies have been warning. The views expressed by the author do not necessarily represent or reflect the editorial policy of Arabstoday.