Bashar al-Assad's Three Kinds of Protesters

Today in Damascus, Syria's president-for-life Bashar al-Assad delivered his first official address in two months, broadcast live via state media and international outlets like BBC Arabic. His words were simply fascinating, and I've spent the morning on Youtube looking for the whole speech (part 1 of BBC Arabic coverage uploaded to Youtube) and reactions from various camps (political camps and refugee camps in Turkey).

You can get a fairly comprehensive look at the speech from this al-Jazeera English article (Arabic counterpart here). Al-Assad acknowledged that there are some protesters with legitimate concerns. But he also said there are 64,000 lawless vandals and a third group composed of "radical and blasphemous intellectuals." Even though he conceded the presence of peaceful protesters, there's no reason to believe the supposed presence of elements from the other two groups won't continue to be used as an excuse for the military to conduct armed assaults on civilian targets. Al-Assad also has not abandoned the claim that "outside elements" are instigating the violent conflict inside Syria.

Al-Assad promised to address the grievances of peaceful protesters. I think al-Assad is going to make up relatively minor grievances and "fix" them as an attempt to regain some legitimacy. For instance, he reiterated his pledge to pardon some of those involved in the protests. Um...it's not like people initially started protesting to demand the pardon of protest participants (though many protesters do want to see an end to arbitrary arrests). If al-Assad really wanted to introduce reform aimed at quelling the violence, he'd announce the cessation of arbitrary arrests altogether, instead of vague promises about going easy on those protesting for the past three months.

As another component of his "reform" plan, al-Assad seems to be taking a page out of King Abdullah's book, calling for national dialogue committees of a total of about 100 people to discuss the country's problems and brainstorm solutions. In Jordan, some people dismissed the committee as illegitimate, claiming that since the government convened the committee, it could not be free and independent in its recommendations. I suspect that will be the same case with Syria--with each committee member hand-picked as a "safe choice" and each recommendation reviewed by the regime for approval.

Another disappointing sign was al-Assad's repeated call for "a return"--"a return to a normal way of life," the return of the army to its barracks, the return of Syria to tranquility and "freedom"... basically, a return to exactly how things were before the protests began.

Perhaps the most stunning example of al-Assad's denial was at the very beginning of the speech, when he said, among other interesting blessings, "Peace be upon every mother who lost a loved one, and on every child who lost a parent." As if that blood is not on his hands, in large part.

That's largely how Syrian audiences in the Turkish refugee camps--the easiest Syrian audience for international media to reach--reacted. Most seemed to react to al-Assad's call for them to return to Syria with contempt and suspicion.

Still, not all Syrians have abandoned the president, and despite reports of defections, the military seems to be holding together well enough with their tanks and automatic weapons against the onslaught of civilians armed with protest signs and rocks.

In other Syria-related news, Russian president Dmitri Medvedev clarified his country's position on the crisis, reiterating that Russia will use its veto to defeat any UN resolution on Syria similar to Resolution 1973, which many feel NATO abused to enter into military involvement in Libya. According to this al-Jazeera Arabic article, "he placed moral responsibility for the civilian casualties on the Syrian regime" but went on to say that "he believes Damascus's promises of reform." That makes one of us, I guess.