It does seem as if the days of the Assad Alawite regime in Syria are numbered. The tide seems to have turned in favour of the rebels. What the longer term will bring is impossible to predict. We need to keep in mind that this is a conflict between Islamic sects: Alawite (a Shi'ite sub-sect), Sunni, and Shi'ite itself.
The Guardian explains how the tea-leaves are indicating the end of the Assad regime.
. . . . With the situation changing by the hour, the government's control over large parts of the country continued to unravel. The F[ree] S[yrian] A[army] said it had captured two border crossings between Syria and Turkey as well as one in Iraq. The regime still holds key cities, at least during the day, but it appears increasingly vulnerable to guerilla raids. . . .
In a further sign of regime erosion a Syrian general was reported to have fled to Turkey, bringing the number of fugitive generals there to 22. The rebels also now control a key Kamal/Qaim border crossing with Iraq, after slaughtering the 22 government soldiers tasked with guarding it. Iraqi troops have now sealed the crossing.
The capture of Syria's borders by the opposition was an important moment, analysts said, and showed Syria's 16-month conflict was now a fast-moving guerilla war. Fawwaz Traboulsi, a Beirut-based historian and columnist, said the tactics and strategy of the Free Syrian Army had improved, in contrast to the early days of the uprising. "It's conducting a war that is very close to a guerrilla war. The FSA can move very easily. It can withdraw. It is taking whole regions and holding them," he said. . . .
Others predicted the end was near. "The regime is going through its last days," Abdel Basset Sayda, the leader of the main Syrian opposition umbrella group, the Syrian National Council, said in Rome. Michael Young, a columnist with Beirut's Daily Star newspaper, agreed that the regime was disintegrating around the edges. "If you lose the borders you are allowing the creation of safe zones for weapons to come through. The Syrian regime holds the cities. But it doesn't control rural areas. And at night its control over the cities is very iffy. This is a new phenomenon," he observed. . . .
Majid Arar, who lives closer to the scene of the attack, told the Guardian. "After hearing the news of the generals being killed there was some excitement and some joy, because people are furious [with the regime]. But when the government started bombarding people started to feel very scared. It's joy and at the same time fear for the future. People are now more open to talk about what's going on in the city, even on the telephone. People usually fear that the government is listening but are now more open to talking. Some barriers have been broken."
The West was once giddy with excitement over the "Arab Spring". We are now in a position to make a more accurate weather report. The Arab Spring is the overthrow of a tyrannical regime by the people, and at the same time the harbinger of a new cabal of tyrants.
You cannot make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. Human beings are not born righteous. They have to be made righteous. Nigh on two thousand years of Islamic culture, teaching, and influence has served to make the sow's ear bigger, not different.
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