The campaign to speed up the Egyptian military's transfer of power and the political conundrum facing the Al-Assad regime were highlighted by Doaa El-Bey and Gamal Nkrumah The Arab world must heed Syria's lesson. The test is what comes next. Syria's President Bashar Al-Assad faces the biggest test of his leadership as his proposed political reform hits the final stretch this week though his popularity is at record low. 'Battles have reached the outskirts of Damascus�ê� and the regime is negotiating [a peace deal] with the [opposition] Free Syrian Army' ran a headline in the London-based pan-Arab daily Asharq Al-Awsat. Another headline trumpeted the political conundrum facing the Syrian regime. 'Syria between the UN Security Council and the Battle for Damascus,' ran the banner. The deplorable political and security situation in Syria is coming to a head; the international community is asked to act swiftly. Secretary-General of the Arab League Nabil El-Arabi was dispatched to the United Nations headquarters in New York to argue the case for international intervention to save the long-suffering Syrian people. In the meantime, the Syrian regime is re-enforcing security forces in and around the presidential palace and the international airport of Damascus, Syria's main gateway to the outside world. And, in a diversion from the Syrian crisis, Asharq Al-Awsat spotlighted the political predicament of Iraqi Deputy President Tarek Al-Hashemi in a full-page interview. "The mistake of my life is that I supported [Iraqi Prime Minister] Nuri Al-Maliki," a forlorn Al-Hashemi told the daily. "I had backed Al-Maliki twice for presiding over the Iraqi government and now I am paying the price. I will spend the rest of my days defending my reputation," Al-Hashemi lamented. "The Iraqi state security forces stormed my office, confiscated equipment including my personal computer and searched my private bedroom," Al-Hashemi bitterly complained. The Shia Al-Maliki has attempted to woo the Sunni Muslim Al-Hashemi, even though the latter has not only spurned the offer -- at least so far -- but has accused Al-Maliki of fomenting sectarian strife. He has raised the stakes further by instituting Al-Maliki personally after the latter decided to punish him by legally persecuting the Sunni leader. "I will stand trial and demand a fair trial. I have left Baghdad, but I shall not flee Iraq. I have the courage to refute the charges levelled against me," Al-Hashemi declared. The political challenge will be to present Al-Hashemi's defence as fair as well as credible and trustworthy. But back to Syria, the paper highlighted the Syrian government committed to stopping the contagion of panic in the ruling Baath Party circles. The paper also personally attacked the Syrian president. The man who came to power promising to modernise Syria will not be able to assure his compatriots. Al-Assad has demonstrated an utter dependence on foreign sources -- Iranian and Russian in particular -- to crack down on his dissidents. The opposition forces, too, appear to be relying increasingly on the tacit support of Islamist forces in the region. Asharq Al-Awsat revealed that Hamas, the ruling Palestinian body in Gaza is "secretly" aiding and abetting the Syrian revolution even though "in public" it declares its official endorsement of the Syrian regime. The paper refutes the simplistic divide -- Sunni versus Shia -- that governs regional political games and deliberations. The Syrian crisis has brought to the fore the various contending factions in a regional context. Sunni Turkey and Gulf Arab states are pitted against Shia Iran and its proxies in Iraq and Lebanon. But Sunni Hamas has demonstrated that this is not always the case. It is time for Western powers and post Arab Spring governments in the region to take this notion into account. In an article entitled 'Are regional balances of power changing?' Egyptian political commentator Mustafa El-Feki writing in the London-based pan-Arab daily Al-Hayat admonishes his listeners that "the question I now pose is whether the Zionist entity has prospered, burgeoned or its fortunes deteriorated with the full flowering of the Arab Spring. "Israel has long presented itself as a leading proponent of democracy in the Middle East." In much the same vein, the Lebanese pundit Ahmed Gaber writing in Al-Hayat noted that the current precarious political situation in Lebanon in the wake of the Syrian crisis is nothing short of ominous. In 'Deferring internationalisation and precipitating civil war' Gaber observed that the pendulum of Syrian officials and opposition attitudes has swung round to hit Damascus below the belt. "The Syrian regime and opposition share an unrealistic outlook towards the outside world. They read the real motives and concerns of the Arab, regional and international players wrongly," Gaber ponderously contemplated the complicated Syrian situation. The Syrian government and opposition forces are at loggerheads. Beset by different hopes and fears and entrenched and in their different narratives of a different solution to the Syrian political impasse look unable to find one. "The Syrian regime's convoluted outlook stems from an outdated and outmoded notion as a bastion of political stability in the region. In this context the Syrian regime has taken uncertain and hesitant steps towards reform. The Syrian street has indeed participated with gusto in the political developments in the country," Gaber pondered the implications that has on his own homeland, Lebanon. The writer reserved his harshest criticism for President Al-Assad himself. "He counted himself among the modernisers, however he ended up among the oppressors and the reactionary forces," concluded Gaber. In Al-Hayat also, several writers urged President Al-Assad to tilt the balance in favour of democratisation and political reform. "Isn't it a curious coincidence that the leader of Al-Qaeda Ayman El-Zawahri, after months of silence hiding in his cell, came out openly to declare his hatred for the Syrian regime urging Al-Qaeda sympathisers to join what he called the Syrian 'Intifada', or uprising? The Syrian regime is not the only one to cry wolf concerning Al-Qaeda. The overthrown autocratic regimes of Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen and Libya all sounded the alarm bells about Al-Qaeda's machinations," noted Elias Harfoush in Al-Hayat. Strangely enough the Syrian official daily Al-Thawra also brought up the subject. Quoting Syria's chief representative to the United Nations Bashar Al-Jaafari, the paper warned that in his address to the UN Security Council, Al-Jaafari warned that the Gulf Cooperation Council is "part of the problem" and that it is "waging war" against Syria. The unspoken suspicion among many in Syria's ruling clique is that the conservative oil-rich pro-Western Gulf states are determined to create a Sunni bulwark in Syria against Iran. "I have been a diplomat for 33 years and personally participated in many sessions and I hereby wish to draw your attention to the targeting of intellectuals, scientists and other key individuals as they did in Iraq, Iran and other countries. There is a systematic plot to assassinate Syrian scientists," Al-Jaafari was quoted as saying in Al-Thawra. Al-Jaafari also alluded to Al-Qaeda's implication in a plot to destabilise Syria. "Ayman Al-Zawahri's call for fighters to head for Syria to help topple the government�ê� Omar Bakri, the head of Al-Qaeda in Lebanon who lives in exile in London also called for Lebanese fighters to join in the campaign to overthrow the Syrian government," Al-Jaafari warned in Al-Thawra.
