Syria: Could Assad go?

In Syria, thousands of residents have fled the northern city of Jisr ash-Shughur since Monday in anticipation of a massive military offensive in retaliation to clashes there that reportedly killed 120 security personnel.

Islamist insurgents repelled government forces on Monday in an operation that was better organized than previous opposition efforts, which have involved disparate groups in different parts of the country.

The same area experienced similar pushes between 1976 and 1982, when the Muslim Brotherhood tried to oust the president, Bashar al-Assad’s father, Hafez al-Assad. Then, the president retaliated strongly. It looks like something similar may happen again.

While the widespread discontent in Syria is unlikely to go away anytime soon, for the moment, the Assad regime appears to still have a firm grip on power, enjoying the strong support of the military officer corps, mostly Alawites and Christians who are loyal to the government and fear an Islamist regime coming to power.

Some analysts do see change on the horizon though. “This looks like the tipping point,” says Barry Rubin, author of The Truth About Syria, speaking of the popular uprising that has continued for nearly three months.

Concessions so far, such as the release last week of hundreds of political prisoners from jails, have thus far failed to blunt the effect of the protests.

Rubin says the impasse may result in the regime staying but Assad leaving. The many people who support the regime are not necessarily reliant on Assad himself to be in power for their interests to be protected. “There are two parts to this regime,” he said, “the man himself and his immediate family, and the larger regime, including its military support.”

“It is possible that at some point a responsible adult high in the ranks of the Syrian Army or the head of an intelligence agency will understand that it is worth throwing the public a bone in order to salvage as much as possible,” Prof. Mordechai Kedar, a professor of security affairs at Israel’s Bar Ilan University, wrote recently. “With the assistance of several armed bodyguards, he will arrest Bashar Assad ….”

Professor Kedar explained that such a person would “conduct a hasty trial and treat [the Assad family] as the public expects them to be treated, in order to attain calm. He will announce constitutional changes and economic reforms and schedule elections for several months later.”

This is certainly a possibility—and could open the door for some serious foreign-policy changes in Syria. Biblical prophecy indicates that at some point in the near future Syria will ally with the more “moderate” Arab states and part ways with Iran. Watch this country for how this may come about.