Friday, December 09, 2005

Desperate Moves!


What’s happening these days in Syria?

According to the local media and such nationalist outlets as al- Jazeerah, which continues to undermine itself as a source of credible news coverage, the Mehlis investigation is in shambles and Syria’s economy is stronger than ever, with more signs of openness and more business deals getting signed on a daily basis and more luxury restaurants and hotels getting established.

And the government, well, despite the million corrupt officials out there, it remains, somehow, as one of the most patriotic governments around fighting resiliently against the machinations of the neo-cons and the Zionists, not to mention the internal enemy that is the Islamists.

Indeed. Things are that bleak. People are in denial. Or at least, the official press is, and certain investors and wishful thinkers.

But at home, the mood is quite gloomy. People know. They just know that things are not right and that, ultimately, they have to pay the price for all that has gone wrong, as usual.

Hopefully, the upcoming sanctions will target only the individuals that will be named in Mehlis’s new report. The list of people will likely include, among others, all those who were mentioned in the previous report, bar none. So, the likely extension of the investigation and Mehlis’s decision not to stay on board will not serve to alleviate the pressures on the regime as some are want to believe.

Good. Six more months of pressures and isolation are good. They will give Syria’s hesitant opposition a last chance to do something honorable, rather than just talk about it something as equally desperate as the regime’s current maneuvers, but more positively so. For, while the regime’s is simply desperate to save itself, the opposition should be desperate to save the country.

Indeed, may the least hopeless side win!