Focussing The Essential

On the first sight things are looking all but good right now.

The massacres in the Syrian cities are reaching a horrible level. Tanks are bombing whole house blocks into pieces while inhuman mercenaries - doesn‘t matter anymore if they are shabiha, security forces, Quds brigades or Hezbollah fighters - are slaughtering men, women, children, whole families in a way even our darkest fantasies couldn‘t imagine before. Assad‘s digital army targets in a provoking manner the Syrian online freedom fighters and their companions from other countries via so-called pornbots (the insulting but harmless variant) up to mennhebakiyeh-style accounts tweeting and posting disgraceful comments (the threatening variant). Assad‘s cousin whose name I refuse to write down here (the blood dynasty‘s title is enough filth mentioned in this post) has won in a European country worldwide known for money businesses a trial to unfreeze some millions of Euros (which let look the imposed financial sanctions on the regime like another farce). The Arab League observers mission will later become cited in the history books as one if not the most failed attempt to bring some light into the Baath produced darkness. And as the top of down-smashing facts the international community a.k.a. the United Nations proves itself unable to react on the actual crimes against humanity committed by the Syrian regime because two of the UNSC members are cooking their own soup.

All in all it sounds like we all, the freedom fighting people including their supporters, are holding the towel in our hands to throw it into the ring and to end the fight resigning.

No.

Au contraire.

Simply because of all the backlashes the original spirit is all but broken. Many aren‘t aware of it at the moment trying to compensate the soul-eating images and news, for sure. That‘s why some fact have to be brought back into the collective memory.

First of all the revolution movement in the whole MENA region started as a call for more freedom, dignity and justice. Let us not forget that Tunisia, where it all began more than one year ago, has had a lot of luck due to two main circumstances: the first was that the demand for Ben Ali‘s toppling came out with the surprise moment, not even the tyrant himself might had expected such a strong reaction from his own people after Mohammed Bouazizi‘s self-immolation. And the second one is that the Tunisian society must be regarded as - through our Western eyes seen - the most conservative one of the Arab Spring affected nations.

When the spark of change flew over to Cairo Mubarrak and his entourage were kind of warned and therefore at least at the surface prepared to deal with the people‘s demands - that they remarkably failed to sell themselves better is another story. And in contrary to Tunisia where the whole regime change worked the Egyptians had to realize that they‘d only cut off the Hydra‘s biggest head. The other heads, today known as SCAF, have simply taken the control of the ousted leader living the motto: the king is dead, long live the king.

The Yemenis whose resilience belongs to the most admirable ones in the human history had made the bitter experience that it is the harder to realize the justified demands the less lobby (I‘m using the term here in a positive manner) stands behind one. Being regarded as the ball in a tennis mixed double - Saudi Arabia, the United States, Al Qaeda and the Saleh clan itself - the people made one embarrassing experience after the other on the political stage. The good news for the Yemenis are that one of her protesting icons, Tawakkol Karman, was honored with the Peace Nobel Price and that the general awareness for Yemen has increased in the last twelve months.

Not to forget Libya: one of the rare moments the United Nations did the right thing to protect a massacre in the former rebel stronghold Benghazi. Of course the discussions are now about the role the NATO played during the liberation but that is normal and would surely be the same if an Arab- or Euro-led corps had supported them. Fact is Gaddafi is gone (in that case alleviatively forever) and the Libyan nation is now in the process of rebuilding and restructuring, a way full of work with many ups and downs but like Tunisia they look at the moment as the winner of the Arab Spring 2011.

What brings us back to Syria.

 Despite the atrocities we are witnessing and for which we can besides Assad clearly make responsible the world community and their inability to act together the iron will for freedom seems in my eyes unbroken. Whoever is willing to stand up fighting for freedom has to be aware of the sacrifices he might make for. Playing with tactical estimations is the absolute wrong way to start such a challenge. And the Syrians knew that in the moment they‘ve torn down their wall of fear (a metaphor perfectly describing the situation in the for decades isolated country). You risk all or you let it be.

It‘s not that the Syrian regime guards have worn gloves treating any form of resistance or disobedience during the Assad (Hafez and Bashar) era. Being regarded more as objects than as human beings the Syrians had only two chances to survive: to silence, to tolerate and to function or to leave the land with their whole family for permanent exile (similar to Gaddafi‘s Libya by the way). The more remarkable is their decision now to rise up wanting to end that dynastic nightmare. Facing the crackdown measures the Baath regime is taking a way back does not only seem, it is impossible. Driven by revenge and supremacist habits Assad would all do to silence not only the louder voices of the protests against him forever - a drastic example he had learned from his father when he suppressed the 1982 revolt with the massacre of Hama.

But Assad is committing a crucial fault if he thinks a bloodbath would bring him the return of the old status quo, the stability back. Crucial because in contrary to Hafez‘ massacre this time the world is able to watch and witness live the violent events due to the development of the digital and social media tools. It took decades to bring the global public the horror of Hama in the early eighties into the mind but it takes today not even an hour to present actual footages of crimes against humanity. Another detail of Assads crucial misinterpretation of the general situation is that he still relies upon the regimes of Russia and China to hold their sheltering hands upon his crimes. In the case of Russia it seems on the surface to work as long as we see Lavrov and Churkin maneuvring with grand gestures especially against the Western not to intervene but Putin has in in his homeland not the best stand actually facing the presidential elections in March with increasing resistance from his own people. Defiantly supporting Assad will turn his trendometer in the worst case rapidly down and leaders like him aren‘t known for generous selflessness if the going gets tough. And even in China online protests from Chinese citizen are reported as a reaction on the veto of their country in the UN Security Council. As so far remarkable that the pragmatically orientated Chinese Communist Party may possibly use a sudden drop-down of Assad as sign that they are able to listen to the demands of their own people raising content in their own rows. The Assad regime can turn the coin as often as it wants, the common perspectives are getting darker and darker.

The more important it is that the Syrian freedom movement may not lose the will for change. Regarding the actual circumstances it is comprehensible that they feel exhausted. The more it is up to us, their friends, companions and supporters to share our power wih them, to show them that they are not alone in their heroic fight for freedom, justice and dignity and to visualize together with them the bright shining horizon of a post-Assad, a post-Baath, a freed and a free Syria.

„The youth is our real capital. Some aren‘t realizing that fact. Only a flourishing youth has the capacity to create a future for us all. Let them try out and make their own experiences without paternalizing them. If we are listening to our inner voices we will feel when they need our help or they will come to us and ask. It is our duty, our challenge, our task not only to let our youth grow in a free and peaceful environment but also to give our best, to sacrifice in the worst case our own existence if the given circumstances are demanding it. Otherwise we risk to lose this future for a very long time.“