Syria: not now but not never

Describing the Syrian protests as less than widespread and deep-rooted, Joshua Landis, who knows more about Syria than 10 of me will ever know, nevertheless writes over at Syria Comment:

But in…four or five years, the next generation of Syrian youth will not remember the turmoil in either Lebanon or Iraq. Palestine will be a cause remembered only by grandfathers. Instead of defeat and hopelessness, invoked by Iraq and Palestine, young Arabs may well have the examples of Egypt and Tunisia. They may well be on the road to becoming the Arab World’s first democracies.

This begs the question of how long the Assad regime can last. Syria’s youth are no longer apathetic. They have tasted revolution and their own power. Many commentators have remarked on Bashar al-Assad’s stubbornness. He may be a “modernizer,” but not a “reformer,” is how Volker Pertes recently explained it. This is a polite way to say that he is not preparing the way for a handover of power from Alawites to Sunnis. Assad’s refusal to prepare the present regime for a soft landing spells bad news for Syria. The day that regime-change will come to Syria seems closer today than it did only a short time ago.

So not now, but not never. A lot depends on how effectively the protesters can unify across the country. Keeping it nonviolent, and funny, will help. Professor Landis might prefer a Bashar-engineered soft landing, but wouldn’t a serious transition like the one occurring in Tunisia be better?