POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY MICHAEL BELL IN TORONTO'S GLOBE AND MAIL
"Most likely, the Assad regime will survive, despite sanctions, diplomatic isolation and economic dislocation."
I'm sorry, but I think Michael Bell is right.
First, the United States does not genuinely want him gone, considering the possible whirlwind he would leave behind.
They make limp statements, but we hear none of the rhetoric we heard about Gaddafi, a man the U.S. establishment has long detested, and there is not a hint of the U.S. using force.
Syria's influence in Lebanon and in Iran are also important considerations.
Second, Israel does not advertise the fact, but America's client state in the Mideast wants Assad to stay around.
Israel loves to criticize him here and there, but it too knows he keeps order in a potentially dangerous place.
Indeed, just as in Egypt with Mubarak or with the king in Saudi Arabia, Israel has always favored the Arab dictators rather the uncertainties of "democracy."
In fact, Israel is a major contributing reason why more of the Arab states are not democratic.
Its blubbering about democracy in the Middle East has always been just that, blubbering.
My understanding is that right now the demonstrators are a minority and they are "small" people.
The middle class and the economic giants of the country remain uncommitted.
Syria does not care in the least about bad publicity abroad so long as it achieves its goals, much, actually, as is the case with Israel with its periodic atrocities.
Assad apparently right now is picking off the little guys in the small cities, hoping to keep things contained from the middle class in the big cities.
