Syrian rebels labeled last week’s parliamentary elections “a farce”. The same word could have been applied on Tuesday to the rebels themselves, when their political representatives proved at such odds that they all, without exception, boycotted the Cairo conference, sponsored by the Arab League to produce a coherent and cohesive opposition platform against the Assad regime.
Assad and his people could not have asked for better. The failure of the opposition factions to take advantage of this key opportunity to present a united front could have extremely serious consequences. The Annan plan calls for negotiations between Assad and the opposition and both sides say they have accepted the agenda. Yet now Assad can argue that it is impossible for him to negotiate, if there is no opposition with whom to talk.
The Annan plan also called for a truce and the withdrawal of Syrian forces and militias to their barracks. Assad has not kept his side of the bargain on the truce and troop withdrawal, claiming that “terrorist” attacks mean that he cannot leave communities undefended. The UN monitors have testified to the continued assaults by government forces, but they have also noted attacks by the rebels, not apparently prompted by regime troops.
UN monitors were present at a funeral in Khan Sheikhoun this week, when government forces started shelling the procession, killing 20 mourners and disabling some of the UN vehicles. The Free Syrian Army protected the six monitors overnight and then delivered them to a UN rescue column. This outrage could have been highlighted at the Cairo conference and world opinion further hardened against the depravity of the Assad killing machine. It could have been. But it wasn’t, because there was no one there. This was an appalling failure of judgment by all the opposition groupings, which will raise unfortunate questions about their ability to form a post-Assad government.
Syria is a complex society with a mixture of communities. What the rest of the Arab world and the international community as a whole wants to see is a stable country, with a pluralist political system that guarantees the position of all within society. What no one wants is a civil war. At the moment the Free Syrian Army, though fighting on many fronts, appears to be a unified force. However when Assad is gone, will different FSA units, drawn from different communities turn on each other? Will the removal of a strongman dictator cause Syria to fall apart, with a disastrous impact on the rest of the region?
The inability of the Syrian National Council to stem the recent flow of resignations and to speak with a single voice is as depressing as it is dangerous. It suggests that individual power blocs within its ranks are more concerned with their own interests than the wider good of a free Syria.
The butchery at the Khan Sheikhoun funeral, as witnessed by the UN monitors could have been turned into a major topic at the Cairo conference, gleaning world media coverage. Instead Assad has been able to grab the news agenda with his election. Officials in Damascus gave no breakdown of the voting, except to say that the turnout was 51 percent.
Few outsiders believe the elections were genuine but the selection of that figure of just over half was very clever. It gives cunning credence to the regime’s pretense that it is committed to reform and democracy. It suggests that more than half of all Syrian voters were prepared to ignore the opposition’s call for a boycott and go to the voting booths. Who actually won the most votes is now less important to the regime than this key proportion for Syrians who, it will be made to seem, still embrace the regime’s political system, with all its oppression and unbridled violence.
It is perhaps not much to say that the failure of the Syrian National Council to take advantage of the platform the Arab League organized for them this week in Cairo is shameful. If they really care about Syria’s future and not their own narrow interests, then they must bury their differences and produce a genuine and convincing display of unity. They are putting the revolution in peril.
Editorial: Assad thriving on divided opposition
