Who killed Al-Buti? Who gains?

The images were gruesome, even by recent standards: The aftermath of the suicide bombing at the Al-Eman mosque in Damascus last Thursday which left more than 40 people dead and close to a hundred injured, among them Muhammad Saeed Ramadhan Al-Buti, who was undoubtedly the target of the bomber(s). Al-Buti, believed 84 years old, was a very senior pro- government Sunni cleric and the imam of the Ummayyad Mosque, one of the most significant mosques in Sunni Islamic tradition. As well as being an Islamic scholar and prolific author, Buti was a lifelong supporter of the Syrian governments of Hafiz Assad and his son Bashar Assad, and backed the Allawite-led government through all its campaigns despite being a Sunni himself. He backed the government’s crackdown in Hama in 1982, which resulted in the deaths of at least 10,000 people according to very conservative estimates and was very vocal against the current uprising, where he would refer to the revolutionaries as “filth” during his weekly television sermons.
Moreover, he would extol the virtues of joining the military to fight a “jihad” to exterminate them.
It should be no surprise then that he would not be short of enemies, but who would stand to gain from his death?
Firstly, we should understand that the Syrian opposition, with all its disparate groups, are predominantly Sunni and it is in their interest to maintain the backing of their constituency. It would be political suicide for them to attack someone who was seen to be one of their own, even if he was a backer of the regime.
Secondly, all the main opposition groups have condemned the attack and nobody, as yet, has claimed responsibility in a war where people have hitherto been lightning fast to do so.
The Free Syrian Army, which is the Assad regime’s usual suspect, was quick to distance itself from the attacks saying that it does not conduct suicide operations or attack places of worship, especially mosques. An analysis of its modus operandi during the uprising would confirm this. The Al-Nusra front, which is reportedly linked to Al-Qaeda and has carried out suicide bombings in the past and is not exactly shy of taking credit for them has also issued a denial by releasing a video on its official Facebook page in which it denies having anything to do with this attack or indeed any other attack which targets Muslims in their “Mosques, markets, streets or other places of gathering.” As for the Syrian National Council, then its president, Sheikh Ahmed Moaz Al-Khatib, also condemned the attack in an interview with the AFP news agency.
What is interesting is that he added that he suspected that the regime was behind the attack.
This is certainly something to consider, especially when we look at the following facts:
•The Al-Eman mosque was in the Barza neighborhood of Damascus.
•This is a heavily pro-Assad district in a city that is still under the full control of the government. It was astounding that such an attack could penetrate such heavy security and it would be remarkable if the first such attack in the capital would be against a Sunni cleric rather than a military or political target.
•Thus far, none of the opposition groups have targeted mosques whereas the Assad regime has, and is doing so with increasing frequency.
•The regime has a long history of killing politicians that have been allied to it both inside and outside its borders.
•Syrian state television first reported that the mosque had been hit by a rocket, and then changed the story to that of the suicide bomber later on.
•With the regime on its knees and growing increasingly desperate by the day, it would not be out of character for it to resort to such a despicable measure in an attempt to garner support for itself by attempting to demonstrate that the resistance has no respect for Sunni scholarship. This would cause splits in the ranks of the resistance as it is quite clear that few people would have agreed with such an attack.
It is still early days and details are sketchy thus far, but it would be a cruel irony if it turns out that Al-Buti did indeed die at the hands of the very regime that he had spent his whole life legitimizing. Ironic, but not unprecedented.