Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Won’t stop, Assad vows; crowd cheers
Syrian’s tone unchanged in 1st speech in 6 months
BEIRUT — Syrian President Bashar Assad rallied a chanting and cheering crowd Sunday to fight the uprising against his authoritarian rule, dismissing any chance of dialogue with “murderous criminals” that he blames for nearly two years of violence that have left 60,000 dead, according to United Nations estimates.
In his first public speech in six months, Assad laid out terms for a peace plan that keeps himself in power, ignoring international demands to step down and pledging to continue the battle “as long as there is one terrorist left” in Syria.
“What we started will not stop,” he said, standing at a lectern on stage at the regal Opera House in central Damascus. The theater was packed with his supporters, who interrupted the speech with applause, cheers and occasional fist-waving chants, including “God, Bashar and Syria!”
The overtures that Assad offered — a national reconciliation conference, elections and a new constitution — were reminiscent of
symbolic changes and concessions offered previously in the uprising that began in March 2011. Those were rejected at the time as too little, too late.
The government last year adopted a constitution that theoretically allows political parties to compete with Assad’s ruling Baath Party. It carried out parliamentary elections that were boycotted by his opponents.
Assad demanded that regional and Western countries stop funding and arming the rebels trying to overthrow him.
“We never rejected a political solution ... but with whom should we talk? With those who have an extremist ideology, who only understand the language of terrorism? Or should we negotiate with puppets whom the West brought?” he asked.
“We negotiate with the master, not with the slave,” he answered.
As in previous speeches and interviews, he clung to the view that the crisis was a foreign- backed plot and not an uprising against him and his family’s decades-long rule.
“Is this a revolution and are these revolutionaries? By God, I say they are a bunch of criminals,” he said.
He stressed the presence of religious extremists among those fighting in Syria, calling them “terrorists who carry the ideology of al-Qaida” and “servants who know nothing but the language of slaughter.”
He said the fighters sought to transform the country into a “jihad land.”
Assad laid out the grim reality of the violence, and he spoke in front of a collage of photos of what appeared to be Syrians killed in the fighting.
“We are now in a state of war in every sense of the word,” Assad said, “a war that targets Syria using a handful of Syrians and many foreigners. It is a war to defend the nation.”
He said Syria will take advice but not orders from anyone — a reference to outside powers calling on him to step down.
The speech, which was denounced by the West, including the U.S. and Britain, came amid stepped-up international efforts for a peaceful way out of the Syrian conflict. Previous efforts have failed to stem the bloodshed.
U.N.-Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi met Assad last month to push for a peace plan for Syria based on a plan first presented in June at an international conference in Geneva. The proposal calls for an open-ended cease-fire and the formation of a transitional government until new elections can be held and a new constitution drafted.
The opposition swiftly rejected Assad’s proposals. Those fighting to topple the regime have repeatedly said they will accept nothing less than his departure, dismissing any kind of settlement that leaves him in the picture.
“It is an excellent initiative that is only missing one crucial thing: his resignation,” said Kamal Labwani, a veteran dissident and member of the opposition’s Syrian National Coalition umbrella group.
“All that he is proposing will happen automatically, but only after he steps down,” Labwani said by telephone from Sweden.
Haitham Maleh, an opposition figure in Turkey, said Assad was offering the initiative because he feels increasingly besieged by advancing rebels.
“How could he expect us to converse with a criminal, a killer, a man who does not abide by the law?” he asked.
Assad has spoken only on rare occasions since the uprising began, and Sunday’s speech was his first since June. His last public comments came in an interview in November to Russian TV in which he vowed to “live and die” in Syria.
On Sunday, he seemed equally confident in the ability of his troops to crush the rebellion despite the recent fighting in Damascus.
“He did not come across as a leader under siege, nor as a leader whose regime is on the verge of collapse,” said Fawaz Gerges, head of the Middle East Center at the London School of Economics.
“He seemed determined that any political settlement must come on his terms, linking those terms with the Syrian national interest as if they are inseparable,” he said.
U. S. State Department spokesman Victoria Nuland said in a statement that Assad’s speech was “yet another attempt by the regime to cling to power and does nothing to advance the Syrian people’s goal of a political transition.”
British Foreign Secretary William Hague called Assad’s speech “beyond hypocritical.” In a message posted on his official Twitter feed, Hague said “empty promises of reform fool no one.”
European Union foreignpolicy chief Catherine Ashton’s office said in a statement that the bloc will “look carefully if there is anything new in the speech, but we maintain our position that Assad has to step aside and allow for a political transition.”
Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu of Turkey said the speech was filled with “empty promises” and repetitive pledges of change by a leader out of touch with the Syrian people.
“It seems [Assad] has shut himself in his room, and for months has read intelligence reports that are presented to him by those trying to win his favor,” Davutoglu said in the Aegean port city of Izmir on Sunday.
Turkey is a former ally of Damascus, and while Ankara first backed Assad after the uprising began, it turned against the regime after its violent crackdown on dissent.
Observers said the speech signaled the violence would continue indefinitely as long as both sides lacked the ability to score a victory on the battlefield.
Meanwhile, Israel announced Sunday that it is constructing a border fence along the length of its armistice line with Syria in the Golan Heights and is coordinating its intelligence with the United States in light of the deteriorating security situation in Syria.
In remarks at the start of the weekly Cabinet meeting, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the Syrian army had moved away from the frontier and that jihadist forces had moved in.
“Therefore, we will defend this border against both infiltration and terrorism,” Netanyahu said, adding, “I also submit to the Cabinet the fact that the Syrian regime is very unstable, that the question of chemical weapons here worries us.” He said that Israel was coordinating with the U.S. and others “so that we might be prepared for any scenario and possibility that could arise.”
Last week, the prime minister toured a new security fence that runs almost the entire length of Israel’s border with Egypt. Netanyahu noted that the barrier had sharply stemmed the flow of African migrants into Israel and had provided more protection against militant groups operating in the Sinai Peninsula in Egypt.
He plans a similar barrier along the Syrian frontier, with changes to suit the topography. A section of an old and rickety border fence near the Golan Druse village of Majdal Shams already has been fortified with a steel barrier after protesters, most of them Palestinians, breached the frontier in 2011, drawing deadly fire from Israeli soldiers.
Israel seized a large portion of the Golan Heights, a plateau that overlooks northern Israel, from Syria in 1967 and later annexed it in a move that has not been internationally recognized. A cease-fire line was established in the aftermath of a 1973 conflict, and though Israel and Syria are still technically at war, it has remained mostly quiet for decades.
But Israeli experts have said thousands of Islamic militants have entered Syria to fight against forces loyal to Assad. Israeli leaders have expressed particular concern that chemical weapons and advanced weaponry such as ground- to- air missiles amassed by the Assad government could fall into the hands of radical groups.