BEIRUT - In his almost 11 years in office, Syrian PresidentBashar al-Assad has brought about some remarkable changes to acountry formerly run by his notoriously ruthless father, fuelingperceptions that he is at heart a reformer, albeit one who has beenheld back by hard-liners intent on preserving the status quo.
Under his rule, Syria has opened its doors to foreign investmentand private ownership. Cellphones, Internet service and satellite TVhave proliferated. The capital, Damascus, has been transformed froma sleepy socialist backwater into the beginnings of a thrivingmodern capital, with shiny glass offices, European fashion outletsand trendy cafes serving flavored lattes to a hip new elite.
Yet in all those years, the younger Assad has implemented not onemeasure that would relax the ruling Baath Party's 48-year-long holdon power, lift the draconian laws that enable the security forces tooperate with impunity or ease restrictions on free speech.
Now, with the Syrian security forces escalating a brutal andbloody effort to suppress an almost nationwide uprising, it may betoo late for Assad to salvage what little remains of his reputationas the thwarted reformist waiting only for a chance to liberalizehis country.
On Sunday, the army sent tanks into the southern town of Tafas,according to Wissam Tarif of the human rights group Insan. In Homs,he said, 14 people were killed by sharpshooters. But withcommunications to many parts of the country severed, it wasimpossible to draw a clear picture of conditions inside the half-dozen or so towns surrounded by the military, Tarif said.
Assad's "reaction to the demonstrations has been the reaction ofa dictator," said Radwan Ziadeh, a Syrian human rights activist whois a visiting scholar at George Washington University's Institutefor Middle East Studies. "Even if he dramatically changed his mindand announced reforms now, I don't think anyone would believe him."
Assad has assiduously cultivated the reformist image since heascended to power in 2000 at age 34, promising a new and more openSyria. With his youth, his British training as an eye doctor and hiselegant British-born wife, Asma, he presented a starkly differentfigure compared with his somewhat thuggish father, Hafez, a militaryofficer, and the region's other aging autocrats.
It's an image that many in the international community have citedin justifying their hesitancy to call directly for Assad's ouster orto include him in sanctions, despite more than seven weeks ofbloodshed in which human rights groups say more than 700 people havebeen killed.
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton called Assad "areformer" during the early days of the demonstrations, though shelater said she was referring to the opinions of others. Even afterSyrian tanks rolled into the town of Daraa in a clear signal of theregime's intent to crush the uprising by force, British ForeignSecretary William Hague said Assad should be given a chance.
"You can imagine him as a reformer," he told the BBC. "One of thedifficulties in Syria is that President Assad's power depends on awider group of people, in his family and in other members of hisgovernment, and I am not sure how free he is to pursue a reformagenda."
That perception also lingers in Damascus, where residents havenot joined anti-government demonstrations in any significant number.There, rumors are swirling that Assad's hands are tied, perhaps byhis more ruthless and reputedly erratic brother Maher, who heads thearmy unit leading the crackdown, or perhaps by his powerful mother,Anisa, who some say is keeping her older son at home in his palacewhile unleashing other family members to quell the revolt.
Yet at no point in the past 11 years has a clear picture emergedof which regime members may be holding Assad back, said AndrewTabler, a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy,who was among those initially convinced of Assad's reformistcredentials during the eight years he lived and worked in Syria,some of them for Asma Assad's charities.
"We've heard all the time that the old guard was holding himback, but we've never heard who the old guard was or seen evidenceof them," he said. "You'd have a conversation with him, and he'd saywhat you wanted to hear, but after that it doesn't happen."
In the first months of Assad's rule, there was a briefflourishing of freedoms known as the Damascus Spring, followed by aswift crackdown, which gave rise to the narrative that Assad wasbeing held in check by hard-line holdovers from his father's regime.
But Theodore Kattouf, who was the U.S. ambassador to Syria from2001 to 2003, suspects the quickly curtailed display of tolerancehad more to do with Assad's inexperience than his inclinations.Although regime old-timers may have helped nudge him back on track,Kattouf said, "he was never a true political reformer."
"What he intended to do was reform within the existing system. Henever intended to truly change the political framework in which hisfather ruled."
Since then, the president has cemented his authority bysurrounding himself with members of the younger generation of Assadclan members, who have filled key positions in the security agenciesand in the new economy.
Among them is Maher, the brother, who heads the powerfulRepublican Guard. A maternal cousin, Rami Makhlouf, secured thelicense for Syriatel, the biggest mobile phone company in thecountry, while Makhlouf's younger brother Hafez is in charge of theDamascus branch of the intelligence services. Another cousin, AtifNajib, was in charge of Daraa, where the revolt first gainedmomentum.
"Ultimately, this is a family affair," said Joshua Landis, anassociate professor at the University of Oklahoma who writes theblog Syria Comment. "And all the signs are that the family issticking together, because they know they're going to have to livetogether or die together."
There's also no question that Assad is in full control of thefamily, said Ayman Abdel Nour, who served as Assad's adviser from1997 to 2004 before he turned against the regime and moved to Dubai,in the United Arab Emirates. "It's him, and only him, and the familyis behind him," Abdel Nour said. "He is the one in full charge, andhe is the one making the decisions."
Meanwhile, Assad has given no indication that he is prepared toaddress the unrest by meeting protesters' demands. One of his onlyconcrete promises, to lift the 48-year-old state of emergency, wasimplemented the day before Syrian troops fatally shot 112protesters, Ziadeh said, adding that this undermines any notion thatreform is seriously on the agenda.
Yet as the violence escalates, the revolt has spread, reachinginto towns and villages in almost every corner of the country.Demonstrators who initially confined their demands to reform are nowcalling for the toppling of the regime.
And even in Damascus, where many still cling to the notion thatAssad's reformist inclinations are being cramped by others, peopleare starting to question the levels of force being used, said aSyrian academic and commentator who spoke on the condition ofanonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject.
"Bashar is bowing to what's going on, so he's part of it," hesaid. "That makes him responsible, doesn't it?"
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