Syria Between Imperialism and Repression

by Sami Ramadani, Samuel Grove

New Left Project
June 12, 2012

[Sami Ramadani is a senior lecturer in sociology at London  Metropolitan University and has been an active participant in campaign's against Saddam's regime and anti-imperialist
struggles for many years. In an in-depth interview, he spoke  to Samuel Grove about the dynamics of the conflict in Syria,  arguing that democratic resistance to Assad's brutal regime
has been eclipsed by reactionary forces, backed by Western and Gulf states, with potentially momentous implications for the Middle East.]

The upheaval in Syria is an enormously difficult subject for Western outsiders to get a handle on. One of the reasons for this is the sheer number of different interests jostling for
position and power, from both within and outside the country. Let us start with the regime itself. Can you give us a brief history of where the Al-Assad family came from and the direction they have taken the country since they came to power in 1970?

Following the magnificent peoples' uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt, toppling two entrenched dictators, there developed a tendency not to closely examine the nature of the various
forces competing for political power both within the opposition movements and the Arab regimes. Events in Libya and NATO's intervention there have alerted most people to the dangers of hijacking the peoples' struggle for freedom by reactionary forces. A brief look at the nature of the Syrian regime and its changing role in the region is crucial in trying to understand the current conflict and the reactionary forces' success in hijacking the people's struggle for radical change.

Syria has been run by a ruthless, corrupt regime. Syrian left activists have been on the receiving end of severe repression since Hafiz Assad's coup in 1970. It was after that coup that Henry Kissinger described Syria as "a factor for stability," despite Soviet military backing for the regime. Hafiz Assad's regime, funded by the Saudi medieval dictators, played a leading role in the 1970's and early 80's in weakening the Palestinian resistance.  During the1975-6 civil war in Lebanon Syrian troops sided with pro-Israeli Phalange and other extreme right wing forces. The regime, in return for US promises over the Israeli-occupied Syrian Golan Heights and Saudi petro-dollars, also backed the 1991 US-led war over Kuwait.

The Syrian forces' presence in Lebanon had the full support of the US and Saudi rulers and the tacit support of Israel. It was only after Syria's gradual foreign policy shift and reversal of roles from enemies to allies of the Palestinian and Lebanese resistance movements that the US and Saudi rulers shifted their stance. They pursued an aggressive campaign to force a Syrian withdrawal (1985) from Lebanon, particularly after the 2003 occupation of Iraq. US forces
even killed some Syrian soldiers on the Iraqi-Syrian borders.

See the rest of the article here.