NATIONALISM ISN'T BA'ATHISM:

Syrian society begins to crack under international pressure: With the country feeling under siege over the Lebanon issue, voices of domestic dissent are being silenced. (Hugh Macleod, 13 March 2005, Sunday Herald)

Lebanese defence minister Abdul Rahim Mrad said that some 7000 troops were evacuating from positions around Tripoli and that most of them were moving back to Syria. However, nine Syrian intelligence offices remain open in northern Lebanon.

Washington remained unimpressed, reiterating its call for a complete Syrian withdrawal.

The question being asked by some observers in Damascus, however, is what effect the external pressures on Syria have on the domestic scene.

“Some Syrians believe protests over human rights and democracy play into the hands of the US and its interests, including Israel,” said Andrew Tabler, a fellow with the Institute of Current World Affairs, and consulting editor with Syria Today magazine.

“I think we will see more of the same kind of thing as the attack on the activists as long as external pressures go on.”

The momentum that carried the students into their attack on the activists had begun the previous day when tens of thousands of Syrians marched through Damascus in a show of national pride.

Time after time the same answer came back. “We are here to support President Assad and his decision to withdraw Syrian troops from Lebanon. We are not interested in internal divisions,” said Lama Daghistani, a worker at the ministry of economy and trade.

But as a celebration on the anniversary of the “Glorious Revolution” that brought the Ba’ath party to power, though, the rally was very unusual. In a sea of Syrian national flags, it was almost impossible to make out a single Ba’ath party flag. [...]

One thing is sure though. The recent isolation Damascus has felt from its erstwhile Arab allies has driven a further nail into the coffin of the pan- Arabism that was the principle founding ideology of the ruling Ba’ath party. The nation’s interests rather than the party’s interests are now at the forefront of the domestic agenda.

And Ba'athism isn't in Syria's interests.

Posted by Orrin Judd at March 13, 2005 8:51 AM