It’s hard to tell what’s more unbelievable, since that reported voter turnout is more than the percentage of Americans who voted in the 2008 Presidential Election, ignoring the impossible to ignore fact that many of Syria’s voters are relentlessly being pelted with rockets and mortars. On the other hand, it’s equally difficult to grasp that 89.4 percent of Syrians would want to see Assad’s reign legally extended for 16 more years.
Congratulations to Syrian President Bashir Assad on securing an overwhelming majority of his countrymen assenting to his continued reign of terror. Reports indicate that 57.4% of Syria’s electorate managed to cast their votes. I’d suspect the remaining 42.6% had been killed, wounded, had fled the country, or were otherwise disappeared indisposed.
Maintaining stability and continuity of power is always a good thing, I suppose. I can’t help but wonder how many more of his fellow Syrians Assad and his army will have to murder in cold blood in order to maintain the power he only thinks he has. Yes, Assad has an army which, so far at least, has shown itself willing to butcher their civilian compatriots. I came across one sentence that sums it up quite well:
Assad’s forces continued to shell cities in central and northern Syria during and after the vote.
How Assad can managed to delude himself into thinking that, a) the referendum is anything resembling valid, and b) the international community views the vote as anything but a complete farce defies understanding.
Once upon a time when I was teaching in Cyprus, I spent Spring Break touring Jordan and Syria (you can find some of my writings on Syria here). I was in Syria when Bashir Assad’s father, Hafez Assad, was the unquestioned President/Dictator. The elder Assad’s visage was present everywhere. Huge portraits were draped over buildings in public squares, and his menacing countenance could be found staring back at Syrians in virtually every shop, home, and gathering place. Talking to Syrians about the political situation there was next to impossible, but certainly understandable, because expressive anything that might possibly be interpreted as dissent would have been dealt with quickly and harshly. One shopkeeper summed it up as honestly as anyone could manage. When I asked him about President Assad, he smiled wanly and said, “He’s what we have.”
How long Syrians will remain saddled with Assad fils is difficult to say, as is guessing how many more Syrians will die at the hand of their government. I realize that the geopolitical calculations are significantly different when comparing Syria and Libya. On the surface, it’s difficult to understand how the international community can aggressively bomb Muammar Gaddafi off his throne while giving Bashir Assad what amounts to a free pass. From a human decency standpoint, it would stand to reason that if we can come to the aid and defense of Libyans, doing the same for Syrians shouldn’t be a stretch. If only Syria had large, untapped oil deposits….
Or are we really OK with the idea of thousands of innocent civilians continuing to suffer and die in a country that lacks the oil reserves that Libya possesses?
At least 41 people died today in Syria, including 39 protesters and two soldiers, according to Al Arabiya television and SANA. Shelling continued in the Baba Amr region in the central city of Homs, Al Arabiya said, while the army also attacked Idlib in the north, Al Jazeera reported.
About 8,500 people have been killed in the government’s crackdown against the protests that began last March, according to the Arab Organization for Human Rights.
And so it continues, while the international community stands idly by….
