Iran and Syria are not the same thing. Syria is a threat to Lebanon and to Israel, yet at the same time the Syrian regime, an Alawite despotism (with a policy, more obvious under Bashir than under Hafez al-Assad, of sharing the government's take with a few selected Sunnis, some of them related by marriage to Alawites), treats the Christians not too terribly by Arab Muslim standards. The government, for example, even closes on Christmas, and Good Friday processions are permitted. Yet the steady building of mosques right between churches, in what is clearly a Christian quarter, proceeds -- see Haleb (Aleppo). Bashir al-Assad, no air force pilot, is incapable of clenching an iron fist the way his father could, and did.

So his strategy is based on appeasement of the real Muslims -- both kinds. kinds of Muslims. He placates the Shi'a of Iran, the Islamic Republic of Iran, by allowing the transfer of weapons from Iran to Hezbollah, and Hezbollah, a Shi'a group tied in some -- not all -- ways, to Iran and Iran's policy, helps to destabilize Lebanon, and that, for Syria, is a good thing, because it wishes to impose its will on Lebanon as what old management consultants (see Bruce Henderson, see the Boston Consulting Group) used to call and perhaps still do, a "cash cow."

Lebanon, its wealth due in large part to the existence of an Christian Lebanese class of entrepreneurs, and in some cases to the Christian Lebanese who have fled Lebanon during the past century, fled the Muslims, and not a few have done well (the most spectacular example being Carlos Slim Helou of Mexico) and some of them provide connections and some may also wish to ensure that Lebanon, being so quickly islamized ever since France voluntarily abandoned the Maronites, for a shallow and misconceived raison d'etat, and Israel was forced to abandon them by all kinds of pressures (though it should never have abandoned the SLA, or South Lebanon Army), is the source of the money that keeps the Syrian regime, its own economy in permanent disarray, going, and provides the style of life to which its rulers have grown accustomed. Meanwhile, though the Alawites would, if the real Muslims, the Sunni Muslims who make up 70% of the Syrian population, were to come to power, that would be the end of the Alawites, and they would be reduced to nothing.

The identity or at least overlapping of interest, between the Syrian regime and the regime in Iran, in keeping Lebanon unstable through support of Hezbollah, or even, possibly, Sunni terrorist groups (Fatah al-Islam inflicts damage on the Lebanese army and, therefore, on the Lebanese state), is reinforced by the Islamic legitimacy, as the Alawites see it, given to them by the Iranians. For they will never be considered full Muslims by the Sunnis, but in Iran, at long last, a fatwa was issued several years ago by some high-ranking cleric declaring that the Alawites were indeed Muslims. That was important. And the reports that the Syrian regime is not stopping efforts of Shji'a missionaries from Iran or backed by Iran, to proselytize among the Sunnis of Syria, may not be a case of hysterical exaggeration by such Sunni rulers as Mubarak and Abdullah of Jordan, may in fact be true.

Securing, as it may seem, its Iranian or Shi'a flank, the Alawite regime also has permitted the Sunni Arabs from Syria, and elsewhere, to flow into Iraq, both to kill Shi'a, and Infidel Americans, and most importantly, in the case of local Sunnis, to get them out of Syria, and to bid them well (and ill) at the same time: here's your hat, what's your hurry? Go kill anyone you want, in Iraq, and let's hope you are eventually killed in turn.

Thus does the Alawite regime hope to stay in power.

And the problem for the American government is that it doesn't necessarily want that Alawite regime to be deposed, for the alternative is almost certain to be rule by Sunni Muslms, and then both the Christians of Syria, and the new influx of Christians who have fled Iraq, will in turn be pushed out, or worse. But it does want a change in the regime's behavior. Perhaps what it needs to do is not, as with Iraq, put its faith in the good-guys-in-exile, who are not always quite so good, so pro-Western, so keenly aware of the problem of Islam, as one expected or hoped, but to put its faith, rather, in Alawite military men who realize that Bashir al-Assad is setting up the Alawites for defeat.

An American attack, not an "invasion" but an "attack," and not on all of "Iran" but on the nuclear facilities in Iran, would shake the Islamic Republic, and if it tried to retaliate, then much greater damage could be swiftly inflicted (it could be warned not to make a move -- not everyone in the Iranian army is as foolish as such civilians as Ahmadinejad). And if that happens, the Syrian regime, the Alawites, that is, will go down with it. But if Syria's Alawites -- and the theme of Alawites, Alawites, Alawites should be picked up and repeated at every opportunity, and the Americans should encourage the Arab rulers in Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia to pick up that theme, and they will do so, not because they are our allies, but because at the moment they wish to weaken Iran, and weaken the Shi'a, and the Syrian Alawite regime has, in their view, helped both too much.

Ideally, the Alawites who rule Syria should be made a deal: you can keep ruling in Syria, because your ruthlessness helps keep the Sunni Arabs domestically in check, and allows the Christians to survive. But that's it. No nonsense about milking Lebanon. No nonsense about getting the Golan Heights -- they have been incorporated into Israel, permanently. It's that -- or such a defeat that not merely Bashir al-Assad, but every Alawite village, will be wiped out by the fury of resentful Sunnni Arabs.

Deal, or No Deal?

Posted by: Hugh at June 11, 2007 7:54 AM

On another note Iran making threats again

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1181559477126&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

Posted by: Sneakyzionistcrusader at June 11, 2007 12:24 PM

...as well as other Israeli sodiers, as well as arming the jihadists in every single country in uprising, as well as...oh hell you get the idea...

Posted by: jcom972 at June 11, 2007 5:00 PM

Noticed on Drudge that Hezbollah has amassed over a hundred rockets with a range capable of hitting Tel Aviv. It's quite obvious from last summer's war that the destruction of Lebanon is not a sufficient deterrent to keep Hezbollah's behavior in check.

The answer is simple: Israel should publicly state that a rocket attack by Hezbollah on Israel will be considered an attack by Syria on Israel, with all the commensurate retaliatory implications. The entire strategic equation will be altered, and Hezbollah will be put on a tight leash.

Posted by: Cornelius at June 11, 2007 5:37 PM