MOHAMMED AZHAR ALI KHANCanadians generally and Canadian Muslims in particular are watching with dismay as the Assad regime continues its brutal crackdown to crush the Syrian people's struggle for dignity and basic rights. Organizations such as Human Concern International and the Islamic Council of North America are raising funds to assist the refugees and those who have lost their homes and livelihood. Prayers are being said for Syrians in mosques throughout Canada. People have demonstrated in front of the Syrian embassy and at the Parliament to express their revulsion. Canadians have urged their government to be tough with the Syrian regime and the government has done just that. But its options are very limited. Canada has imposed economic and diplomatic sanctions on the Syrian regime and has condemned its brutality. It has supported the efforts of the United Nations to promote an end to violence and repression, and it has ousted Syrian diplomats. Canada has urged the Soviet Union and China to stop bolstering the regime. But these efforts have yielded no tangible results. Killings, torture and brutality reign in Syria unchecked. For Canadians of Syrian origin, and Muslim Canadians, the situation is particularly painful. They enjoy freedom, democracy, dignity and equality in Canada and know that their Syrian brethren are being killed and maimed for seeking basic rights. When a similar uprising erupted in Libya last year, Canada made a modest but effective military contribution to the North Atlantic Treaty Organizations' action to protect Libyan civilians. That action was so lethal that it crippled the Gaddafi regime and precipitated its downfall. Analysts here assert that the Syrian regime is much tougher and that military action against it would be much more difficult. That is why Western governments have lent moral and material support to the Syrian opposition but have shied away from military intervention. The Syrian regime is facing assaults from the Free Syrian Army and is being weakened by the growing desertion of its top military and civilian officials. But Syrian authorities are fighting ferociously, targeting innocent civilians, torturing even children and old men and indulging in brutalities that the United Nations and Red Cross officials have stated amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity. Bashar Al-Assad's father Hafez Al-Assad ruthlessly killed 20,000 civilians in Hama in 1982 according to British journalist Robert Fisk (the Syrian Human Rights Committee puts the number at 40,000). The present death toll is mounting ominously and may soon surpass 20,000. The Syrian regime lacks legitimacy and holds office only through its labyrinth of intelligence agencies, police and military personnel and its ruthless operations against civilians and freedom fighters. Given the regime's brutality it is unlikely that the opposition will agree to join a governing arrangement that keeps the killers in office. The prospect is for escalating violence, repression and bloodshed before the people achieve their basic rights. It is difficult to imagine that the Syrian people will give up before attaining the objective of getting a settlement that represents their aspirations and respects their rights. However, the problem is not Bashar Al-Assad alone, but the system. The French and the British, after promising independence to the Arabs during the First World War if they revolted against the Ottoman empire, concluded the notorious Sykes-Picot agreement to carve up Arab territories among themselves. The French grabbed Syria and, like the British, adopted a policy of divide and rule. They placed the minority Alawites in key positions in the armed forces and the civil service. When air force chief Hafez Al-Assad seized power in a coup in 1970, he systematically bolstered the Alawites' domination of Syria to the detriment of justice, fairness and the rights of all Syrians. Since then the regime has relied on mass arrests, torture and terror to maintain its grip. The Syrian people are left with the choice of submitting to this injustice or resisting it. So the evil that the colonial power devised to keep itself in command continues to flourish long after the end of the colonial era. Muslims in Canada enjoy the blessings of democracy, the rule of law, and dignity in this great country. But they have also learned that democracy only enables people to elect rulers they trust or at least hope will govern them with wisdom and fairness. Democracy does not change human nature. Politicians in Western democracies seek power unashamedly. They paint their political rivals as demons, misrepresent their programs and malign them constantly. They make promises they have no intention of keeping. Once in power they break their campaign pledges. They repay their cronies with patronage and favors, some illegal. This hypocrisy also manifests itself in foreign policy and in the lip service some Western governments pay to promoting human rights and democracy in Arab and other countries. Their real aim is to promote their own interests, and those of Israel. Canadian Muslims fear that the aim of the US in Syria and the Middle East is not to help the Syrian people but to consolidate its own position and to bolster Israel. Canadian Muslims are watching the Syrian situation with hope and apprehension.— Mohammed Azhar Ali Khan is a retired Canadian newspaperman, civil servant and refugee judge. He has received the Order of Canada, Order of Ontario, the Queen's Diamond Jubilee Medal and the Queen's Golden Jubilee Medal.
