Bashar al-Assad may be the luckiest man in the Middle East, and maybe in the world. The defiant Syrian president has been under fierce popular, military, regional and global pressure to step down, his country is almost destroyed, more than one hundred thousand of his people have been killed and thousands of his soldiers splintered. Yet he is seriously considering running in the 2014 presidential election.
Assad is neither detached from reality nor delusional. The man knows well that he's backed by a solid front that he can bet on. Assad's front is ready to do whatever appropriate to keep him in power, providing money, arms, political backing and fighters.
