Syria's Fragmented Opposition
The lack of unifying leadership among Syria's opposition has limited its effectiveness, writes Jean-Loup Samaan.
Despite its recognition as the legitimate representative of the Syrian people at the March Arab League summit in Doha, the Syrian National Coalition (SNC) has been torn by numerous crises that put into question its very credibility.
In particular, Moaz al-Khatib, the president of the SNC declared only a few days before the summit that due to disagreements within the coalition and with international partners, he would resign. Khatib eventually decided to remain until the end of his mandate, in May, to prevent a sudden leadership vacuum. This episode, however, reflects an ongoing trend in the difficult buildup of the Syrian opposition.
Since the beginning of the Syrian revolution in March 2011, media have grown bewildered by the apparent inability of the Syrians to form a robust political body responsible for conducting the rebellion against the regime of Bashar al-Assad. True, oppositions are always fragmented, and in recent history, the Libyan Transitional Council was no exception. Eventually, however, agendas tend to coalesce, at least temporarily, to topple the regime. This is not yet the case in Syria, after two years of conflict. The role of external military support is not here the decisive factor. Instead, cohesion among the rebels is.
This fragmentation of the opposition may be one of the legacies of the regime of Hafez al-Assad, father of the current president. The popular narrative that paints the Assad government as a mere sectarian regime ruled by an Alawite minority oppressing a Sunni majority is a strawman that ignores the complexities of Syrian power struggles. Both father and son maintained their hold on power by engaging the various parts of Syria's communities, including the Sunni bourgeoisie in Damascus and Aleppo and some elements of the Kurdish autonomists in the north. The elder Assad’s calculus shaped a trans-sectarian community of interests and privileges that benefited from the regime and that effectively divided his potential competitors. He assembled a caste composed of his Alawite relatives but also of opportunistic allies to help him pre-empt any insurgence from one or several communities.
