A Free Syria
I woke up like so many others this morning to the news that the city of Damascus and the regime of Bashar El-Assad has, incredibly, fallen. This had become a possibility over the last few days, as rebel groups swept across the country and the army dissolved and yet — as is so often the case — the end of what seemed an impregnable power came with a sudden, dream-like ease, reality re-arranging itself.
I went to buy groceries here in Amman and the lovely Syrian shop assistant — who had told me before how he and his brother fled into exile years ago — was beside himself at the prospect of being able to return to his hometown, Homs. His phone was open to video chats with friends and relatives, he kept shaking his head in disbelief and delight. “We're going back,” he said, and I congratulated him and almost started crying (I’m a crybaby).
I only visited Syria once, twenty years ago. I found Damascus beautiful. My picture of the country is partly formed by the Syrians I’ve met over the years, by Syrian friends, and by following the devastating news and scenes of the Syrian uprising and civil war. And then by readings. The works of the playwright Sa’adallah Wannous — a leftist, anti-imperialist and engagé artist whose life and work, from the 1960s to the 1990s, took amazing turns, and who I’ve written about here. Syrie, l’État de Barbarie, the seminal analysis of the Assad regime by the great Michel Seurat (who was assassinated in Beirut in 1986). The Impossible Revolution by the great Syrian intellectual and dissident Yassin El-Hajj Saleh, whose wife Samira Khalil is one of the many disappeared of the civil war. Today, as we see footage of prisoners being freed from Assad’s prisons, I also keep thinking of the prison memoir The Shell, by Mustafa Khalifa, who spent years in the infamous Tadmour prison. This is one of those excellent books that you can nevertheless hardly recommend — it is such an unbearable read that you hesitate to take the responsibility of putting someone else through the experience. (I wrote about it here).
The book is un unanswerable indictment of the Assad regime, which stood out — in a crowded field — for its extreme, repugnant violence against its own people. (And any so-called leftists and anti-imperialists who have defended it on ideological and geo-strategic grounds over the years have provided a case study of moral blindness and utter stupidity). There is much to be worried about, for the future, and many Syrians are. They have already been through so much. But today we can witness their relief and pride and hope that they are able to build the future they deserve, after unimaginable suffering and sacrifices and such a long, long wait.