The former deputy to the Syrian president, Abdul-Halim Khaddam, considered his rival, President Bashar al-Assad, who has been facing an unprecedented wave of popular protests for weeks, to be “politically dead.” He stated that Assad is fighting to remain in power in the face of escalating protests, but the Syrians have decided to overthrow this regime.
Khaddam, who defected six years ago and leads the opposition “Salvation Front,” told the German magazine “Der Spiegel” that the Syrian president will step down “perhaps within weeks, as Syrians have been suffering from over four decades of dictatorial rule. There is a massive amount of anger that can no longer be controlled,” according to him.
He dismissed reports of armed protesters and gunfire against soldiers as a “lie.” However, he claimed the existence of destructive forces from foreign countries, specifically mentioning Iran. He said, “I mean Iran; anyone who imagines that Damascus still makes political decisions without Iran is mistaken.”
Khaddam described President Bashar and his brother Maher, who leads the Republican Guard, as “becoming the implementers of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard,” stating that most of the Syrian security personnel were trained in Iran, and there has been close military and security cooperation between the two countries for years.
He pointed out that “Iran’s cultural influence is increasing. Tehran has established religious institutions in Syria, and Iranian pilgrims go to the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus for atonement, a religious ritual that did not exist in previous eras.”
Khaddam, who was a key figure in the late Syrian President Hafez al-Assad’s regime, compared the events in the southern city of Daraa to what happened in the city of Hama in 1982. He said, “What is happening today in Daraa is moving in the same direction. Civilians are being killed there as well, but today there is the internet, and the whole world witnesses it shortly after humans die anywhere.”
On April 21 of last year, the Syrian president issued reform decrees fundamentally lifting the state of emergency in place for nearly fifty years, and announced a series of important reforms. However, campaigns of arrests and killing of civilians have not stopped.
Despite the escalating protests, Assad, who belongs to the Alawite minority, still retains support, especially among members of his Shia sect who dominate the army and secret police. He might lose power if Sunni-majority Syria transitions to democracy.
The former deputy to the Syrian president stated that the Assad family is “extremely powerful. We can talk about no more than 20 people who share Syria’s wealth among them. This concerns ten individuals from the Assad family and their relatives from the Makhloof family who use these riches with them. For example, Rami Makhlouf, Bashar’s wealthy cousin, controls a network representing 25% of Syria’s total GDP.”
He added, “It is clear that Bashar is not the ruler, and the truth is that after he took the Yemeni presidency, he appointed individuals of his own choice, especially from the Republican Guard, to prominent positions. For example, the current head of military intelligence comes from the Republican Guard.”
Although there are no indications so far of an imminent fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime, Khaddam anticipated that “the fall of Bashar will have a positive impact on neighboring countries. The new democratic Syria will maintain, above all, close relations with post-revolution Egypt, and the Egyptian-Syrian alliance will reappear. On the other hand, Iran will have to realize that its strategic ambitions will be limited to its national borders.”
Khaddam expressed hope that “Europe will help by taking measures that tighten the noose on the regime. Sanctions should be imposed, and the assets of the Assad League and their associates should be frozen.”
Since March 15 of last year, Syria has witnessed unprecedented protest demonstrations demanding the release of freedoms, the repeal of the state of emergency law, the fight against corruption, and the improvement of services and the standard of living for citizens. The protests have turned into sometimes bloody confrontations, resulting in hundreds of deaths, according to human rights activists.
