Can Syrians dare to hope?

Even by the standards of regimes in the region, Bashar Assad's is brutal. But we feel the end may be near

A GOOD COMMENT
Rana Kabbani
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 9 August 2011

"One of two eye doctors are determining the future of Syria. The first is alive and kicking: son of a brutal military dictator; heir to a corrupt family junta that has ruled the country for 41 years. The second is a long-dead private citizen, buried at the bottom of his family's modest garden.

Dr Hikmat Khani was head of Hama's national hospital when, in 1982, his city was besieged and bombarded on the orders of Bashar Assad's father Hafiz and his uncle Rif'at. To rout 1,500 armed Islamists there, the Assads killed 25,000 innocent civilians. Tens of thousands were rounded up and tortured. Young girls were gang-raped and women had their hands chopped off so their bracelets could be stolen more quickly after their men had been murdered.....

What will the Assads and their extended family be remembered for? Their prisons, mass graves, scorched earth policy; their denaturing of Syrian society into a place of suspicion and fear; and their ugly creation of a North Korea without the bomb? Their illegal enrichment, corruption, arrogance and vindictiveness?

Syrians deserve better and will win their freedom the difficult way, as other peoples have. Perhaps, judging by the mysterious reported death of Ali Habib, the recently sacked minister of defence, widely believed to have clashed with Bashar's lunatic policy; the increasing defections from the army; the no-show of 10,000 reservists at least; and the falling away of all the regime's friends, bar Hugo Chávez and Hassan Nasrallah, the end is nearer than we dare to hope.

Of the two eye doctors that Syria has produced, I believe it is the late Dr Khani – and millions like him – who will make our country the place we want it to be."