Syria's opposition is unified and peaceful

Bashar al-Assad may claim his opposition are violent Islamists, but the birth of the Syrian National Council shows otherwise

Mohanad Hage Ali
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 19 October 2011

"The birth of the Syrian National Council in Istanbul earlier this month challenges the Assad regime's claims that the opposition is Islamist, backward and violent.

Since the uprising began seven months ago, the regime's media has been trumpeting reports of clashes with Islamist extremist gangs to undermine the revolution internationally, and to nurture a fear of change inside Syria. The relative absence of a unified voice for the opposition and the revolution has played into the regime's narratives.

But the emergence of the SNC largely demystifies Syria's opposition map, which is mostly divided into the old guard and the revolutionary youth organised under co-ordination committees.

The old guard are pre-revolution opposition groups and independent dissidents, whether secular or Islamist (including the Muslim Brotherhood). The new youth groups, also represented on the SNC, are the revolution's "engines", officially known as the local co-ordination committees and the Syrian Revolution General Commission....

The Syrian opposition now has a somewhat unified voice. What remains unclear is how the confrontation will unfold. In the words of one Syrian dissident: "The regime's fate is known; the two unknowns are only the time and the heavy price we have to pay.""