Syria: The crucible

Although the carnage has slipped under the radar, Syria's destiny will define the future of the Arab revolutions. 

By Hamid Dabashi

Al-Jazeera

".....
The drama of Egypt is today overshadowing Syria, but Syria will remain the crucible of the future of Arab revolutions - every force and every ferocity brought to bear on the body politic of a nation dismantled under the pressure. Silenced are now the overwhelming majority of Syrians themselves - ordinary people waiting their turn, beyond sectarian divisions, beyond the vicious cycle of the ruling regime and its militant nemesis.

There are no blueprints for these Arab revolutions. No one knows for sure where they are headed. Militant lslamists, outflanked Wahhabis, outdated Salafis, combative Shias, petrodollar arrogance, bewildered Zionism, Russian and Chinese opportunism, and above all the Yankee Doodle Dandy imperialism of Obama administration are all in the crucible boiling to affect the future.
But nations from Morocco to Afghanistan and from Turkey to Yemen have crossed a psychological barrier and reached the point of no return, a clear consciousness has dawned upon the horizon of history and all these retrograde forces are in one way or another waging a losing battle against each other and against themselves - their heated transmutation the fuel of history as it delivers itself to a vastly different posterity.

As a potent political category, "the people" has never been a more pertinent force, and people's public self-consciousness never a more critical factor in outlasting all these feeble treacheries. In the midst of all the carnage remain the Syrian people themselves, those peaceful protestors who are the silent majority that might now be quiet in the midst of the violence, but will be heard again (in the form of labour unions, women's rights organisations, student assembles, and any other form of voluntary association) once these brutish conquerors come down off their horses and Humvees to rule.

There and then they will see that a cartoon of Ali Ferzat, a documentary of the late Omar Amiralay , a film by Mohammad Malas or Usama Muhammad, a poem of Adonis or Salim Barakat, or a fiction of Khaled Khalifa or Samar Yazbek has enriched the moral imagination of a nation far from being ruled by the combined banalities of these forces now vying for power.    "