In terms of the result, the Syrian official announcement of the acceptance of international-Arab envoy Kofi Annan's mission matches the previous official Syrian announcement of political reforms. In other words, both steps did not lead to the discontinuation of the killing in the country and even came in the context of a qualitative escalation of the conflict in a way that pushes the country toward numerous upcoming rounds of bloodshed. The support of Annan's mission should mean the acceptance of the fact that the conflict in Syria is between two sides, i.e. the regime and the opposition. As to the six points featured in the initiative, they aim at ending the fighting, monitoring the troops, ensuring the delivery of the aid to the afflicted due to this fighting and launching dialogue to induce a change that meets the aspirations of the opposition. However, out of these points, the Syrian regime chose the ending of the fighting, i.e. the clause that recognizes the existence of an armed opposition facing the governmental troops during their invasion of the cities which are witnessing demonstrations – thus relying on the skill of dissipating what is essential at the level of details. It also considered that the return of the governmental troops to their barracks could only follow the disarmament of these oppositionists, which in fact means the insistence on pursuing the demonstrators by use of power, and not the abstinence from using killing tools against them. As to dialogue, its outcome is settled in advance by the Syrian authority, as it is being conducted with “specific oppositionists” under the ceiling of the president and the reforms he announced. In other words, the purpose of dialogue is the enhancement of what is being rejected by the oppositionists and the demonstrators, especially in regard to the prerogatives of the president who controls all the decisions in the context of a socioeconomic structure that led to the escalation of the crisis to the current level. This means that the Syrian regime has not undertaken any actual steps confirming its realization of the necessity to meet the minimum level of the demonstrators' and oppositionists' demands. And all the official announcements are mere political tactics it is using to protect itself with the help of international sides, especially at the Security Council, while insisting on the core and image of the regime in place. The public support offered to Annan's plan falls in the context of the search for that protection. And at a time when Annan was trying to promote his six points among these sides in particular and earning their public support, the regime issued a travel ban against men who reached the age of performing the military service and announced the postponement of the parliamentary elections. This measure is usually adopted in the context of the general mobilization of the armed forces during times of war. Consequently, the Syrian regime believes it is engaged in war and not just in security operations against armed gangs, which will end within a few days as it had previously announced. Politically, this mobilization aims at showing that the six points which were supported by Moscow and Beijing no longer met the requirements of the nature of the battle, despite the fact that they were verbally accepted. This conveys the first signs of the rejection once the details of the implementation are reached, after having become implicated in the welcoming of the mission. But what is more important is what is happening on the field, knowing that general mobilization is not the goal behind the travel ban. Indeed, the forces being pushed toward the invasion of the cities are governed by a structure, command and plans which do not go in line with the idea of general mobilization, as the latter usually affects all the factions of Syrian society. The war on the cities has acquired a whole new nature and is focusing on specific areas based on their demographic structure, by methodically destroying the buildings to force their inhabitants to leave and resort to other locations. This gives the operations the character of forced displacement, if not popular cleansing, and confirms the fears surrounding the continuation of the confrontations for a long time and their slide toward blatant civil confrontations. This direction is enhanced by the absence of any chances of seeing a political solution – which is rejected by the regime to begin with – and cannot be imposed in the context of the protection of the country's unity. The most dangerous challenge facing the opposition's conference in Istanbul – apart from the objections voiced against it – is the slide toward the logic of the regime in the context of the confrontation, whether militarily or politically. This would be seen by refusing to limit the military standoff to the areas chosen by the regime instead of spreading peaceful protests throughout the country as a key goal for the opposition's action, not settling for the political dispute with the regime and presenting a clear and temporary political program capable of rallying the widest factions in the country around the action, its slogans and missions. The new stage which the regime is trying to impose also needs new slogans extending beyond generalization.
