Western governments, and some Asian countries that revolve in their orbit, took the decision this week to expel Syrian diplomats and ambassadors to protest the hideous massacre in the village of Houla and the methodical killing by the Syrian regime and its allied militias. But the move will have only a limited impact, in terms of morale, in expressing the international anger at the acts of the regime, no more and no less. The move will constitute no effective pressure on the regime, which will not alter its behavior or change its already-known plan for dealing with the uprising, ever since it erupted. This policy is based on a minimum and a maximum objective. The first involves crushing the intifada of the Syrian people by force, at whatever the cost. However, this goal is becoming more difficult, with the strong insistence by segments of the Syrian people to continue their movement to topple the regime, despite the hideous level of violence being used against them. The maximalist goal, meanwhile, involves “cleansing" some areas of the country, to respond to the rebels who have taken over elsewhere. This policy is focused on the region of Homs, known in ancient times as Heliopolis, and for ages a place of religious coexistence. The policy covers the region surrounding Homs because the regime's objective is to render it a safe corridor for it and its supporters, linking the Syrian coast to Damascus, and between the coast and the Lebanese borders, adjacent to the northern Bekaa Valley. The regime and its supporters are fiercely pursuing this minimalist objective and are insistent on creating demographic changes in this region, through massacres that use a policy of genocide, and displacement, which has affected (in this area alone) nearly 800,000-900,000 people, fleeing to other parts of Syria or abroad. There is no embarrassment for the regime in seeing this accompanied by the destruction of buildings in entire villages and neighborhoods, and their removal from the map, as has happened in Homs, or surrounding villages in the governorate. The expulsion of Syrian diplomats by Western countries and their allies has been an alternative to the inability to draft a practical, clear stance that exerts pressure in the direction of halting the "security" solution to the uprising in Syria. International military intervention has become nearly impossible, and Moscow is acting the hero when it says that it and Beijing have agreed against such an option, because Western countries themselves are not going to resort to it, at least in the foreseeable future. Western countries are content to wager that financial and economic sanctions will have their effect in shaking up the Syrian regimes in the fall, which means that there is no deterrent to the continued murder and massacres until that time. In parallel to a "safe corridor" that the regime is trying to guarantee for itself by stepping up its campaigns against Homs and the surrounding region, the international dispute over a clear political (and not military) plan that could pressure the regime to stop killing, provides a safe corridor for its survival, letting it continue to do what it does on the ground. Moscow has repeatedly declared its rejection of any military intervention that is not put forward in a serious forum, which is no more than political cover for rejecting another solution – a political one – to treat the crisis. This involves a Yemeni-style solution, which appears to be the serious minimum option being put forward by the west. The Russian leadership, despite the hints that it does not support the Syrian president, and the Syrian government, rejects any solution that sees Bashar Assad step down in Yemeni fashion, because it insists on retaining the negotiating card of Assad's survival, for reasons that go beyond Syria, and involve Russia's relationship with the United States. Moscow and Beijing continue to call for dialogue among the Syrians, and the former warns night and day of a civil war (along with some Western countries, and the US), while the deputy Arab-UN envoy, Jean-Marie Guehenno, is saying that dialogue between the opposition and the regime is impossible. Meanwhile, the first point in the Annan six-point plan is to "commit to work with the Envoy in an inclusive Syrian-led political process... and, to this end, commit to appoint an empowered interlocutor." This means that the Annan team itself is saying the mission has failed. As for a civil war, the excessive level of statements about fears of such a war breaking out is utterly malicious. This war started months ago, and the massacres taking place in Sunni areas, and in Alawi areas, and the displacement of Christian regions, not to speak of the tit-for-tat kidnappings – can't this be termed a civil war? Why are there so many fears and warnings that Lebanon is sliding toward civil war on the rise, under the banner of the need to avoid threats to Lebanese stability as a result of the repercussions of the Syrian crisis, if this crisis itself has not entered a phase of civil war?
