Syria's official media was keen to deliver special coverage of President Bashar Al-Assad's Oct. 16 meeting with Robert Malley, head of the Middle East program at the International Crisis Group and erstwhile informal adviser to U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama.
The lead story the next day in government newspapers reported that Al-Assad and Malley discussed Iraq, Palestine, Lebanon and prospects for peace in the Middle East, and that Malley explained the role the ICG would have in briefing the new U.S. administration about Syria's important role in the region.
What really attracted attention, though, was that on the same day a Web site closely associated with the government published a translation of a lecture Malley had delivered at Yale, offering effusive praise for it.
The site referred to Malley as a senior adviser to Barack Obama on the Middle East, even though the Obama campaign says Malley's role was never official. In any case, the campaign dropped him as too controversial after it was reported that he had met with Hamas officials. The Web site further stated that Malley's opinions would shape the next U.S. president's ideas about the Middle East, noting that, unlike the Bush administration, Malley supported a peace agreement between Syria and Israel--which would weaken Iran, Hezbollah and Hamas.
The site noted that Obama had twice echoed Malley in stating that the failure of the war in Iraq had strengthened Iran's influence. But if the Obama campaign has indeed severed its ties to Malley, it seems that Syrian officials are overestimating his influence. (Malley last met with the Syrian president in April 2007.)