Probably the most important statement to come out of the Syrian conflict to date.
From this morning's Times
Jim Carroll
Not sure where the suggestion that Assad could be sold riot-control gear features in all this!

WE SYRIANS NEED YOUR OUTRAGE - NOT YOUR PITY

Fares Chamseddine

When Marie Colvin and Remi Ochlik were killed by a rocket in Homs last week, it did more than just focus the rest of the world's attention once again on the horrific number of people killed so far in my homeland. It also helped to reawaken the spent passion of Syrians.
Many of my fellow countrymen and women that I know—and many that I don't—were quick to express their sorrow and outrage through Facebook and Twitter. One blogger changed her profile picture to one of Marie Colvin to show solidarity. For large numbers of us, myself included, the daily body count had simply stopped shocking us. Somewhere along the line, without us realising it, we had got used to the carnage; the news that a dozen Syrians had been killed here or there had ceased to trigger the anger that it deserved to.
The deaths of, at the most conservative estimate, more than 5,000 people in Syria is an outrage. It is a grim achievement of the Assad regime that so many people are numbed to it — Hannah Arendt once described something similar and called it "the banality of evil".
But there are people in the world who will not be numbed, and Marie Colvin died because of her belief that the suffering she witnessed in Syria should not go unnoticed. That is why many Syrians are grateful to her and is what the Assad regime wishes so desperately to stop.
The Syrian people do not want pity for their sufferings. For more than a year, many have freely and of their own choice risked their lives in the face of a brutal regime; at first simply to fight for basic dignities and later to overthrow the entire regime. What they want is for the outside world to share their moral outrage at the barbarism inflicted on them every day.
The Assad regime is trying to sweep away its culpability for the bloodshed by claiming that it is fighting religious terrorists and Salafists funded from abroad. The absurdity of this argument is plain to see—it would be as if the British Government were to besiege and shell Leeds simply because some of the 7/7 bombers came from there. This excuse should be dismissed outright as a shameless attempt to distract attention from the real issue —that the Syrian regime is systematically murdering its own people simply because-they have dared to challenge the Assad family's 40-year grip on the country.
Albert Hourani, the distinguished historian of the Arab world, once said that power is never comfortable unless it can turn itself into a legitimate authority. For more than ten years Bashar Assad has sought to do just that.
Spin-doctors, usually expatriates
with some standing, have quietly been trying to convince governments, academics and journalists that the Syrian regime is one that the West could do business with. They have worked to portray the regime as a firm but fair authoritarian government, a bulwark against Islamic fundamentalism or a critical partner in negotiations with Iran or Israel.
The regime has done its best to make sure that flattering articles appear on the travel pages of newspapers; in a now infamous interview with Vogue magazine, Assad's wife said that she ran her family on "wildly democratic principles". The Assad regime has desperately sought to make itself socially acceptable to the West. Remember, this regime and its supporters wish very much to continue sending their wives and children to shop and study in the West, and to buy properties in exclusive parts of London and Paris.
Whether he is posing as a reasonable middle man who represents secularism or now as a champion of anti-imperialism fighting a cosmic conspiracy of the CIA, Mossad and Saudi Arabia, Assad cares a lot about his image and the way that the world sees him.
The tragic deaths of the past year, and of Marie Colvin and Remi Ochlik, have destroyed Assad's meticulously constructed image of moderation. But if people around the world could do one thing for Syrians, it is to prevent such an image from again masking the true nature of his barbarous regime. We must not allow him the legitimacy and credibility that he, and all other dictators, crave so desperately.
FARES CHAMSEDDINE IS THE PEN-NAME OF A SYRIAN BLOGGER LIVING IN BRITAIN

PPS get stuffed Keith