NEWS ANALYSIS

BEIRUT, Lebanon – On a freshly paved road that runs from Baalbak to Ersal in northern Lebanon stands a towering billboard.
 
On one half of the billboard is Syrian President Bashar Assad, in military uniform. On the other half is a portrait of Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, the powerful Lebanese political and paramilitary organization that has been labeled a terrorist group by Washington.

The conflict in neighboring Syria has put Hezbollah, the staunch regional resistance movement, in a tough spot. Despite praising the Arab Spring democracy movement in many other countries, Hezbollah and its leader Nasrallah are standing by the Assad regime, even as it kills thousands of its own people to preserve power.

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While Hezbollah supports Assad’s regime, the broader Lebanese population is divided and hesitant to take sides. Nonetheless, there is growing concern that this distance will be increasingly difficult to maintain as the conflict spirals on.

In fact, both pro- and anti-Assad groups have traded accusations that the other is receiving material support from inside Lebanon

Rivals or bedfellows?
On the surface, Assad and Nasrallah appear to be opposites.

Assad is the president of a country that is increasingly isolated in the international community and is widely unpopular on the Arab street. His government is embattled and his grip on power challenged.

Nasrallah, on the other hands, is the head of a popular Lebanese resistance movement and a domestic political force. He enjoys widespread support on the Arab street, particularly for his staunch resistance to Israel and Western imperialism in the region.

Nasrallah’s organization is considered the strongest non-state actor in the Middle East. It commands respect for its firepower and discipline. Nasrallah’s leadership of Hezbollah is not in doubt. Ideologically, Nasrallah and his organization draw on their Shiite Muslim religious beliefs as the steadfast backbone of their convictions.

In comparison, Assad's Baath party, which rules Syria, is staunchly secular. 

But when it comes to understanding why the two men share the same billboard, as well as campaign posters at pro-Assad rallies,  there is only one measuring stick, according to a Hezbollah official who spoke on the condition of anonymity: "What is the specific party's proximity to the resistance of Western and Israeli aggressions and occupation in the Middle East?” He added, "Nothing else matters.”

Shared enemy
For years, Syria was a conduit by which Hezbollah was able to acquire support from its main backer Iran (also a close ally of the Syrian regime). Because Syria aided and supported Hezbollah's top priority – perpetuating resistance to Israeli occupation – it was considered an ally despite their differences.

While the organization supports the democratic aspirations of all people in the region, there cannot be a "conflict of priorities.”
Hezbollah’s "only priority is the perpetuation of resistance” to Israel, the official said.

That helps explain why Assad and Nasrallah are pictured on the billboard and other posters around Lebanon conveying a message of solidarity. The two men are allies because they are celebrated as pillars of Arab resistance and enemies of Israel. It is the classic "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" scenario.

In fact, Nasrallah made a rare public appearance in December to address his followers and make clear his support for the Syrian regime.  

"We support the reforms in Syria and we stand with the regime against the resistance movement," Nasrallah said at a rally in Beirut on Dec. 6. He has rarely been seen in public since Hezbollah’s war with Israel in 2006 out of fear of an Israeli assassination attempt.

His appearance was meant to reiterate not only his support for Assad’s regime – but also to diminish any sense that Hezbollah had been weakened by the ongoing conflict in Syria. 

It was also meant to thwart what the Hezbollah official said is seen as a major outgrowth of the "Arab awakenings" – inviting more Western influence and interference, if not dominance, in the region. For the Arab revolutions to succeed, he believes, “Western meddling and interference in the region must be rejected and true Arab sovereignty established.”

To Hezbollah, losing Assad means losing an ally; so by their calculation, it is more important to avoid losing their ally Assad than gain a pro-democratic and Western-oriented Syria.

This has been Hezbollah's position towards the Western-led invasion of Iraq, the Western-backed airstrikes on Libya and it would be the same for any Western action against Iran, the official added.

Not fighting other people's wars
What would Hezbollah do if Iran is attacked by Israel and/or the U.S.? Would it fire back at Israel? Target American or Israeli interests? Remain on the sidelines?

"Constructive ambiguity" is how the Hezbollah official described their approach. "Why would Hezbollah tell its enemies what it will do?"

"We have the right to self-defense.” But he quickly added, “We are a resistance movement that is Lebanese, we don't fight other peoples’ war, we fight to defend ourselves.”

 

 

RAMTHA, Jordan – One year ago, Syrian engineering student Emad Maho's future plans revolved around finishing his university degree and then starting a family.

The Arab Spring changed that. The 23-year-old says he was tortured by Syrian authorities for protesting against President Bashar Assad's regime.

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Maho is among the thousands of Syrians who have fled their homeland. According to the United Nations, at least 8,000 people have died in Syria over the past year due to the government's violent repression of the uprising.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees says more than 5,000 Syrian refugees have registered with them in Jordan. But the Jordan government says the number is much higher and that as many as 80,000 Syrians have crossed into the country since the revolution started.

1,000 refugees flood out of Syria in 24 hours

Speaking from the northern Jordanian town of Ramtha, which borders Syria, Maho told of his arrest, torture and humiliation at the hands of Syrian authorities.

'I always hated the regime'
Maho had never thought about becoming an activist -- but says he had "always yearned for freedom."

“I always hated the regime and wished I could have the minimal freedom other people in the world enjoy,” he said. “When I received an invitation on Facebook to participate in a demonstration in front of the Libyan Embassy in Syria to support the Arab Spring, I was very excited and I remember thinking: ‘When will the Syrian people demand their own freedom?’”

From the front line to front page: Syria's image war

After more than 40 years of oppression, Syrians were not immune to the revolutions sweeping the region. Syria has been ruled with an iron fist by the Assad family since the current president's father, Hafiz Assad, seized power in 1970. Last March, Syrians decided it was their turn to demand their freedom.

“From the start of the revolution till the 9th of July 2011, I participated in more than 150 demonstrations all over Syria,” Maho said. “I made flags, wrote banners and reached a point where I was organizing the demonstrations, capturing footage on my mobile [phone] and sending the videos to Al-Jazeera and Al-Arabiya TV channels,” he said. 

The Assad regime does not sanction protests – so those who have taken part in demonstrations have reportedly suffered the worst forms of torture, including electric shocks. Activists have also had their homes stormed and family members taken hostage. Many of their relatives have been tortured, killed or simply disappeared.

“I became wanted by the Syrian security forces," Maho recalled. "So I left my home and went into hiding for a few months. But my mistake was that I missed my mother terribly.

"I went home to see her; she prepared breakfast for me and then we argued because I was tense. I knew I was going to be arrested that day. I took a quick shower then walked 200 meters to my father’s shop to say hello and get some money.

Country music, Harry Potter: Leaked emails reveal Assad's tastes

“My mother came running into the store to tell me she spotted six 'shabeeha' – armed men in civilian clothing who assault protesters – walking towards the store.”   

Maho said he immediately realized he would be arrested, but that his main fear was for his father.

'My mother was crying'
“I tried to attack them so that they will only arrest me and forget about my father. I threw my phone away because it had all the videos I shot in recent demonstrations. I managed to hit two of them, but I was outnumbered and was arrested. My father was arrested, too. My mother was crying behind,” Maho said.

Maho said he spent 20 days imprisoned at the General Headquarters of the Military Intelligence in Damascus’ Kafer Soussa neighborhood. He said he was physically tormented for at least six days – beaten, tortured with electric cables and deprived of sleep. He said he still has nightmares.

“I was forced to stand naked on a wall with my hands tied to the ceiling for seven hours. Every 30 minutes they would spill cold water on me and electrocute me. On the third day of my arrest, they realized I wasn’t saying anything, so they blindfolded me, put a stick in my mouth and escorted me to a room. I heard a man screaming. As soon as they took the blindfold off my eyes I saw the man was my father. He was yelling and I started crying. He was on the floor and three men were beating him. That was the worst moment,” he said.

Syria laying landmines on route used by fleeing civilians, group says

Finally, after days of torture Maho confessed what his captors wanted him to confess: That he was a spy for Al-Jazeera since he was filming the demonstrations and sending them to the TV network, as well as the fact that he was an activist and protest organizer. After his confession, he says they continued to torture him, but finally released him.

But even upon his release, Maho says he returned to the demonstrations.  He said his father was arrested for a second time, along with some cousins, in order to pressure him to turn himself to the Syrian authorities.

Report: Emails indicate Assad got advice from Iran

“I knew that if I stayed in Syria, they would never leave my family in peace.  And I believed I could be of more help to my people alive, rather than dead. I went to Daraa [near the Jordanian border] and was smuggled into Ramtha, Jordan.”

For now, Maho says he does not want to return home. He wants to help Syrian families in Jordan.

But he said he would like to see Assad leave the country. “We will not judge him, history will.”  

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TRIPOLI, Lebanon – They are just 55 miles away, but for Syrian refugees now in Tripoli, Lebanon, couldn't be more different.

We spent a cold and rainy day in Lebanon's north, crisscrossing from hospitals, to apartments to slums, meeting with Syrians fleeing their country and seeking refuge in Lebanon.

A 27-year-old patient, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said he was shot in the leg by a sniper’s bullet. The wound was so severe, he couldn't get the proper treatment inside Baba Amr. Afraid to go to any hospitals inside Syria for fear of being turned over to government forces, he and his brother decided to make the trek to Lebanon. For four days they moved by car from house to house under cover of darkness and the constant barrage of war all around them.

When they crossed the border they were taken by activists to a hospital in Tripoli, Lebanon’s second largest city, but it was too late. The leg was severely infected and doctors had to amputate it at the knee.

For a country that over the years has seen its own share of violence, forcing many of its own citizens to take refuge in Syria, it's new for Lebanese to see Syrian refugees in their country. So much so that international aid workers and activists say Lebanon has been slow to acknowledge and deal with the flow of Syrians across the border into their country.

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Part of problem, Syrian activists say, is the attempt by the Lebanese government to remain on the sidelines of the conflict – without conceding that its side effects are beginning to seep in.   

More than 7,000 Syrians refugees have fled into Lebanon and registered with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.  The majority of them have crossed into the north of Lebanon, activists tell us.

Dangerous trek
Over the past few days, dozens of injured residents of the besieged cities of Baba Amr and Homs have made the dangerous trek across the border. None of those we interviewed agreed to show their faces on camera. All were reluctant to give us their real names fearing their family members still living inside Syria would be hunted down.

Another refugee who called himself Abu Fares saw the war in Syria spreading five months ago and decided to flee the country with his family. Back then, Syrian officials didn't object to single families exiting all together. Now, activists say, Syrian border guards will turn back families that appear to be "fleeing" the country. More families have taken the route of entering the country illegally, making it difficult to keep an accurate number of who has entered Lebanon.

So far, no large refugee camps have been set up inside Lebanon for displaced Syrians –  unlike in neighboring Jordan, which has also taken in thousands of refugees.

Instead, what has emerged is an acute housing crisis for the families currently in Lebanon. The majority of families have taken refuge in apartments in rundown buildings, often at exuberant prices.

Abu Fares and his family of nine are living in a small shack in an illegal seaside slum in Tripoli. Without any heat or regular electricity, they have struggled to survive, relying instead on handouts for clothes, blankets and medicine. His heart and back conditions have made it impossible for him to work in the low-paying, labor intensive jobs most Syrians can vie for.
                                                                                                                            
Puddles of water filled the narrow walkways in between the shacks, and makeshift wiring and electric cables crisscrossed the alleys to the small, cramped and humid huts. Despite the hardship, Abu Fares said he has no regrets that he fled Syria and said he has no plans to return until the Assad regime steps down from power.

Not really a welcome mat
For Syrian activists, Lebanon has proven to be a dangerous country to operate. Lebanon’s weak central government has failed to fully embrace other Arab countries and international calls for Assad to step down. Lebanon for now has opted to remain impartial in the conflict, tacitly allowing refugees to come into the country, but not allowing the opposition to openly equip the Free Syrian Army.

Instead, Syrian opposition activists say they are routinely harassed by Lebanese security forces and military intelligence.

More importantly, Syria's strongest Lebanese ally, Hezbollah, has acted as a counter-balance to any major and visible opposition taking root publicly in Lebanon. Hezbollah commands a strong street presence in Lebanon and can easily mobilize large crowds in support of the embattled Syrian president. 

Instead, Syrian opposition activists feel more comfortable that their leadership remains in Turkey and abroad. They say Lebanon's past relations with Syria make it easy for Syrian intelligence and pro-Assad operatives to target them. Still, activists are discreetly using Lebanon as a base from which to supply and arm their comrades inside the country.

Even if the government in Lebanon has been reluctant to take sides in the conflict, it may not be long before the conflict forces Lebanon into a more direct course of action. 

The intense fighting in Syria between President Bashar Assad's forces and opposition rebels seems to be getting worse by the day. On Wednesday, a French photojournalist and a prominent American war correspondent working for a British newspaper were killed as Syrian forces intensely shelled the opposition stronghold of Homs. 

Weeks of withering attacks on the city of Homs have failed to drive out opposition factions that include rebel soldiers who fled Assad's forces. Hundreds have died in the siege - galvanizing international pressure on Assad, who appears intent on widening his military crackdowns despite the risk of pushing Syria into full-scale civil war.

NBC News' Chief Foreign Correspondent Richard Engel is on assignment along the Turkey-Syria border. He answered reader questions about the ongoing conflict in Syria earlier today.

Click on the box below to replay the chat.

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CAIRO -- With fighting now encroaching the suburbs of the Syrian capital, the conflict is entering into a new dimension for the first time in nearly 10 months.

The Syrian military has regained control of the Damascus suburbs after rebel fighters over the weekend made strong advances around the capital, threatening the grip of President Bashar al Assad. The Syrian News Agency say security forces attacked "terrorist hideouts" in the Damascus countryside -- a loosely veiled acknowledgment that the fighting is now on the doorsteps of the capital.

But the attention on the capital and its outlying areas is a sign that rebel fighters who are part of the loosely knit Free Syrian Army have grown more brazen in their attacks as they go on the offensive against government troops. The fighting near the capital comes as a spike in violence has left several hundreds of people dead over the past five days. Both the government and opposition activists continue to blame each other for the violence that only seems to be escalating.

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Syrian opposition fighters say the spike in violence is a sign that Assad's regime is desperate and launching whatever counter offensive it can to crush a stubborn uprising against his rule. Syrian analysts say with the international community convening at the U.N. to discuss the Syria crisis, the regime sees a window of opportunity in which it can resort to violence before pressure and possibly action is ratcheted up against Damascus rendering it impossible to continue on the same path.

An Arab League monitoring mission tasked with making sure Syria complies with an Arab peace plan to end the violence has been suspended. Syrian opposition says this has given Assad the greenlight to crack down in the blackout of media and monitors.

Read more: Gunfire 'everywhere': Street battles rage in Damascus suburbs

Some Syrians say the Free Syrian Army has grown in strength as more supporters and defectors join its ranks buoyed by its will to fight on despite being overpowered and outnumbered. As their numbers grow, the Syrian military is increasingly fatigued and weary, according to opposition members. Time is the regime's enemy, they say.

But Syria's fault lines are now spilling over into the international arena. U.N. Security Council members are convening in New York on Tuesday to discuss endorsing an Arab League plan that calls on Assad to hand over power immediately. The biggest objection so far has come from Russia which sees such attempts as interference in Syrian domestic affairs.

Russia instead has gone on its own diplomatic offensive, offering to host negotiations between the Assad government and all of the opposition forces. But a member of the Syrian opposition tells me Russia's efforts are only so that it does not appear as an obstacle to the will of the international community without offering an alternative. The Syrian opposition will not enter into any dialogue with Assad's government without preconditions. At the top of its list of demands? The President must agree to step down from power immediately.

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Editor's note: Cairo-based NBC News correspondent Ayman Mohyeldin is reporting from inside Syria this week. Follow his updates on Twitter @Aymanm

Inside Syria, Day4

DAMASCUS, Syria -- It's part concert, part celebration, but ALL for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

That's what it was like attending a pro-government rally Friday in Damascus.

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Here, there is no mistaking whom this crowd supports. His picture is everywhere, even draped on the side of a multistory building that belongs to the Central Bank.

There are some glaring observations that any one who comes to these rallies notices. First, they are extremely safe. Police block streets, volunteers usher people to the opens spaces, there is a nice stage and sound system set up. Flags and the president’s pictures are plentiful. The rallies are carried on State TV.

This is in stark contrast to the demonstrations against the president's rule. Those protests are often in tight side streets away from the eyes of security forces that have used force to disperse them. No high-quality cameras beaming the images on TV, the vast majority of anti-government protests are captured on amateur footage and shared via social media websites.

There was something rather disturbing I noticed during Friday's pro-government rally. Even my Syrian friends who were with me thought it was extremely distasteful and alarming.

People were openly professing their support for the "SHABIHA" - armed thugs that critics and activists say are used by the Assad regime, along with the military, to put down the nationwide uprising violently.

Related story: US considers shutting embassy in Syria

It's very difficult to gauge the support the president has across the country, but there is no doubt that here in the capital, there are still those who will come out to show their support for the leader. But what is even harder to tell is whether the president and his government enjoy support for their performance or fear out of the alternative that would emerge in a post-Assad era should he leave power.

Many people feel as the conflict drags on and becomes increasingly militarized, the wounds of a full-blown war between the government and armed insurgents would destroy Syria and that fear has paralyzed some into supporting the president -- for the time being.

But I haven't seen too many pro-Assad rallies in the rest of the country and certainly not as big or as frequent as the ones held in Damascus.

Earlier in the day, we had requested permission to go to a square in another part of the city where anti-government protests are held. Surprisingly, the ministry of information granted us the permits relatively easily. Keep in mind we have been waiting for 4 days to get permission to film long lines at petrol stations.

See all of Ayman Mohyeldin's Inside Syria reports

When we arrived there was no rally … just plain-clothes security and pro-Assad supporters who coincidently showed up when our camera appeared.

Foreign journalists visiting Syria have been banned from traveling to areas where anti-government sentiment runs high. The government says it's for our own safety. Critics say it's to control the message. So because we can't get to them, activists are sending amateur footage out to the world showing what they say are atrocities the government is committing against civilians.

A reminder that in Syria's uprising, there now is a battle raging for the hearts and minds of viewers as well.

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Editor's note: Cairo-based NBC News correspondent Ayman Mohyeldin is reporting from Syria this week. Follow his updates on Twitter @Aymanm

Update at 5:20 p.m. ET Wednesday: Arab League monitor in Idleb described monitoring mission there as terrifying, repeatedly coming under attack and receiving threats.

Update at 8:18 a.m. ET Wednesday: Police in #damascus have let us go after about an hour and deleting our video of long petrol lines #syria

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 Update at 8 a.m. ET Wednesday: Ayman Mohyeldin says in a message on Twitter that he was "Taken to police station in #damascus. Despite having permits we were forced to delete video of people waiting in line."

Published at 8 p.m. ET Tuesday: Inside Syria, Day 1

DAMASCUS -- To say that Damascus suffers from a cult of personality is an understatement. Arriving in Damascus airport, there is no mistaking who runs Syria: "Doctor Bashar al-Assad."

In the short walk from the airplane to the car, I counted more than 200 posters plastered on the walls, columns, doors and pretty much everywhere my eye turned. All I could see were pictures carrying the image of Assad. From planting olive trees to donning full military dress, Assad is everywhere. Even customs officials processing our paperwork were humming pro-Assad songs.

A few hours later, at a dinner with old and new friends in a Damascus restaurant, I am told it's not just the president's image that is ubiquitous, it’s the entire security apparatus that's keeping a watchful eye on what is happening in Damascus. "Be careful what you say and when you say it," a friend tells me. "Never speak freely with a taxi driver or start a random conversation about what is going on," I am advised.

But despite the warning, there is a certain ease by which the current crisis comes to the surface of any discussion. Criticism of the government is rampant at one restaurant where conversations flow from table to table. An occasional silence interrupts the chats as diners peek over the shoulders to ensure no one is paying attention too closely. "It's OK, don’t worry, the regime has bigger problems right now than to worry what is being said on every table. We know everyone here," my friend says, nudging me to keep on eating.

Over the course of the next several hours, I hear about "Syria's uprising" from those living it daily, including its pitfalls, its weaknesses, its strengths. Lessons learned and gains made. In the background, a TV plays Arab music songs, and then a red ticker on the screen flashes a breaking news bulletin. In unison, heads across the restaurant turn: An explosion has been reported in the Damascus neighborhood of Nahr El Aisha. People turn back to their meals.

Damascus is a city on edge. There is an uneasy nervousness in the city. Yes, shops are open, and restaurants and cafés bustle with patrons. But that’s up to a certain time, and for those who know Damascus, it’s a few hours less than normal, and a few hours less than what it was just a few months ago. There is an unofficial curfew, imposed by residents who are weary of a different city after dark. There are parts of the city where the risks of travel are too dangerous at night. As we drive around one roundabout in the city, we veer on to a side street. "This side of the circle is safe. If you drive a kilometer in the other side, there are tensions between the residents and the security," my friend tells me.

The government says "armed gangs" have inched closer to the capital, frequently attacking security checkpoints at night. Several attacks have already happened in the heart of the capital. And even government employees concede certain routes in and out of the city have become too dangerous to traverse. Anti-government activists say momentum is on their side as pressure mounts on the government, with political and military defections increasing. When night falls, security forces crack down on neighborhoods close to the capital where anti-government sentiment runs high.

Along one of the capital's main streets, one side of the street is well lit. The other is dark. Local residents tell me power outages are becoming more frequent across the city. There are rolling blackouts and increasing shortages of fuel and gas. Factories are shutting down, exports are halting. The value of the Syrian currency is plummeting and inflation is skyrocketing as a result of international and Arab sanctions that are aimed at punishing Assad's government. But the sanctions are clearly taking a toll on the daily lives of Syrians.

But their daily lives go on, it seems for now, as routine as they can be in the middle of a 10-month uprising against the rule of the man seen everywhere in Damascus.

ANALYSIS

CAIRO – It was a speech that was long in form, but short on new substance.

For the first time since June, Syria's President Bashar al-Assad spoke publicly, addressing a crowd at Damascus University in a nearly two-hour speech that was carried live on state television and around the Arab world. 

But if Assad is under increasing international pressure and isolation, he certainly did not show it.

In fact, he was defiant as ever, seemingly casual at times but confident with his government’s course of action. At one point, he dismissed calls to step down, saying that while he never sought power, he would also not shy away from his responsibilities as the country's ruler.

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The speech followed the same talking points the Syrian regime has been consistently delivering: There will be no let-up in the crackdown on what Syria describes as terrorists who are undermining the state and its sovereignty. Foreign hands are at work to divide Syria and sow sedition in an attempt to conquer the broader region.

But perhaps the strongest words from the president’s speech were targeted at the Arab League, the pan-Arab regional body, which has condemned Syria and sanctioned it for its violet crackdown on protesters that the U.N. estimates has killed 5,000 people since March 2011.

He even said the Arab League should be called the “Foreign League.” With that comment he seemed to be playing to his audience, if there is one thing that irks people across the Arab world uniformly it’s the notion of foreign powers intervening in their domestic affairs.

Tough spot for Arab League
Analysts say the Arab League is in a difficult position. Its 165-person observer mission in Syria is tasked with making sure Damascus complies with an agreement aimed at ending the violence. The mission has drawn criticism for its work and its composition – including the fact that a Sudanese general who has been accused of war crimes himself is in charge of the mission.

The observer mission is expected to submit its full report on Jan. 19 in Cairo. Russia says the mission is helping stabilize the country, but according to activists inside and outside Syria, the death toll continues to rise, leading many in the opposition to worry the mission could simply serve as a political cover for the continued crackdown. 

Syrian opposition groups say the Syrian government is limiting the mobility and ability of the mission to freely see the facts on the ground. A group of Arab League observers were reportedly attacked by “unknown protesters” in the northern city of Latakia on Monday.

Opposition groups say they want the Arab League to refer the Syria crisis to the United Nations Security Council. But doing so may prove to be a double edge sword for the Arab body which does not want to appear as having given the green light for foreign action in yet another Arab country.

The fear among some within the Arab League, according to sources I have spoken to, is that such a move would pave the way for international intervention in Syria that could ultimately take the shape of military action. However, Western powers have expressed their unwillingness for any foreign military action in Syria like that in Libya.

The Arab League was criticized when it referred Libya to the United Nations. That move ultimately led to NATO military intervention that helped topple the Gadhafi regime.

The current Arab League Secretary General Nabil Elaraby previously told me the Libya decision was a mistake (he was not the Secretary General at the time of that vote) and he did not want it repeated under his leadership.

The Syrian opposition has concluded that the Arab League is divided and weak to take any further actions to stop the bloodshed. But they are divided as well.

The opposition movements both inside and outside of Syria have been criticized for their inability to build a cohesive decision-making opposition body that could allay the fears of regional countries and also meet  the immediate demands of the Syrian people in a possible post-Assad Syria.

‘A challenge of biblical proportions’
The larger international community isn’t stepping up to fill the leadership void, either. The international community is reluctant to get involved in Syria as it did in Libya. The regional fallout could be greater following any intervention in Syria than it was for Libya.

Security experts say Syria's military capabilities are far greater than Libya's and that poses a whole host of challenges. 

“There are questions as to whether the process could be repeated, for example, in Syria,” said Jeremy Binnie, a senior analyst at IHS Jane’s, the defense and security intelligence provider. “Russia and China have expressed concerns that the U.N. resolution to protect Libyan civilians was loosely interpreted, the allies were up against inferior air defenses and the potential geo-strategic ramifications of the intervention were comparatively limited.”

Binnie explained how the situation in Syria differs from Libya. “The Syrian regime would be a significantly harder to topple and the fallout potentially far more serious, especially given the country’s arsenal of chemical weapons. Libya’s air defenses were a push over by comparison. Syria would be a challenge of biblical proportions compared with Libya.”

Hanging in the balance
For now, Assad says his government will press ahead with reforms while pushing for wider political participation from opposition groups. The president boldly promised that a new constitution would be put up for referendum later this spring and new elections would be held shortly after, a timetable that analysts say is unlikely to produce genuine reform.

Opposition groups have dismissed these as half-hearted measures and duplicitous. But with a divided opposition, timid Arab neighbors and an international community that lacks consensus on what to do, Assad has found a balance in which he continues to remain in power.

 

 

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Activists inside Syria are being forced to leave the country as violence intensifies in the ninth month of anti-government protests.

Rima Flihan is an activist who left behind two children and her career after she received death threats following her release from a Syrian police station.

Flihan said she was near al-Hassan mosque in the al-Midan neighborhood of Damascus when she and nine other young female activists were detained in mid-July for protesting without permits.

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“We laughed, we cried, and shared our fears and hopes together,” Flihan told NBC News in an email about her time in detention.
 
She said she remembered meeting one of the other detained women months earlier at a demonstration on Syria’s Independence Day, April 17. They were reunited when they were arrested and detained for four days in July.
 
Flihan said she met up with other activists on the day of her release and encouraged them to continue the fight. Part of her talk was recorded on this YouTube clip she shared with NBC News. She is the woman speaking with the white shirt and microphone.

The U.N.’s top human rights official said last week that her office estimates that more than 4,000 people have been killed since the uprising began in March.

Flihan fled the country in September for Jordan after she said she was threatened by government security forces and left her children in the care of her family still there.
 
Even though Flihan is no longer in the country, she said she remains in touch with many of the activists she demonstrated with through social media daily, and encourages her friends she met at demonstrations inside the country to continue protesting.

Flihan said she hopes to return when she feels her life is no longer under threat.
 
“I dream to go on a trip with my activist friends to all of the troubled spots in Syria and light a candle and celebrate freedom, and build our country in a different way,” Flihan said in an email.
 
A familiar name to the theater community in Damascus, Flihan worked as a theater writer and wrote two Syrian dramas.

Two years ago, she created a popular Syrian television drama called “Qoloob Saghirah” or “Small Hearts” that uncovered what she called were injustices in the region to spark discussions and debate surrounding issues of organ trafficking, homelessness, and women’s rights.
 
It’s rare that we hear of the stories of Syrian female activists. Flihan, whose father was an army officer who was imprisoned for his political views against the civilian killings in the Syrian town of Hama in 1982, said she wanted to share her story with NBC News to highlight the women of the revolution.

You can follow Rima Abdelkader on Twitter at: twitter.com/rimakader