Dangers in Damascus

For a Syrian, Samir Nashar is close to being a dream democrat. He's liberal, secular, rich--and brazenly outspoken. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has "lost his credibility," Nashar boldly told a NEWSWEEK reporter who visited him recently at his home in Aleppo. Three months ago, Nashar and six friends decided to form a political group called the Alliance of Free Nationalists. Yet even Nashar says that his tiny democracy movement can barely muster support. The group is "still waiting for a legitimate party law," he says, and most Syrians are too scared of the secret police to push for it.

But if Syrian democrats like Nashar were empowered, more radical elements might be too, and that could be a nightmare for Washington. "You might get what you wish for. But not quite what you wish for," said one diplomat in Damascus who requested anonymity because of diplomatic sensitivities. The prospect of regime change in Syria worries even Israel, Syria's longtime enemy. If al-Assad's rigidly secular regime were toppled, the nation's mosaic of competing sects and ethnicities could explode into conflict. Islamist radicals--including a group called Soldiers of the Levant--are already gaining influence in Syria, where they were ... // 71% Remaining