“A regime that refuses change, and a revolution that doesn’t die”

• By the head of the Syrian Future Movement
  Dr. Zaher Baadarani

Introduction:
As soon as the Syrian regime’s party and its various trumpets, politicians, and analysts raised their victory banners with the return of their stalwart “Bashar Al-Assad” to the embrace of the Arab League, declaring the conspiracy defeated in front of the regime’s rock-solid resilience! Shouts from the street – which was long classified as being in the regime’s favor – emerged, ending the facade of the regime’s celebratory event. The curtains fell on the last chapter of its 12-act play, signaling the start of a new, tumultuous season. Its heroes are the nation’s people, from the mountains to the plains and the coast, those who suffered the flames of corruption and the hardships of poverty. For them, silence is no longer an option, as life and death have become equal in the era of the younger Assad.

Today, the epicenter of the Syrian revolution in the south, “Daraa Plain”, echoes the cries of its children who wrote on their school walls 12 springs ago: “Leave!” And in the mountains and the wise elders of “our Sweida”, attentive ears listen, triggering the voices of the Alawites in “the coast”, roaring, threatening, and warning!
Yes, we can now boldly declare that all of Syria is in revolt. Sunni and Arab, Druze and Alawite, Kurd and Turkmen and Circassian, Christians and Jews, all united towards a common goal, seeking salvation from the corrupt regime! Perhaps the intense pressure on the citizens has raised the collective consciousness across Syrian land. The people have clearly identified their adversary and aimed accurately, choosing their arrow from the birthplace of the younger Assad and the homeland of the elder, hitting its target dead on.
True, Syria now complains of its corrupt, both “the regime and the opposition”! But we are confident that liberation from Assad and his regime, which has been oppressing the hearts of Syrians for decades, will pave the way to free ourselves from the superficial opposition (the Dracula of the revolution) – those who we now consider an extension of the regime’s corruption! Fate seems to be moving towards comprehensive change, as the forces from the north and south come together to eradicate the corrupt from both sides.

The likelihood of success of the movement in the regime’s territories:
We are not dreamers. Our optimism level is calibrated to the people’s measure. However, we are confident that the deteriorating regime no longer has the immunity to combat those its media once labeled as “germs”. Nothing illustrates this more than its poor vision and insight when it believed, as recently shown on “Sky News”, that its opposition (those who took to the streets in the hundreds of thousands at the start of the revolution) did not exceed 100,000!
A revolution that rose against Assad’s rule in 2011, when he had full control of the nation’s resources within an almost respected sovereignty, managed to deceive and dress it in various cloaks tailored in the regime’s chambers to ensure its distortion. It will not protect him from the 2023 revolution, especially when he does not even control the “Muhajireen” palace. Even his army and his intelligence, even if it slept late at night in his bed, has now openly engaged in pleasure or prostitution all day long here and there with the international intelligence agencies present in Syria.”
Perhaps the decision for Assad to step down is no longer within his control. Yet, the hall of the People’s Assembly that approved the constitutional amendment in 2000 to make him the president of the “Syrian Arab Republic” is the same place and its members expected today to take this patriotic step. We do not say this out of imagination, but it’s a reality signaled by the angered streets.

“What do we demand today from Syrians in areas under regime control?
In reality, we don’t demand anything, and no one among us (those living abroad) can ask them for anything! However, we know with certainty that the Syrian people (inside) whether in 2011 or in 2023, didn’t move at the request of anyone (even if the regime propagated and advertised otherwise). It was rather a mass explosion that no one could control, limit, or govern its aftershocks. It became a revolution that witnessed highs and lows and still persists until it achieves what’s hoped from it.
Yet, in the Syrian Future Movement, we call upon the wise inside to reassess the situation with a precise “Syrian microscope”, learning from the mistakes and pitfalls of the 2011 revolution to avoid falling into the endless traps of the regime. This ensures the continuity of the movement of the street that is burdened by the corruption and injustice of the Syrian regime, which have deeply entrenched themselves in the Syrian fabric. They have left no sensible or discerning individual without openly declaring their honorable national positions, without any equivocation.”
In the Syrian Future Movement, we refuse some’s attempts to label the revolution in ways that undermine its essence and true nature. It’s not a revolution of the hungry, as some want to market it, nor a revolution of those burning with international economic sanctions, nor a second uprising, or a temporary burst, or whatever! It’s a “people’s revolution” that has persisted with its demands since 2011 only. A people living inside a cage or prison called (homeland), who, unlike millions of its sons and daughters, didn’t find reasons to leave, chose to live in it with bitter silence rather than cutting ties with it. A people that reached a crossroads and chose the homeland over the regime and chose the people over the rule of a single individual.”

What do we demand today from Syrians outside the regime’s control areas?
The Syrian Future Movement calls on our Syrian people in the liberated areas to reignite the spark of the initial revolution by activating the popular reservoir, through enlightening speeches, directed and guiding national festivals, that unite everyone on the revolution’s goals, re-aligning their vision, and overcoming peripheral disagreements for the sake of the just and rightful Syrian cause.
Additionally, the Syrian Future Movement calls for reconsidering the establishment of an internal national revolutionary popular front, whose backbone consists of the parties, currents, and national forces truly present within the country. From this front, a unified statement should be issued, supporting through it all individual and collective popular efforts (in the regime-controlled areas) that aim at reunifying the nation once more, preserving the rights of citizens based on citizenship, far from the sectarian, doctrinal, and tribal classifications that we drowned in and which drowned our homeland. Meanwhile, these classifications were the regime’s lifesaver amidst the raging wave of the revolution.”

What do we demand from Syrians outside Syria?
The Syrian Future Movement calls on our fellow Syrians (the sons and daughters of the homeland) abroad to continue supporting their families and relatives inside the afflicted country (both in regime-controlled areas and beyond) with whatever effort and extra resources they can offer. This is a moral, social, humanitarian, and religious duty. Additionally, kind words and psychological support play a significant role in stabilizing their conditions, reinvigorating their spirits, and crystallizing their thoughts, ensuring their effective participation with an advanced state of awareness and maturity that we have collectively reached after experiencing 12 springs and autumns. No Syrian household, whether inside or outside the country, has been spared from the factors of attrition and exposure, which unified the resetting of the clock towards starting a new phase where the opposition stands on equal grounds with loyalists, prioritizing the supreme Syrian interest over any other secondary populist considerations.”