Ending The Assad Regime

"God willing, this is the beginning of the end of the regime.  Hopefully, Bashar will be next."  Riad al-Asaad, commander Syrian rebel forces

President al-Assad's three top warmongers, war-wagers are dead.  "Shawkat has been a key architect of Syria's domination of Lebanon as well as a fundamental contributor to Syria's long-standing policy to foment terrorism against Israel", according to a report from the U.S.  Referring to one of the dead, Assef Shawkat, Bashar al-Assad's brother-in law.

Assef Shawkat was also implicated with suspicion that he had orchestrated the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik al-Hariri as well as other officials he saw as threats to Syrian influence in Lebanon.  He has long been recognized as a clever, well-read officer, part of Syria's "killing problem".  His influence, at least, is now dissipated.

"Who will replace these people?  They are irreplaceable at this stage; it's hard to find loyal people now that doubt is sowed everywhere.  whoever can get to Assef Shawkat can get to Assad.  Everyone, even those close to the inner circle, will now be under suspicion", remarked Elias Hanna, Lebanese military analyst.

It remains a mystery how the most secure place in the centre of Damascus, the meeting place of the country's power elite, could have been accessed at a time that top government security officials in charge of finally crushing the uprising were holding a crisis meeting to conclude with a strategy that would effectively bring the revolt to a crashing halt.

Never would the high-powered Syrian defence minister, the deputy defence minister and the interior minister have suspected that their lives were endangered and soon to be forfeit as they went about the business of prosecuting the nation's affairs in defending the regime from its own people.  If the regime doubted that the rebels could ever penetrate into the heart of Damascus, this colossal infiltration proves otherwise.

Rebel leaders insist they were planning this very event for two months.  Coming to the conclusion that the time was right to plant the bomb in the very room where top government security officials in charge of putting an end to the revolt were conferring.  "There were two bombs.  One was hidden in a packet of chocolates and one in a big flower pot that was in the middle of the table of the conference room", claimed the Free Syrian Army's logistical co-ordinator.

According to Louay al-Mokdad of the Free Syrian Army, this was an operation led by FSA members collaborating with drivers and bodyguards working for President al-Assad's inner circle.  A claim repeated by other activists.  And no one is now certain where President al-Assad and family have re-located themselves.

The regime has reacted predicably however, swearing it will "wipe out the criminal gangs in their rotten dens", while tanks and helicopter gunships are in full evidence in the caapital's Sunni suburbs being subjected to ferocious bombardments.

"I think this type of event has massive impact.  A few weeks ago, we were counting the life span of this regime in months.  Now after the last week and today, I think you'd have to say weeks.  This is a very fast moving conflict", summed up Paul Salem, director of the Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut.