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First Real Threats to Assad Emerge
(American Interest) Walter Russell Mead - The list of outside powers who want Assad out is slowly growing; so too is the intensity of their desire to see him gone. The primary reason isn't the blood in the streets, although that helps. It is the alliance with Iran. The struggle of the Sunni Arab powers with Iran, and the struggle between Turkey and Iran, is growing - and Syria is the flashpoint. Tossing Iran's client out of Damascus is becoming a more important objective for everyone on earth who wants the mullahs curbed: that is a lot of people and their numbers are growing. If these outsiders start to smell blood in the water, their incentives to intervene either overtly or covertly could grow. Fast. Signs that the unorganized, popular unrest is mutating from political action into sectarian violence is going to make a lot of rich and powerful Syrians extremely nervous. The Assad family is accepted because it brings stability; if it is driving the country into anarchy and meltdown, many powerful Syrian interests who have stuck with the Assads this long will begin to think about change.