Syria could be paying a price for more moderate policies.

Syria is a secular state and just as with Saddam's Iraq is hated with a vengeance by Al Qaeda types. This tends to be forgotten in the western press. Terrorists are often lumped all in one in western reports but they are quite different. Hamas for example is Sunni and Hezzbolah Shia. The two often do not see eye to eye at all. As this article suggests it may be because of recent overtures to Israel that Syria is being attacked at this time. However Syria has often helped out the west particular with regard to interrogation and torture of suspected Al Qaeda operatives. It doesn't seem to have gained much in return. Syria has long been a foe of Al Qaeda.





Syria could be paying a price for moderating
Syria bomb may be sign it is paying a price for moderating as it tries to end isolation
BASSEM MROUEAP News
Sep 28, 2008 16:50 EST
A rare bombing in Damascus over the weekend could be sign that Syria is paying a price for moderating its hard-line policies as it tries to boost its international standing.


No one has claimed responsibility for Saturday's car bombing outside a state security complex which killed 17 people and wounded 14. The Syrians have not directly accused anyone but state-run newspapers suggested foreign involvement — a veiled reference to northern Lebanon which has become a hotbed for extremist Sunni Muslims.
The Sunni militants, sometimes called Salafists, have been blamed for a string of smaller bombings and attacks against the Syrian government and diplomatic missions in recent years. The main group accused is an offshoot of al-Qaida.
The Sunni extremists are angry over the tightening of security along Syria's border with Iraq, which cuts off their routes to the fight against U.S. forces in Iraq. They also oppose the government's alliance with Shiite Iran and the strict secular nature of the state.
"Once you have Salafists and Jihadis in your country and when you stop their flow to Iraq and their transit in and out from Lebanon, it is not surprising that such bombings" occur, said Andrew Tabler, a Syria analyst and consulting editor at the English-language Syria Today magazine.
Syria has long been viewed by the U.S. as a destabilizing force in the Mideast. An ally of Iran and Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon, it has also provided a home for some radical Palestinian groups.
But the country is now trying to emerge from years of international isolation, opening up to Europe and engaging in indirect negotiations with archenemy Israel, even while still professing steadfast support for Lebanese and Palestinian militants.
In recent months, Syria has agreed to establish diplomatic ties with Lebanon for the first time since both countries became independent and has tightened its border with Iraq to control the movement of people and goods. A goal of European rapprochement is to drive Damascus away from its regional ally Iran.
The weekend car bombing could also be a sign of the weakening grip President Bashar Assad's regime on security and of an emerging power struggle between the regime's security agencies, analysts said.
Writing Sunday in the independent conservative Beirut daily al-Anwar, Editor-in-Chief Rafik Khoury linked the bombing to "the dangerous scenarios pertaining to the 'crossroads' of changes in the region."
An Israeli Cabinet minister said the bombing may be linked to Syria's indirect negotiations with Israel.
"There are elements who want to derail this process, mostly Tehran which feels that Syria might be moving toward a peace coalition in the region," said Isaac Herzog.
Assad's secular regime has been battling Sunni Muslim extremists for years. In September 2006, Islamic militants tried to storm the U.S. Embassy in Damascus and three months earlier, a battle near the Defense Ministry left four militants and a police officer dead.
Officials blamed these attacks on Jund al-Sham, which means Soldiers of Syria, an al-Qaida offshoot that was established in Afghanistan. Militants often denounce Assad's regime and have at times called for its overthrow, especially since Syria began cracking down on those crossing the border to reach Iraq.
Despite hosting radical anti-Israeli Palestinian groups, Syria insists it has an interest in fighting Islamic extremist groups such as al-Qaida and in the 1980s, it cracked down heavily on the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood.
Syria is also on poor terms with regional heavyweight Saudi Arabia, which in the past has supported conservative Sunni groups in the region and takes a dim view of Syria's alliance with Iran.
Another motive for the bombing could be the rising Sunni-Shiite tensions in the region. The bomb was placed at a highway intersection a few miles from a Shiite shrine frequented by pilgrims from Lebanon, Iraq and Iran.
The bombing, last month's assassination of a top intelligence general in mysterious circumstances and the February bombing in Damascus that killed Imad Mughniyeh, a top Hezbollah commander and one of America's most wanted terrorists, feeds suspicions carried by opposition media that it could all be part of an internal power struggle between the regime's security agencies.