“This is the real deal,” said Shakeeb al-Jabri, an activist in Beirut who refrained from supporting previous iterations of an opposition council because they were not sufficiently representative of the youthful revolutionaries inside Syria. “I'm optimistic because finally we have a comprehensive council that we can say legitimately represents the revolution. This will reinvigorate the protesters and give us a voice with the international community.”
Rift emerges on way forward
Whether the council will succeed in finding a unified voice is in question, however. There is no consensus on the increasingly contentious questions of whether the protest movement should acquire arms or whether it should call for foreign military intervention along the lines of the NATO mission that helped topple the Libyan regime.
The statement read by Ghalioun called for the continuation of “peaceful” resistance to Assad and rejected foreign intervention, though he urged the United Nations to do more to protect Syrian civilians.
But a sharp divide is emerging between protesters inside Syria, who are increasingly calling for NATO intervention as the government presses ahead with its military offensive against them, and those living abroad, who still hope that nonviolent resistance will eventually succeed in toppling the regime.
“The situation is deteriorating rapidly on the ground. It’s a war, and the people inside are calling for all the help they can get,” said Radwan Ziadeh, a Washington-based dissident who is on the council. He said he thinks a majority of Syrian dissidents now support military intervention, but he foresees bitter wrangling within the council.
“Some are lobbying for it, and some are against it, but those against it are very few,” he said. “This will be the most difficult decision for the council to take,” he said.
‘We really feel we are alone’
The announcement of the council came a day after the Syrian government declared it had crushed resistance in yet another town, Rastan, which had become a center for defecting soldiers seeking to organize an armed rebellion against the government in the name of the Free Syrian Army. Rami Abdelrahman of the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said 17 people were killed in the five-day offensive.
In Homs, a central city near Rastan where violent confrontations have been escalating, activists said they welcomed the formation of the council, but on the condition that it presses for greater international intervention.
“The Syrian National Council is a very good step, but we need more movement from the international community,” said an activist contacted by Skype who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he fears for his safety. “We really feel we are alone. We feel no one is helping us. And after all the bloodshed we have seen, we want any kind of help.”
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