Word: assad
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...music. Whenever dictators pass away, it seems, state-controlled TV takes to the airwaves not with news reports but with music--as if a mellifluous melody could somehow soothe the anxieties of a leaderless populace, a commanderless army and a watching world. And so it was when Hafez Assad died last week. Syrian state media trumpeted classical music and koranic verses--a TV prayer vigil for the 69-year-old dictator. The cameras captured weeping members of the Syrian parliament mourning the onetime air force pilot who had taken a poor nation of 17 million and made it, well, still...
...three decades, Hafez Assad ruled Syria--and confounded the world. Six American Presidents found him frustrating, remote. The Egyptian pyramids lay to the southwest, but it was Assad who was dubbed the Sphinx. Assad remained a riddle. Austere, he neither smoked nor drank. He would summon aides at all hours to discuss an issue, then closet himself for days before abruptly announcing a decision. He never came to America; from Nixon to Clinton, they either traveled the road to Damascus or met him in neutral Geneva. They worried about elections and deadlines; a dictator, he never worried about the clock...
...months ago there were hopes--in both Washington and Jerusalem--that the end of the Clinton Administration would provide an incentive for a two-track peace deal, one that included the Palestinians and Syrians. This week Israeli and Palestinian leaders jet to Washington to resuscitate their settlement negotiations. But Assad's death seems likely to kill hopes for a fast Syrian-Israeli pact. President Clinton praised Assad for his "commitment to the path of peace." But that was an oversimplification. Assad was committed to peace--but only on his inflexible terms. He was intent on doing...
...Israeli government expressed its sorrow, but behind the scenes a more sober view reigned. Assad was, in some ways, a good foe to have: smart, reliable in his intransigence. Though in 1973 he sent hundreds of tanks swarming toward Israel on the Jewish Day of Atonement in a concerted effort with Egypt to regain Arab territory, once he'd lost the war, he kept to the truce with utmost scrupulousness...
...Although the current foreign minister, Igor Ivanov, is a firm, erudite and self-assured Primakov prot?g?, he doesn't have his tutor's strategic vision and skill, his experience or his Rolodex. Primakov's presence, both on Putin's European tour and at the funeral of Syrian president Hafez Assad, suggests the president is eager to make use of his erstwhile rival's expertise in order to engage the U.S. in a diplomatic battle for influence in theaters as diverse as Europe, the Middle East and East Asia...