Word: hafez
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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...
...advantage. 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...
...father certainly bequeathed Bashar more than enough enemies to keep him awake nights. For one, there's his uncle Rifaat, exiled since leading a failed coup attempt against his father in 1983 - and against whose supporters Hafez and Bashar, of late, have conducted a campaign of violent harassment. Rifaat made clear Monday that, having held the title of deputy president before his ouster, he, and not Bashar, should succeed Hafez Assad. Syria's security forces have pledged to arrest the outcast uncle should he attempt to come home, but that hasn't stopped him from stirring up trouble...
...policy issues for at least two years, and he may actually have to play the anti-Israel card - which still mobilizes the Arab masses behind a leader - to stabilize his rule. That worked for his father, and even though he was the strongest leader Syria ever had, not even Hafez Assad was able to conclude a peace deal with Israel...