George Banna, Mufid Bitar: 

            Compensating for the lack of electoral legitimacy  an ideological flood is a well-known and possible matter, and the cunning Hafez al-Assad knew that, so as they say, he “handed over” the Golan Heights to Israel and rejected all tempting offers to recover them (talks under Turkish auspices, Assad rejected the Israeli offer to return the Golan Heights for six square meters on Lake Tiberias), How will Assad manage his affairs if the Golan Heights are returned and what will he trade? Is Palestine enough for trade? Or is it better to trade in Palestine and the Golan Heights together!! Of course, it is easy to hide the face of the tyrannical, thieving, criminal tyrant behind the mask of Palestine and the Golan Heights together, The investment capital of the ideology of resistance and defiance in the case of Palestine and the Golan Heights is greater, and therefore the gains are higher, and excessive investment in this may compensate for the electoral deficit in terms of legitimacy, Here we want to remind you of the advice that Rifaat al-Assad gave to the late Bashir Gemayel, he told him if you want to erect gallows, raise the Palestinian flag, but Gemayel’s zero-centric ethics prevented him from following Assad’s advice, He erected the gallows Without raising the Palestinian flag, the lions erected gallows under the Palestinian flag,This is the Bedouin, pastoral, tribal mentality.

     If it weren’t for the deep sense of the lack of electoral legitimacy, the search for a compensatory legitimacy would not have been necessary in the way the Assad regime did by exploiting what should not be invested and bequeathing what should not be bequeathed, The background and basis of this practice is the disregard for the people, their minds and dignity,Whoever officially announces the results of a referendum that says that the candidate received 100% of the votes is either completely crazy, or there is no limit to the degree of his fooling the people and disregarding their will and minds, He treats or deals with the people as if they were an obedient flock led to pledge allegiance to its shepherd, Assad fully realized the reality of the fraud and realized the benefits of riding the wave of Palestine and the Golan to compensate for the inability to obtain real electoral legitimacy, Therefore, the people were treated like a flock, and the people have actually been a flock not only since 1963, but for fourteen centuries and still are, Al-Julani did not differ from Al-Assad in his talk about an eternal transitional period, then the establishment of a People’s Assembly, i.e. a parliament, appointed by him or by those he appointed, on the one hand, Another one claims that his popularity and followers have exceeded 90% of Syrians, without feeling any embarrassment about the people discovering his lies and fabrications, Someone who has 90% popularity does not need to be appointed, We do not feel any popular discontent with the issue of “appointment.” The reason is that the people are truly a herd by chronic habit for decades.

  The Syrian people paid the price of Assad’s continued rule for half a century in bitter installments, and paid the price of the Ottomans’ rule for four centuries, and paid the price of the Quraysh Caliphate’s continued rule for ten centuries, Throughout those centuries, we did not witness a single revolution or protest movement until the French mandate came after the First World War with the enlightened rebellious mentality of the French Revolution,A political parties law was issued, several elections were held, and there was an electoral law, Even after a few years of France’s departure, the French “shell” remained effective, and there was the only clean election in 1954, despite several military coups, The shell was removed in 1958 by a referendum in which Abdel Nasser won 100% of the votes, In the following years, Assad and Assad’s son won those percentages, and in the appointed People’s Assembly, al-Julani will also win that percentage, Isn’t it a shame that there was a state under the French mandate and that there was no “state” after the independence? Isn’t it a shame that political parties were abolished in the era of independence and replaced by the religious entity, i.e. what is called “pre-state,” after there were political parties in the era of the French mandate? Isn’t it a shame? That the country would develop under the banner of independence to define people by their religion, that is, their sect, not by their political orientation, meaning that the Syrians failed to build a political state after independence and quickly returned to the Ottoman Empire and the culture of sects, and before that to the culture of the best nation and to the dhimmi, and then to the culture of the duality of believer and infidel. Is it not expected that the country would fail to transform into a political state, and the state is political by nature? The Sultanate and the Caliphate did not represent “states” in the known sense of the state, but rather they were religious entities with legitimacy derived from Sharia.

Syria in the fifties was a “project” state, and after it was destroyed, vanished and disappeared, it was officially transformed into a colony with an internal and external colonizer, We did not know how Syria would develop after its transformation into a colony, and now we know how it has developed, We did not expect much to rejoice, and nothing to rejoice at all has been achieved so far, and Syria is still under a complex internal and external colonization, Instead of the Iranian turban, there is now Erdogan’s fez, As for internal colonization, the incubator has changed, but the incubated, i.e. the regime, has not changed noticeably. It is not fair to evaluate the current authority after months of sitting on the seat of power, but it seems that the matter of the “state” is heading in the direction of “pre-state” or non-state.

In general, it is difficult for any authority, whatever it may be, to make the Syrian entity a state, and for this state to be democratic and respect freedom, justice and equality. Therefore, it has a relationship with the cumulative culture of the people, In the last fourteen centuries, nothing has accumulated except corruption, tribalism, violence, tyranny, exploitation and domination under Bedouin colonialism for 1,000 years and under Ottoman colonialism for 400 years,The ruler does not monopolize Bedouinism, tribalism, violence, corruption and other negatives, These characteristics and qualities are rooted in the psyche of the Bedouins, both rulers and ruled, There is no doubt that the ruler is able to devote change to the characteristics that are rooted in the souls of the people and are not consistent with the concept of the modern civil state, as is the case in Europe. The dictator Franco led Spain to democracy and freedom, and what Ataturk did was good in a different way,Kekkonen ruled Finland for 25 years, that is, until the early eighties of the last century, According to the annual report of the United Nations on the happiness of peoples, Finland has monopolized the first place in the world for eight consecutive years, Finland is the first country in the world, In terms of freedoms, democracy, social justice and international standing, like President Kikkonen, Mr. Bashar al-Assad ruled for nearly 25 years, As a result, there is no miserable person in Finland and no happy person in Syria!

   The silence of the people and their addiction to submission after fourteen centuries of brutal colonialism, their hypocrisy, servility and pettiness harmonized with the Assad regime as the poets of the court harmonized with the caliph. Without the silence of the people, there would have been no means and ways, including what was mentioned about exploiting regional and national calamities such as the issue of Palestine and the Golan Heights, to consolidate survival, What we call calamities was nothing but a curse on the people and a blessing for the Assad regime and those who accompanied it, fabricated and servile with it, satisfied with crumbs. An ignorant people of Bedouin nature turned, in partnership with the Assad regime, that which we metaphorically call a “state” into a mere brothel for plundering and converting public money to personal possession, to the possession of the Assad regime and its henchmen, without any sense of guilt, Theft is part of the nature of the mind of the Bedouin people and those who rule them as Bedouins. It is the nature of the pastoral Bedouin mind, for which “construction” and integrity are not among its features, Bedouin plunder ate the state project, flesh, skin and hair, and left it as a skeleton. Skeletal, dead, lifeless.

The pastoral Bedouin mind is a prisoner of chronic corruption, and absolutely free from the concerns and interests of public affairs. Nationalizing public affairs and transforming them into personal possession is not just a presidential problem, The president resides in every Syrian, just as the Caliph resided in the interior of every faithful Muhammadan,Greed has turned into a collective gang among the president and his subordinate, They all want to devour everyone, they all want a state to devour its flesh and bone, Therefore, there is no benefit in changing the presidency without changing the nature of the people, and there is no benefit in removing Assad and keeping millions of lions inside the Syrians, There is no future for Syria except by breaking with the pastoral Bedouin mind that currently exists in the head of the president and his subordinate equally. .