Just exactly who is running Syria?

Editor's Note: The following report is excerpted from Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin, the premium online newsletter published by the founder of WND. Subscriptions are $99 a year or, for monthly trials, just $9.95 per month for credit card users, and provide instant access for the complete reports.

Bashar Assad

WASHINGTON – There are increasing indications that Syrian President Bashar Assad may no longer be in full control of his own regime, if he ever was, according to Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin.

Instead, power and authority increasingly appear to be in the hands of his younger, more hard-line brother, Maher, and his brother-in-law, Assaf Chawkat, according to informed regional sources.

While Bashar Assad frequently has promised sweeping reforms, most have been technical and none have been implemented. In addition, the president proclaimed last week that all fighting had stopped, but the military under Maher's authority continued to fire tank rounds and have snipers fire on protesters.

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Sources say that the regime's stridency increased after the president, in effect, had to cede authority over to the Iranian-dominated security forces which Maher controls.

For years, Maher has been the strong arm representing what sources say are the hardliners who were loyal to the late President Hafez Assad, the father of Bashar and Maher.

Since the Assad family is from the Alawite tribe, which is close to the Shiites, Bashar has relied on Shiite Iran's assistance and consequently its influence that now is being challenged by the West and Sunni Saudi Arabia.

Iran also has serious equities in the preservation of Assad's Shiite regime, even though the majority of the population is Sunni. Consequently, IRGC elements are at Maher's disposal to help in the training of Syrian forces to put down the demonstrators, which the brothers believe are elements of the Sunni Syrian Muslim Brotherhood instigated by the West and the Saudis.

For the rest of this report, and the following Intelligence Briefs, please go to Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin:

• Turkey/Iraq: Conflicts over pursuit of PKK
• Iraq/Syria: Baghdad's balance unsettled by Syria
• NATO/Russia: Talk of diluting the Western alliance
• China: Anti-terror team to confront 'threat'
• United States/Taiwan: Give them those fighters, now
• Turkey/NATO: Intel secrets at risk

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