Early Monday Aug. 1, undeterred by international condemnation, President Bashar Assad broadened his bloody tank assault to all of northern Syria – a 20,000 square kilometer area almost the size of Israel. He is now waging war on the 3.5 million inhabitants of Hama, Deir al-Zour, Homs, Idlib, Ar-Raqqah and Abu Kemal, after inflicting a one-day death toll Sunday of 150 – 120 in Hama, 30 in Deir el-Zur and more than 1,000 injured.
Syrian armored forces are running into heavy resistance, increasing desertions.

President Bashar Assad and his brother Maher, who leads the crackdown on protest, are not talking. Their Alawite sect is withdrawing its support and the clergy spurn the regime's demand to keep the crowds off the streets during Ramadan, during which the opposition plans nightly anti-Assad rallies.

Iranian intelligence experts in Damascus have been disrupting the Syrian opposition movement's telephone and Internet links with the outside world and among fellow-protesters in the country. In the last two weeks, the US and Saudi Arabia have smuggled thousands of satellite phones into Syria for opposition activists. This also allows them to continue to transit images of Syrian brutality, debkafile reports.
A new Saudi-funded TV station representing the Syrian opposition began broadcasting on July 19.

Since Thursday, July 21, Syria's entire operational fleet of 1,500 tanks surrounds the country's most active anti-Assad protest cities Homs, Hama, Deir al-Zour, Abu Kamal and the big Damascus suburb of Harasta. The same evening, tank-backed forces stormed Homs, shelling densely populated districts at random, causing many casualties.
Five months into the uprising, these flashpoint cities are out of control, barred to the army except in large contingents backed by heavy armor and live fire.  

Syrian President Bashar Assad sees his military crackdown of dissent beating hopelessly against a brick wall, and increasing American covert intervention against him, army desertions and signs of civil war. Yet he continues to send his tanks and guns against a rising tide of protest.

Obama's acceptance of the Russian-Libyan formula opens the way for ending the Libyan war by Muammar Qaddafi's departure from power – not the country – making way for transition administration and elections. His sons and loyalists will run for office. The format for Syria expels Bashar Assad and all ...

If Aleppo finally throws its weight against the anti-government opposition, Bashar Assad's days will be numbered – especially after his elite troops failed to break the back of the uprising and he blew his only shot at national dialogue by disinviting influential opposition leaders.

After Hama, US and French ambassadors to Damascus Robert Ford and Eric Chevalier will Friday, July 15, try to reach the eastern Syrian oil town of Deir al-Zar on the Iraqi border to meet opposition leaders, although debkafile's reports government forces are poised to stop them. The town is also a Sunni tribal and Kurdish center.
In a key policy shift, US President Obama Tuesday questioned Bashar Assad's legitimacy. And another first: A bomb blast damaged an East Syrian oil pipeline.

Monday, July 11, after a pro-Assad mob invaded the US embassy in Damascus, a personal attack on Syrian President Bashar Assad was heard in Washington for the first time. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Assad "is not indispensible and we have absolutely nothing invested in him remaining in power," after US embassy staff were forced to shelter in a fortified wing of the mission as Assad's militiamen rampaged through the building and raised the Syrian flag.

The visits the US and French ambassadors, Robert Ford and Eric Chevalier, paid to Hama Friday, July 8, in the thick of the half-million anti-Assad turnout, offered a rare glimpse of the quest by Barack Obama, Nicolas Sarkozy and Tayyip Erdogan for a Syrian compromise: It would leave Bashar Assad in place provided he accepts reforms and makes room for the opposition in government. But Turkish troops still remain poised on the Syrian border over his head.

The United States, Britain, France and Turkey are spearheading a plan to preserve Bashar Assad as Syrian president while cutting away his support system of relatives and political and military chiefs and replacing them with "moderate opposition" figures, debkafile reports exclusively. But the process is marred by profound mutual mistrust: The West suspects he has no intention of abandoning his savage crackdown on protest, while Assad suspects he is being set up for a Turkish invasion. 

The Lebanese capital was only the first stop for a delegation of the UN-backed Special Tribal for Lebanon investigating the 2005 assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri. Thursday, June 30, the group arrived in Beirut and presented four arrest warrants against top Hizballah officers. Its next destination may eventually be Damascus for the submission of a second batch of warrants against Syrian officials suspected of controlling the Hizballah hit-team in the commission of the murder.

Only two Arab autocrats have succumbed to six popular uprisings: four have survived. NATO's score in Libya is zero to one as Europe's war sustainability is hit by the falling euro Two countries are in the grip of civil war and two undergoing partition. Yet Barack Obama is grimly ...

Obama and Erdogan had divided up Arab Revolt missions between them, targeting another two Arab rulers, Muammar Qaddafi and Bashar Assad, for eventual eviction – first by diplomacy, then by force - when Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi jumped in with a demand for NATO to halt hostilities in ...

The Syrian army went into action Tuesday, June 21, the day after the Assad speech, to drive back to their homes the nearly quarter of a million civilians who fled towns and villages on the Turkish border to escape military persecution. Syrian President Bashar Assad remains undeterred by the risk of a showdown - even after the ominous phone conversation between US President Barack Obama and Turkish Prime Ministeror and Obama's demand that his regime end the "outrageous" violence now.

The Arab Revolt erupted in Tunisia on Dec. 18, 2010, exactly six months ago. The latest  DEBKA-Net-Weekly out last Friday offers the first interim report: The uprisings are log-jammed after ousting two Arab presidents: Three rulers, Saudi King Abdullah, Qaddafi and Assad, defy the US and Europe and Yemen is breaking up. Qaddafi, Assad and Saleh are evoking tribal and clan allegiances to survive.
So where does this leave Obama, Netanyahu and Erdogan?
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debkafile reports war fever in and around Syria after Syrian President Bashar Assad's speech Monday, June 20, sparked riots by disappointed protesters in Damascus and Latakia. Syria airspace remains open to civilian traffic although Cypriot sources earlier reported it closed. Turkish military helicopters are reported infiltrating northern Syria on reconnaissance missions and Arab sources report NATO is planning to fly extra troops from Spanish and German bases to the Izmir Air base in western Turkey to expand the current number of 400.

In his first address to the nation in two months, Syrian President Bashar Assad June 20 accused a "minute number of terrorists" backed by "conspirators at home and abroad" of exploiting legitimate demands for reform to serve longstanding plots for controlling Syria because of its geo-strategic importance.
While hinting at possible reforms, there was no suggestion that he might step down or dismiss his brother who has been leading the savage crackdown on the nearly four-month old protest.

Lebanon has a new government headed by Najib Mikati, ally of Syrian President Bashar Assad and Hizballah. Formed suddenly on June 13, the 30-minister lineup has earmarked an unprecedented 18 portfolios – including defense and interior – to Hizballah loyalists and pro-Syrian politicians. While fighting the uprising against his rule, Bashar Assad has recaptured Beirut. The appointment of friendly Fayez Ghosn as defense minister places the army at the service of Damascus and portends trouble on the Lebanese-Israeli border.

Turkey considers giving Bashar Assad a last chance before resorting to military action after receiving the promise of a US shield against Iranian or Syrian missile retaliation. Assad, for his part, is rigidly fixated on his harsh crackdown and a victory over the rebels against his regime.