Zakria: Why I know the Assad will fall

By Fareed Zakaria, CNN

Earlier this year, I thought the Syrian regime would be able to persevere. It has been extraordinarily brutal and, unfortunately, if governments are willing to open fire on their people with utter disregard for human life, it often works. Crowds disburse; people stop gathering. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has been about as brutal as you can get. So I thought that, as sad as it is, his regime would be able to endure.
Furthermore, I noted that the opposition did not have a geographic foothold in the way that the Libyan opposition did. In Libya, you had a divided country; the opposition, generally speaking, came from the East. They were able to take Benghazi. That provided them with a base of support. Syria's opposition doesn't seem to have that.
In the face of all of this, the courage of the Syrian people is just stunning. They keep protesting. They keep organizing. And it appears that the Syrian security forces are actually suffering significant setbacks.
But a big reason I think the Assad regime will fall is simple: It's running out of money.
Remember, Syria is not an oil regime. It doesn't have that much cash. It has always relied on trade and smuggling and some money from Iran. The United Nations sanctions are actually quite effective in cutting down trade. And Turkey is now going to impose its own sanctions on Syria, which is very significant. It will squeeze Assad even tighter.
Assad leads a minority regime that has been able to stay in power by bribing key members of the Sunni elite in both the business community and the military. At the end of the day, that game becomes much more difficult to play once the money runs out.
For this reason, I think we are now seeing the beginning of the end of Assad's rule. It may still take a year to run its course. But I now think this regime is going to collapse after all.

Blogger comment:
To the west, the Arab streets and Israel we never have a common interest like having this guy Assad falls. The Arab/Muslim streets and particularly Islamists have to understand there is no really common interest between us and Iran as well the Shia in general. Their rhetoric against the west and Israel is for inside consumption and to try to have the Muslims Sunni to buy in that and stand with them. Their goal is not really Israel otherwise they would attacked Israel when it attacked Gaza but there goal is to have us Sunni convert Shia, follow their crazy books and ideas that God never told us about in Quran or Sunna. As well if Al Mahdi Al Muntazer is Sunni they will undermine him. All the sympathy we gave them about their revolt against Shah and against crazy Saddam they met it with wickedness to take over Iraq from Sunni. When I tried to talk to their leaders they did not E-Mail me back. It is very clear from sanding with the Syrian tyrant by both Iran and Hazeb Allah leaders that they are against Sunni. In Hazeb Allah I hear only the same guy who is the only one talking Naser Allah. Tell me why in hell they should stand with a corrupt secular tyrant regime who is mercilessly killing his people. It became clear to the west that Iran wants to acquire nuclear weapons and not only technology. This should never happen they will use it against Israel and against the Arab world. Al Malki their guy in Iraq was torturing Sunni Muslims. Interestingly he was playing with both sides USA and Iran. To get Syria down now we need to have all the west, Arab streets and Israel uniting in bringing Syria down and isolating Iran severely. Syria is weak and quickly the Sunni will take over. Iran is strong and attack in Iran will make their leaders strong and make their people unite with them. Break Iran regime down from inside and have moderate Iranians take over and from outside isolate and sanction them so their leader get displaced. Thus the west should start bombing Syria or have Arab pilots from USA ships do that. Russia and China will respect the Arab/Muslims will Sunni of Syria went peacefully in revolution and the tyrant Bashar met them with bombs. He could have meetings with their leaders and sit down and listen to them and change things in days. What he did is silly sayings that there will be change and in the ground he killed them with brutality. Like any human beings they have to fight back, I was in favor if they wait and see if the Arab tyrants Assholes will do anything.

Al Mahdi Al Muntazer