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Michael B. Oren-Tutte le strade portano a Damasco 14/04/2009 Wall Street Journal, March 5, 2009

ALL ROADS LEAD TO DAMASCUS Michael B. Oren Wall Street Journal, March 5, 2009 In his inaugural address, President Barack Obama expressed his willingness to "extenda hand" to America 's Middle East adversaries, and in a subsequent interview with Al-Arabiya television, reiterated, "[W]hat we are going to be offering is a hand  of friendship." The gesture was aimed primarily at Iran , but so far the Syrians have been the principal recipients.... "We never clenched our fists," Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad declared in a rare interview with the Western press. "There is no substitute for the United States ." Americahas much to gain from improved relations with Syria . In addition to enhancing Iraqi security, Syria can contribute to Washington 's efforts to isolate and perhaps even palliate Iran , and could participate in a U.S.-brokered peace deal with Israel. Syria , too, can benefit, especially from the lifting of American sanctions and aid for its ailing economy.... What are the real chances for moderating Syrian behavior and what price is the U.S. willing to pay for that change? And what risks does Mr. Obama take in reaching out to Syria ...? Syrians had never made peace with the partitioning of Lebanon . The Syrians saw  control over Lebanon 's lucrative resorts, its robust free markets and unlimited access to the West as the cure-all for their moribund socialist economy. Syria  's chance to restore its integrity and solvency came with the Lebanese civil war  in 1976. Determined never to allow one of the warring factions to dominate Lebanon , the Syrians interceded first against the prevailing Palestinian forces, crushing them, and then turned on the Christian militias when they became too powerful. Thereafter, Syria allied with various groups to keep out foreign invaders--with the Palestinians against the Israelis in 1982, and with the Druze and the Shiites against the U.S. in 1983. The need to preserve their primacy in Lebanon led the Syrians to support a then little-known Shiite militia, Hezbollah. The secular Baathists' partnership with the Islamist Hezbollah was never purely ideological, but represented a practical means for maintaining Syria 's Lebanese lifeline.... Syria's policies did not deter the U.S. from seeking improved relations.... These demarches proved successful in persuading the Syrians to join the anti-Saddam coalition in 1991 and to send their foreign minister, Farouk al-Shara, to the subsequent peace conference in Madrid . But many hundreds of hours of deliberations could not move Mr. Assad to make genuine peace with Israel --even in exchange for most of the Golan--or o alter significantly any of his noxious policies. Further vexing for Washington , Syria had begun to forge strategic ties with Tehra , based on common opposition to the West and its Arab allies.... Hopes were revived when [the late Assad's son] Basil was killed in 1994, ostensibly in a car crash  but quite possibly by assassination, and replaced by his younger brother, Bashar...heralded as the vanguard of Syrian modernization and of improved ties with the U.S. His rise was accompanied by a marked enhancement of civil rights in Syria and a sense of  greater liberty for Lebanon . But the so-called Damascus Spring quickly gave way to a discontented winter.... Instead of turning to the West, Mr. Assad fortified the alliance with Iran . The situation could have scarcely worsened when, in March 2003, America invaded  Iraq . Though Syria displayed magnanimity in sheltering more than one million Iraqi refugees, its border remained porous to anti-coalition insurgents. Syrian-U.S. relations appeared to go into a freefall. Syria was widely accused of planting the one-ton  bomb that killed former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri and 21 others in February 2005, an attack that remains the subject of a massive U.N. investigation. Mr. Assad went on to back the Hezbollah ambush that ignited the Lebanon War of July 2006.  He supported Hamas's bloody overthrow of the Palestinian Authority in Gaza the following June and the firing of thousands of Qassam rockets into Israel that culminated in the most recent Gaza crisis. Of all these actions, none was more destabilizing--and potentially cataclysmic--than Syria 's attempt, aided by North Korea but ultimately foiled by Israel , to secretly attain nuclear capabilities.... This is the legacy of radicalism, subversion and ruthlessness with which President Obama must grapple as he sets out to place America 's relations with Syria on fresh footing.... Based on Syria 's past and its recent behavior, there seem scant grounds for optimism regarding a breakthrough. Even if such conditions existed, the question would remain whether America should pay the price. Clearly, reconciliation with Syria is incompatible with a free and independent Lebanon and with a Damascus that still hosts Hamas's headquarters. Moreover, it is difficult to conceive how the U.S. might simultaneously restore its relations with Syria before reconciling with Iran. ... Such obstacles should not, however, deter the Obama administration from negotiating with Damascus and seeking to achieve a workable partnership. If for no other reason than to exhaust all possible diplomatic options, the U.S. should try its utmost  to avoid confrontation and promote dialogue. Every effort should be made to pry  Syria from Iran 's grasp. At the same time, however, the U.S. should be cognizant that these overtures carry risks. The Syrians should be offered carrots--economic aid, the lifting of sanctions, even-handed mediation for peace--but also shown the sticks. The same hand that America extends in friendship should be ready to recoil, parry a blow or return one. (Simone Gold, Seth Robinson and Alissa Gordon contributed to the research for this article. Michael B. Oren, a professor at Georgetown University and a distinguished fellow at the Shalem Center in Jerusalem, is the author of Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East , 1776 to the Present.)