Springboard For Change

Hamza al-Khatib, a 13-year-old Syrian boy who disappeared following an anti-government protest in late April, appeared to have been brutally tortured before his death. Pictures have added fat to the fire in the ongoing Syrian revolt.

The Arab Spring that brought the world
sharply to incredulous attention appears,
somehow, to have metamorphosed into a
springboard heralding the Arab Winter
of their discontent unanswered, leaving
the social revolutionaries who passionately
gathered in their demanding numbers to
protest failure of fundamental human rights.

The varied response has been polarized and
polarizing, from surface assurances of
long-awaited lifting of civil restraints - and
opposing sectarian violence and endemic
corruption - to outright military responses,
resulting in mass funerals and sorrowing
but hardily resilient, determined protesters.

The hard lesson being learned: That in
some parts of the world where heritage
and tradition preclude enlightenment,
popular demands for change to benefit
society become criminal acts of civil
and religious disobedience, the penalty
for which becomes violent death.

In hindsight, the detested dictator
seems downright benevolent when
compared to successors steeped in a
cauldron of fanatical resolve to implement
a reign of theocratic oppression and terror
- too late, however, to easily reverse the tide.