Dear Bashar al-Assad,
I congratulate you as the Syrian crisis is finally over, and before congratulating you for winning this war, I want to say a few things. Firstly, the major reason for writing this open letter to you is because it would have been intercepted by the CIA anyway. I cannot say that I am writing to you this because I am a huge admirer of you. Also, there is no other connection or reason that could identify us (myself and you) in any possible way. I’m a commoner, an ordinary citizen and if I had been in your country, I could have been one among the hundreds of thousands of the citizens who were fed by the war that began in 2011 in your country.
But it does not mean that I am blaming you, Mr. Bashar al-Assad, for initiating this war. Instead, the Syrian crisis was kicked off in 2011 by a 14 years-old named Mouawiya Syasneh, whose mischievous graffiti kicked-off the uprising that brought about all the destruction, misery and calamity, that could be possibly witnessed by a war-ravaged country. As a result of that graffiti, more than 12 million people of the country fled their homes, including 5.6 million who left their country. And if it had not been for that teenager boy’s graffiti that read, “Doctor, you’re next!”, I would not have any idea that you are a qualified doctor with an accomplished medical degree.
I would refrain from asking how come such an educated person with a foreign degree ended up being the king of ashes, rubles in the country with more dead-bodies than living souls. I would also refrain from asking you the rationale behind responding so repressively to the demands of your countrymen in the wake of Arab Spring that triggered the Syrian crisis, and which eventually animated Moawaiya into writing on the school wall. It is none of my concern to ask what would be the harm if you would have acted politically rather than militarily. After all, you are supposed to be the only politician in Syria, that matters.
Also, it is of no use to ask you why your government used housing laws that include those 45 new pieces of legislation passed during this time, to seize the property of all those who opposed you. I shall also not ask why you urged your opponents to come back and promised them a general amnesty, before arresting them upon their return.
On the contrary, I shall congratulate you for the tremendous victory you finally gained after years of the bloody war that was primarily revolving around your person, and which could have been ended years ago with your simple announcement that you would be flexible to democratic reforms. But since this victory couldn’t have been possible without the active support of your Russian friend, Vladimir Putin. So, I cannot forget to mention his name here. For, at one time, you were about to lose the war in 2015 when the rebels had almost occupied as much as 75% of your territory. But thanks to the timely Russian airstrikes, you are restored to the place where you were before 2011 uprising.
You deserve to be congratulated for withstanding all the global conspiracies against you, and despite all the opposition, you are still the head of the Syrian state. It is a different matter if your perseverance has reduced the country into dust and rubble.
Related: Princess Haya Flees to the UK: Symptom of A Deep-Rooted Problem in Arab Society
