U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton says the United Nations must act to end what she calls the Syrian government’s “divide and conquer” strategy against its own people. But Russia vows to veto any U.N. action against its allies in Damascus. A Look at the Arab League The League of Arab States, or Arab League, is an association of 22 Arab states, based in Cairo. It was founded on March 22, 1945 in Cairo, with the aim of strengthening the relationships between member states through political, cultural and economic cooperation. The first six members of the organization were Egypt, Iraq, Transjordan (later renamed Jordan), Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and Syria. Yemen joined a few months later Nabil Elaraby was elected secretary-general of the Arab League in May 2011. Syria’s membership was suspended in November 2011, following bloodshed caused by brutal government crackdowns on pro-democracy protests. On Jan. 22, 2012, the Arab League proposed to Syria that President Bashar al-Assad should transfer power to a deputy and form a national unity government within two months. The plan was rejected by Syria. After meeting with her French and British colleagues in New York, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton went before the United Nations Security Council to support Arab League action against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. “The United States urges the Security Council to back the Arab League’s demand that the Syrian government immediately stop all attacks against civilians and guarantee the freedom of peaceful demonstrations,” she said. Secretary Clinton says President Assad has driven his country to the brink of chaos and the longer he continues, the harder it will be to rebuild Syria once he is gone. “We all know that change is coming to Syria.  Despite its ruthless tactics, the Assad regime’s reign of terror will end and the people of Syria will chart their own destiny.  The question is how many more innocent civilians will die before this country is able to move forward to the kind of future it deserves,” she said. But Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov says U.N. action could make the situation even worse. “An essential element of any U.N. resolution must be the firm statement that this resolution can not be interpreted to justify any kind of outside military intervention in Syria,” he said. Steve Heydemann, a Middle East analyst for the United States Institute of Peace, says Moscow fears a change of government in Damascus would weaken Russia’s position. “If the regime were to change and Syria were to move in a more pro-Western direction, I think the Russians would view that as a blow to their strategic posture in the region. And so one of the things that the U.S. might do is to offer reassurances to the Russians that even if a process of regime transition happens in Syria, they won’t be left out,” he said. In order to avert a Russian veto, U.S. officials say they are ready to work with all U.N. members to pass a resolution supporting Arab League efforts to end the crisis. Secretary Clinton says failing to do so would abandon the Syrian people and embolden a dictator. Join the conversation on our social journalism site – Middle East Voices . Follow our Middle East reports on Twitter and discuss them on our Facebook page.

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Syrian government forces intensified their military crackdown against opposition forces near the capital, Damascus, retaking a number of key towns that had fallen to rebel soldiers in recent days. The fighting is occurring amid a frenzy of diplomatic activity to try to resolve the more than 10-month-old conflict. Heavily armed Syrian government forces pounded a string of Damascus suburbs for a second day, reportedly retaking the towns of Saqba, Kafr Batna and Hammouriya from rebel soldiers. The shelling was so heavy in places that black smoke was visible on the horizon in Damascus. An opposition supporter named Abou Ayman al Dimashqi told al-Hurra TV that government tanks and field artillery caused widespread destruction in several suburbs, and troops went house-to-house to arrest scores of people. He said the suburb of East Ghouta was devastated by the shelling of buildings and civilian targets by government artillery, tanks, rockets, helicopters and planes in the face of lightly armed rebel soldiers. Al Dimashqi added that plumes of smoke poured into the sky over the town of Arbein, while government snipers deployed in Hammouriya, and troops made arrests. Witnesses say hundreds of civilians fled the outlying suburbs for interior districts of Damascus. Government tanks and military hardware also  were deployed in central squares of the capital to allay fears that rebel soldiers might breach the capital’s defenses. Opposition sources say more than several dozen civilians were killed in the government offensive, which included attacks on the cities of Homs, Daraa, Hama and Deir ez Zor. State-controlled TV reported six soldiers were killed near the southern city of Daraa. A gas pipeline near Homs also reportedly was blown up. Video on opposition websites showed fields being flooded in Idlib province near the Turkish border. Opposition sources claimed the government opened dams to prevent civilians from fleeing to Turkey. Al-Arabiya TV reported the government hanged a founder of the rebel forces, Hussein Harmoush. In a report that could not be independently confirmed, the Syrian League for Human Rights said he was executed last week. Lieutenant Colonel Harmoush was the first Syrian officer to publicly declare his opposition to the deadly government crackdown on protesters. He fled to Turkey, where opposition activists say he was kidnapped and taken back to Syria. Peter Harling of the International Crisis Group said the military balance is still “massively” in favor of the government, although its power has slowly been eroding. But he said it is not clear if and when the government might fall. “The regime has been eroding for months now, but it still has an ability to do a tremendous amount of damage,” said Harling. “But it is not in a position really to design and implement any strategy, let alone regain control over the country and start ruling anew. So now we see the crisis accelerating, the only question is, in what direction things are going into. It could be downfall, a collapse of the regime, it could be civil war, but there is no clear third option at this stage.” As fighting intensified, the U.N. Security Council prepared for talks about the Syrian crisis. Meanwhile Russia, which has been blocking a Security Council resolution, indicated the Syrian government was ready to hold talks with the opposition in Moscow. But opposition sources are refusing to take part. Join the conversation on our social journalism site – Middle East Voices . Follow our Middle East reports on Twitter and discuss them on our Facebook page.

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European and Arab nations are calling on the U.N. Security Council to back a resolution supporting the Arab League’s plan to end the 10-month-old political crisis in Syria. But, Russia has expressed concerns about the new text. Following a lengthy closed-door discussion Friday afternoon on a draft resolution proposed by council members Morocco, Britain and France, Russia’s Ambassador Vitaly Churkin told reporters that the new text ignores what he called Moscow’s “red lines” where they could not go. “The red lines included any indications of sanctions, the red lines included any sort of imposition of arms embargo – because we know how in real life arms embargo means you supply arms to illegal groups but you cannot supply weapons to the government – we cannot accept that,” he said. “Unfortunately, the draft we saw today did not only ignore our red lines but also added some new elements which we find unacceptable as a matter of principle.” The Russian envoy said the Arab League plan, which includes the transfer of power from President Bashar al-Assad to a deputy in preparation for multi-party elections, imposes a certain outcome of political dialogue before that dialogue even starts. “We need to concentrate on establishing political dialogue,” he said. “The Arab League may have its ideas about where that political dialogue should go, they are free to express those ideas, but certainly the Security Council cannot be a tool to impose specific solutions on countries, including in this particular situation, Syria.” He said Moscow does not see the new draft text as one on which they could agree, but said they would be willing to engage in negotiations.         British Ambassador Mark Lyall Grant rejected his colleague’s objections, saying the proposed text does not include an arms embargo or sanctions, nor does it call for regime change. He noted that it also includes some language from an earlier Russian proposed draft resolution on the subject. Essentially, Lyall Grant said, the new resolution simply supports the Arab League’s efforts to end the crisis. “Frankly, the time has come where we should be supporting the Arab League’s efforts,” he said. “They took a very strong, binding decision on the Arab League members at the weekend. They have come with a credible plan that involves dialogue, a political transition, and we believe that we should support it.” Lyall Grant said negotiations on the text would begin Monday and he hoped to have a vote on the measure next week, possibly as early as Wednesday. On Tuesday afternoon the Arab League Secretary-General Nabil ElAraby and the Prime Minister of Qatar will brief the 15-member Security Council on the League’s month-long monitoring mission in Syria, which was plagued by difficulties. Read the Arab League report in English Syria has rejected the Arab League’s plan of January 22nd, but has said the League’s observer mission may remain in the country for another month. The United Nations estimates that more than 5,000 people have been killed during the 10-month-long crackdown on anti-government dissenters. On Friday, the U.N. children’s agency, UNICEF, said nearly 400 children have been killed during the crisis. Join the conversation on our social journalism site – Middle East Voices . Follow our Middle East reports on Twitter and discuss them on our Facebook page.

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