Being Hafiz al-Assad: Syria's Chilly but Consistent Peace Strategy

Hafiz al-Assad's on-again, off-again approach to the Middle East peace process frequently drives U.S. and Israeli policymakers to distraction. Both Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and President Bill Clinton have argued that Syria's president has made a "strategic decision" to resolve his differences with Israel peacefully. But some wonder if Syria has really resigned itself to peace. Assad's refusal to return to the table after January's Israeli-Syrian peace talks in Shepherdstown, West Virginia, a subsequent wave of deadly violence in southern Lebanon, and a frosty March summit in Geneva with Clinton hardly seemed evidence of pacific intentions.

Is the Syrian leader temperamental and unpredictable? Have Clinton and Barak been gulled by the mistaken view -- first advanced by Henry Kissinger after the 1973 Yom Kippur War and now accepted as conventional wisdom in foreign ministries worldwide -- that Assad, a maddeningly clever negotiator, is entirely trustworthy once he has given his word? In light of Assad's enigmatic behavior, should Israel and the United States not forgo the notion that only procedure, not substance, stands in the way of an Israel-Syria agreement?

Many pundits in Israel and the United States have answered yes to all these important questions. A pall of skepticism enveloped the Syrian track, especially after attacks on Israeli troops by Hezbollah, the radical Shiite militia that operates with Assad's blessing in southern Lebanon. Indeed, for some observers, Syria's behavior showed that Assad is not resigned to Israel's existence and is interested not in peace but in process -- in stringing out the negotiations to preserve Syria's regional position rather than cutting a deal.

But this is a serious misreading of Assad, one that could easily lead policymakers to miss a rare opportunity to achieve a larger Middle East peace. In fact, Assad's behavior has been anything but erratic: it has been consistent and predictable. To understand that consistency, one must understand the man known as the sphinx of Damascus and the world in which he lives.

HOW THE SPHINX THINKS