Damascus Spring - Events

Events

The "Damascus Spring" was characterised above all by the emergence of numerous muntadayāt (singular muntadā), referred to in English as "salons" or "forums". Groups of like-minded people met in private houses, with news of the occasion spread by word of mouth, and discussed political matters and wider social questions. The phenomenon of the salons spread rapidly in Damascus and to a lesser extent in other cities. Long-standing members of the Syrian opposition were notable in animating the movement, as were a number of intellectuals who resolutely declared themselves apolitical, such as film-maker Omar Amiralay. Members of the Syrian Communist Party and reform-minded Ba'th Party members also took part in debate. The most famous of the forums were the Riad Seif Forum and the Jamal al-Atassi National Dialogue Forum.

The Damascus Spring can be seen as having mobilised around a number of political demands, expressed in the "Manifesto of the 99" signed by prominent intellectuals. These were, principally, the cancellation of the state of emergency and abolition of martial law and special courts; the release of all political prisoners; the return without fear of prosecution of political exiles; and the right to form political parties and civil organisation. To these was often added the more precisely political demand that Article 8 of the Syrian constitution be repealed. This article provides that "the Arab Socialist Ba'th Party leads the state and society".

The Damascus Spring made a major impact across the Arab world, and initially there was considerable optimism that it would lead to real change. The editor of the Syrian state Tishrin newspaper announced his intention of forming a committee, to comprise prominent intellectuals such as Maher Charif, Ahmad Barqawi and Yusuf Salameh, to edit a new opinion page, but this never came about. The salons debated many political and social questions to a wider nature, from the position of women to the nature of education methods and the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian Territories.

In November 2000, the government responded with the release of hundreds of political prisoners and the closure of Mezze prison. In 2001, it returned to repressive methods with a number of imprisonments and the forced closure of the salons, bringing the Damascus Spring to an end. Some of the forum participants and organizers who were jailed for a longer period of time were Ma'mun al-Homsi and Riad Seif who were accused of "attempting to change the constitution by illegal means" and "inciting racial and sectarian strife" and were sentenced by the Damascus Criminal Court to five years in jail. The other eight activists, Riad al-Turk, Aref Dalila, Walid al-Bunni, Kamal al-Labwani, Habib Salih, Hasan Sa`dun, Habib `Isa, and Fawwaz Tello were referred to the Supreme State Security Court which issued prison sentences between two to 10 years.

Though the arrests ended the Damascus Spring, its effects persisted: Syrian intellectuals released further statements echoing that of the 99; some small demonstrations took place in Damascus; and until 2005 one salon, the Jamal al-Atassi National Dialogue Forum, was still permitted to function. The Atassi forum was shut down after a member had read a statement from the banned Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, a Sunni Islamist organization which had rebelled against the government of Hafiz al-Assad in the early 1980s by murdering thousands of government officials and civilians, which culminated in the Hama Massacre. The government made clear that any collaboration with the Brotherhood, which despite the exile of its leadership was considered to be by far the strongest opposition movement in Syria, was a "red line" not to be crossed.