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Turkey's Shift on Syria Gives West Room to Get Tougher on Assad
(Christian Science Monitor) David Schenker - Fearing another government-perpetrated massacre, hundreds of Syrian civilians are streaming into Turkey, a development that will push Ankara to take a harder line on Damascus. For the Sunni Islamists in Ankara, the notion that an infidel Alawite regime in Damascus could kill a thousand Sunnis is probably beyond the pale. On the other hand, the killing of thousands of Sunni Libyans earlier this year was perpetrated by a Sunni, and hence did not provoke the same outrage in Ankara. The same is true of the atrocities in Iran, where, according to some Sunni Islamists, the deaths of Shiites at the hands of their co-religionists is little cause for concern. Without Turkey, Assad is today less insulated and more susceptible to external pressures and the regime is less secure. Indeed, Turkey is not only moving away from the Assad regime, it's looking to help organize its successor. Last week, Turkey hosted a conference for the Syrian opposition on its territory in a clear statement that it has assessed that Assad is irredeemable. The writer is director of the Program on Arab Politics at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.