Syria: U.S. Officials President Obama Should--But Doesn't--Listen To

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By Barry Rubin

“The international experience of dealing with Bashar [Assad] gave us no confidence to trust his words. We suspected he would employ excuses, trickery and delays.” [Jeffrey Feltman, then U.S. ambassador to Lebanon, quoted in Michael Young, The Ghost of Martyrs Square, p.52.] Feltman is now the assistant secretary of state for Near East affairs. Since he became president, Obama has praised Assad, congressional leaders have called him a reformer; U.S. policy has given him one concession after another, and refused to call for his downfall.