Bashar al-Assad, who marks his 10th year in power this July 17, has already firmly secured his place in Syrian history, as a leader with talent, vision, character, and plenty of patience. When coming to power in 2000, he was the youngest of Syria’s former 19 presidents, aged only 34, and the first medical doctor. Now ten years down the road, he ranks as Syria’s 2nd longest serving president after the late President Hafez al-Assad, surpassing Shukri al-Quwatli, who remained in power for eight years. Additionally, Assad is the first president born in the post-colonial period, and the first to implement massive reforms that have affected every aspect of public life; economic, educational, political, social, and developmental.

Let us take a look at how far Syria has come over the past ten years, thanks to President Assad.

Salaries have been raised by over 100% since Assad’s 2000 inauguration. NGOs have mushroomed all over Syria, the first being FIRDOS and the Syrian Young Entrepreneurs Association (SYEA), and so have 13 private Syrian universities. In 2007 the first batch of graduates came out of these universities and this summer, the first generation of medical doctors from private universities, will enter the Syrian work force, along with 200,000 students who march into the labor market every year. They are finding jobs in the multitude of private sector companies that have opened since 2000; GSM operators, newspapers, banks, and insurance companies. Private media is flourishing, with 13 private radio stations, a private TV channel, two dailies, and an endless number of periodicals and magazines, Forward Magazine, being one of them.

The Damascus Stock Exchange (DSE) was established in March 2009, over 40 years after it was nationalized, and now lists 16 companies.

Politically, Assad faced a very difficult and often hostile regional and international environment—yet against all odds, Syria survived the storm. Two months after his swearing-in ceremony, the Palestinian uprising, known as the Al-Aqsa Intifada, broke out in Jerusalem. Then came the horrific 9-11 attacks in 2001, followed by the October war on Afghanistan, and the March 2003 invasion of Iraq. Syria, which for decades has combated Islamic extremism, lent a helping hand to the international community in counter-terrorism operations against al-Qaeda. A chorus of accusations started against Syria, however, of harboring Saddam Hussein and his sons, of supporting the Iraqi insurgency, and of lax security on the Syrian-Iraqi border. In 2004, the UN passed Resolution 1559, calling on the Syrians to leave Lebanon and in February 2005, someone killed Syria’s former ally in Beirut, Rafiq al-Hariri, and tried to blame it on the Syrians. Syria began with a long and tedious effort to cooperate with the Hariri probe, supporting the International Tribunal, which has to date, affirmed time and again how cooperative Syria has been, thereby drowning the famous Mehlis Report, released in October 2005 which read like an Agatha Christie crime novel and tried to incriminate Syrian figures in the Hariri murder. Clearly from where things look like today, Syria has overcome.
Syria paid a high price for its efforts to bring security and stability to the region.

During the past few years, several terrorist attacks struck within Syrian territory, sometimes at the hands of terrorists, like on Mount Qassiun, at Omayyad Square, at the Palace of Justice, at an abandoned UN building in Mezzeh, and near the US Embassy in Damascus. Once a terrorist attack was carried out by none other than US troops, who invaded Syrian territory near the border with Iraq in late 2008, killing seven Syrian civilians. They claimed to be hunting for a senior commander from al-Qaeda. Needless to say, we shouldered these difficulties, along with the hardship of hosting our Lebanese brothers during the war of 2006, playing host to 1.5 million Iraqis fleeing the mayhem in Iraq, and lined up rank-and-file behind the Palestinians during the 2008-2009 war on Gaza.

Now, the dark days are hopefully over, never to return. Syria mended its relations with the US after the election of Barack Obama in 2009. That same year, relations with both Lebanon and Saudi Arabia were fixed when Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri and King Abdullah came to Damascus, turning a new page with the Syrians. The EU realized, long before the US, that no peace and stability can be brought to the Middle East without full engagement of the Syrians. A colorful assortment of EU officials have been coming to Syria, engaging with Hizbullah and Hamas— realizing that they cannot be ignored in the complex web of Middle East politics. Those who for years wronged the Syrians—George W. Bush, Tony Blair, and Jacques Chirac—are all now out of office, and Syria has created a tactical relationship with their successors, Obama, Nicolas Sarkozy—and now hopefully, David Cameron in the UK.

What is remarkable about Bashar al-Assad is that all of the above was achieved without Syria having to bend—not even once—to international pressure or dictations by the US. Syria remains closely allied to Hizbullah, Hamas, and Iran. To crown successes of the past ten years, we need one more thing: restoration of the occupied Golan Heights to Syria.

Here is to the next ten years of Bashar al-Assad, when hopefully, the man who outlived Bush will walk into the liberated Golan Heights and raise the Syrian Flag over land that was abducted by war against UN Resolutions, declaring that justice has been done to Syria.

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• Assad appoints a 29-member Constitutional Committee, for a new constitution by next February

• Assad appoints a 29-member Constitutional Committee, for a new constitution by next February
• Sam Dalla: Was the Chinese model that good?

• Assad appoints a 29-member Constitutional Committee, for a new constitution by next February
• Sam Dalla: Was the Chinese model that good?

• Assad appoints a 29-member Constitutional Committee, for a new constitution by next February
• Sam Dalla: Was the Chinese model that good?