Putin has stolen the initiative on Syria

The Russian leader saved the US president from a foreign-policy debacle, an Arabic-language commentator notes. Two other writers look at the situation in Egypt.

Vladimir Putin, the lord of the Kremlin, the new tsar who has been holding the UN Security Council hostage for two years, can now brag before President Barack Obama that his last-minute "initiative" has saved the master of the White House from a major setback before the US Congress, columnist Zuhair Qusaibati wrote in the pan-Arab daily Al Hayat.
In truth, it is the Syrian regime that the Russian president is desperately trying to save, and he has now practically guaranteed that the regime of Bashar Al Assad will survive.
Moscow hopes that the prolonged procedures and manoeuvres needed to guarantee the Syria will abide by the terms of the chemical-weapons deal will send the military-intervention option into oblivion.
"Mr Putin saved Mr Obama's face, but he obliterated the US-French military option and with it the Syrian opposition's hope for an imminent definitive chapter in the war against the regime," the writer noted.
It may be true that Washington doesn't seek to topple the Syrian regime by force. But it is clearly true that the so-called Russian initiative will only prolong Syria's darkness.
The initiative suggests that the West has reduced its perception of Syria's suffering to that imposed by the chemical arsenal. This transforms the rest of the conflict into a mere internal affair, the writer suggested.
Mr Putin's gift allowed Mr Obama to avoid a debacle in Congress, where the disappointing results of US intervention in Iraq and Afghanistan are strongly present, despite the president's repeated assurances that his Syria strike would be limited.
Russia is the Syrian regime's primary ally. It has the ability to force Mr Al Assad to stop the fight. All parties concerned understand clearly that if the Kremlin succeeds in turning the page on the US-led strike, the regime will only step up the momentum of its offensive against the armed opposition.
In his persistent efforts to secure the survival of the Syrian regime, Mr Putin was able to wipe from everybody's memory his recent announcement that he wasn't prepared to go to war to defend Mr Al Assad and his regime.
"Some see his previous statement as an underhanded and successful manoeuvre to deceive Washington and Paris into thinking that Moscow has lifted its cover for Damascus, and that a military strike would be nothing more than a promenade," the writer added.
The question today, after the disappointment of the Syrian opposition and the hesitation of the West to be involved in Middle Eastern conflict, is this: will Mr Kerry acknowledge his acceptance of Moscow's plan, which means giving up Mr Obama's proposal to launch a military strike on Syria?
Egyptian revolution needs time to mature
The achievement of the majority of the Egyptian people, following the unprecedented mass protests since last June, is that they succeeded in driving the Muslim Brotherhood out of power and off the streets, said columnist Sarkis Naoum in the Lebanese daily Annahar.
But a number of prominent pro-democracy figures think that achievement is still incomplete. According to information from political and security sources, a few months are still needed. And even then, the achievement alone is not sufficient, and must be coupled with other procedures to entrench it and to help persuade Egyptians that the country has moved to a new and promising phase that will eventually lead to the realisation of their hopes and demands.
"An essential political step among these would be to leave the door open for Egypt's Brotherhood to return to political action under the new system that the 'second revolution' is putting in place according to the agreed road map," the writer said.
This would guarantee an effective implementation of democratic principles and, more importantly, prevent the Brotherhood from going underground to plot to take power by undermining the country's security.
"It could be achieved by allowing for the rise of moderate Brotherhood currents that would be more prone to dialogue and cooperate with others," the writer added.
Egypt's constitution must 'unite not divide'
Now that the constitutional panel formed to amend the Egyptian constitution has set up its five subcommittees and is ready to get down to work, it is the right time to remind each of the panel's 50 members that every article in Egypt's new constitution must bring all Egyptians together and not be grounds for division, the Cairo-based daily newspaper Al Ahram said in its editorial yesterday.
"The higher interests of the nation must be put ahead of any kind of personal interests, and above any narrow, perishable partisan gains," the paper said.
"The people want a constitution that preserves everything that the nation holds as sacred. They want a constitution that defends their dignity, fosters their right to decent livelihoods and guarantees for the coming generations a future where public liberties and the principles of social equality are entrenched; a future that has real opportunities to offer the young and where cronyism and nepotism are banished," Al Ahram said.
All citizens, regardless of class, ideology or faith, must be able to see the reflection of their own aspirations in the constitution.
"The people also want a constitution that brings all those millions of Egyptians living all over the world around one thing: the love of Egypt," the paper added.
* Digest compiled by The Translation Desk
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