The decision of the Obama administration to send an ambassador to Damascus after a four-year break is a noteworthy development. It is a recognition by the US of Syria's regional importance; it is an admission that the Bush policy of seeking to isolate and punish Syria was a failure; and it is a realistic assessment that an Israeli-Palestinian settlement would be difficult, if not impossible, to achieve if Syria were left out.
It is therefore a strong signal that US President Barack Obama is seeking, not just Israeli-Palestinian peace, but a comprehensive Middle East settlement, involving Syria and, of course, Lebanon as well.
Obama has clearly understood that the Bush administration's policy towards the Arab and Muslim world - the global 'War on Terror' and the blind support for Israel - served only to inflame terrorism, create major obstacles to Middle East peace, and endanger American national interests. Obama is now seeking to correct America's policy.
This is good news for Syria's President Bashar Al Assad. His early years in power, and especially the years 2002 to 2006, were a period of great anxiety, which he managed to survive against great odds. He survived the US neo-cons' aggressive determination to reshape the Middle East to Israel's benefit. He survived the American occupation of Iraq which, had it been successful, would undoubtedly have brought down his own regime. And he survived the forced withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon, after the February 2005 assassination of former prime minister Rafik Hariri.
Throughout all these trials, Syrian diplomacy managed to defend the country's vital interests. It prevented Lebanon - Syria's 'near abroad' - from falling under the influence of a hostile power, thus protecting Syria's own sphere of influence in the Levant; it resisted US-Israeli hegemony by forging its own regional alliance, notably the Tehran-Damascus-Hezbollah axis; and it remained steadfast in its backing of Palestinians of all stripes, including Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah and Khalid Mesha'al's Hamas.
The regime's legitimacy rests essentially on its steadfast refusal to compromise its Arab nationalist credentials. With the population at large, it also rests on the fact that it has managed to provide Syria with reasonable protection in a highly turbulent region. Several other Arab societies have been shattered by US invasions, Israeli assaults, civil wars, insurgencies or other disturbances, but Syria has remained relatively unscathed.
This has come, however, at considerable cost. Powerful security services have not been held in check. The rule of law has not always been observed. Syria's human rights record leaves much to be desired. Freedom of expression is limited. Civil rights activists and other critics have languished in jail. The fact that other states in the region - Israel, Arab countries, the US itself - have behaved with cruel disregard for basic human values does not absolve Syria from blame for its own misdeeds. The country's image has suffered accordingly.
Al Assad is aware that regional peace is essential if he is to achieve his ambition of building a modern state. He has called repeatedly for negotiations with Israel. Not surprisingly, he is anxious to recover the Golan, seized by Israel in 1967. But Syria has no time for a peace which will give Israel further strategic advantages or allow it to continue to oppress the Palestinians.
Living nose-to-nose in the Levant with Israel has not been comfortable for Syria. Its enduring goal has been to find a way to contain Israel. It has therefore sought to acquire a certain deterrent capability, if not by military means - not an easy task in view of the Israel Defence Forces's overwhelming power - then by expanding its network of allies and friends.
Iran has been Syria's strategic partner for 30 years, indeed ever since the Islamic Revolution of 1979 overthrew the Shah, ending Iran's alliance with the US and Israel. And Hezbollah has been Syria's main partner in Lebanon, ever since this resistance movement emerged in the early 1980s to fight Israel's occupation. Hezbollah forced Israel's final departure from Lebanon in 2000, and successfully resisted its latest assault in 2006.
Syria's backing for the Hamas government in Gaza, together with the base it provides for Mesha'al in Damascus, underlines its view that Hamas, much like Hezbollah, is not a 'terrorist organisation' but a legitimate movement of national resistance to Israeli occupation and aggression - a view widely shared throughout the Arab world, and which Europe and the US itself will no doubt have to come to in due course.
Syria has already established better relations with European heavyweights such as France, Spain and the Britain, and with Russia and China. It has consolidated its close ties with Turkey. It has also found common ground with Qatar and Iraq.
An illusion, still entertained in some quarters in the US, is that peace with Israel might induce Syria to sever its links with Iran and Hezbollah, and abandon the Palestinians to an uncertain fate. Such thinking suggests a misunderstanding of the vital interests which Al Assad since 2000, and his late father former president Hafiz Al Assad, have been determined to defend.
Patrick Seale is a commentator and author of several books on Middle East affairs.
