By Nir Boms and Erick Stakelbeck
For Bashar Assad, the diffusion of last weekend’s anti-government riots in northern Syria represented a dodged bullet, as his Ba’ath Party was ultimately able to maintain its tyrannical grip over the lives of 22 million Syrians.
For Syria’s democratic reformers, however, the unrest may merely have signified the calm before the storm.
As of Tuesday, armed police continued to stand guard on the streets of Qamoshli in northeastern Syria, where the atmosphere remained tense following the largest uprising against the Syrian Ba’ath Party in years.
