The Syria flag painted on cracked ground with vignette.
Photo Credit: Aleksey Klints/Shutterstock.com

The Syrian uprising’s first stirrings in 2011 marked the Arab Spring’s arrival to a country ruled by a regime intent on holding onto power forever. But two and a half years after protests first broke out, the uprising has turned into a catastrophic civil war fueled by outside powers jockeying for their own interests.

Inspired by the fall of dictators in Egypt and Tunisia, Syrian children in the border town of Deraa drew anti-government graffiti on a school in February 2011. The arrests and brutal torture of the 15 young boys sparked protests that spread across the country. The Assad regime unleashed immense firepower on Syrian demonstrators calling for democracy and an end to the Assad family’s 43-year reign. The opposition then took up arms, eventually forming what came to be known as the Free Syrian Army (FSA), a ragtag group of fighters loosely organized to try to bring down Assad’s regime. While the FSA has taken over some territory, the Assad regime still exercises power in the country.

Meanwhile, the ongoing fighting has attracted thousands of foreign fighters, some of them radical Islamists, to take on Assad, who is viewed unfavorably by them because of his Alawite religious sect, an offshoot of Shiite Islam.

http://www.alternet.org/world/meet-major-players-who-turned-syrian-...