(MENAFN - Khaleej Times) THE MASSACRE in Hama is another grim reminder of the fact that Syria is slipping into the abyss of chaos and anarchy.
The daredevil manner in which more than 80 civilians were massacred in the sleepy towns, with many of them being stabbed to death and later their corpses burnt, vindicates the assumptions that carnage has a stint of personalised vendetta.
It would not be out of proportion to read ethnic, sectarian and power politics inclinations behind the mayhem that Syria is experiencing. The undeniable fact, however, is that there are groups apart from the ruling Baath Party-driven security forces who have their own vested objectives to achieve, and the crises-ridden Arab country is merely on the receiving end.
The Hama slaughter has come close on the heels of bloodshed in Houla, which also saw around 100 people being crushed to death. The fact that international condemnation, and even Russia's annoyance against President Bashar Al Assad's regime, hasn't come to dither the trend of violence is quite worrisome. This hints at the marginalisation that this mess has reached and the scary shadows under which the traumatised nation is being made to live.
Syria is surely on the brink, and one cannot rule out many more such mass killings given to understand that the society is deeply split, and law and order and writ of the government have ceased to exist. This equation is surely compounded with the volume of foreign interference that the country is witnessing in the form of arming the host of militant groups that call them part of political opposition.
One cannot rule out the possibility of many such small and big groups working for their own interests rather than furthering the aims of dislodging Assad's government under the umbrella of a united opposition alliance. The situation is no different from what Afghanistan experienced, or is experiencing, in the absence of governmental writ and undue foreign meddling.
The point is that the world community cannot just sit back to lament on repeat of such massacres. Something serious and substantial has to be done. The political-cum-diplomatic format is in a state of limbo, as upsets in the form of Houla and Hama only come to further the blame game tendency and deflect attention from consistently implementing the United Nations-Arab League sponsored Six-Point peace plan. This trend of exigency and apathy has to go. Syrians cannot be left to count dead bodies anymore.
