To Ammar Abdulhamid – a prominent opposition member in the United States who is adjunct fellow at the Foundation for Defence of Democracies – exile is the wrong place to look for Syrians around whose charisma, political ingenuity and force of intellect an opposition will somehow coalesce.
“Syria’s future leaders are in Syria,” he says. “The political process will be determined by Syrian actors, despite all the dabblers and the dabbling taking place.”