The American Spectator

I snapped this picture on Saturday in front of the White House, where anti-Assad activists held a demonstration against the Syrian regime. As you can see, they waved Syrian flags alongside the pre-1969 Libyan flag that has been adopted by anti-Gaddafi rebels. In the minds of pro-democracy activists, the uprisings against various Arab tyrants are very much linked.

At the protest I caught up with Mohammed Abdallah and chatted a bit about his father Ali’s recent arrest. Ali Abdallah and other political prisoners have been on a hunger strike, and Mohammed sounded a bit concerned about his dad’s health. His brother Omar remains in prison for blogging; Mohammed was hopeful that Omar would be released soon, as his sentence is nearing its end.

The day this demonstration was happening in Washington, protests were also snowballing in Syria, and have continued, breaking out into full-scale civil unrest in some places; regime opponents have set government buildings on fire in the city of Daraa. Michael Totten has some thoughts on that. To keep an eye on developments in Syria, you can follow Ammar Abdulhamid on Twitter. You cannot, however, access the website of the pro-democracy Tharwa Foundation where Abdulhamid works; if you try you’ll find that it’s currently down. Abdulhamid told me on Saturday that they were hacked; the attack, naturally, can be traced back to Syria.