The same is happening in Aleppo, where regime-supported Christian militias are setting up checkpoints and conducting house searches. Some Armenian Christians are also reportedly following suit. Late last month, the Higher Council for the Syrian Revolution issued a statement urging Armenians not to take up arms alongside the regime. It noted that in Aleppo and Kasab-north of Lattakia-some Armenians were manning checkpoints, and their houses were being used by Assad's paramilitaries.
Similarly, some Druze factions are also taking part of this regime-supported effort. In the Damascus suburb of Sahnaya, for instance, Druze men are also reportedly manning checkpoints in order keep out rebel units. There had long been rumors that Assad loyalists, like Lebanese Druze figure Wiam Wahhab, have been working to arm and mobilize Syrian Druze on the side of the regime.
This phenomenon pushed Lebanese Druze chief Walid Jumblatt to attack those "shortsighted" Druze factions, who, "in collusion with some notables in [the Druze] Jabal al-Arab, are seeking to drag the Druze, after arming them, into a confrontation with the revolution, for the benefit of the regime." Jumblatt saw in this drive to arm the minorities, as well as the recent bombing in the Jermana suburb, an effort to instigate them to fight the Sunnis on behalf of the regime.
Assad's ploy, however, is unlikely to solve the problem of his continuously dwindling manpower. None of these minorities is eager to enlist in Assad's army, and most choose to flee the country instead. Nor is it clear that the disparate, small-scale formations of Druze and Christian neighborhood militias will be sufficient to embroil the FSA and limit its increasing expansion. In other words, the military significance of this strategy is highly questionable.
Rather, the move is primarily political. Assad seeks to assemble the minorities around him in order to present himself as the sole and unavoidable interlocutor on behalf of these segments of Syrian society, where he has cultivated loyal patches.
Realistically, Assad's only viable strategy is to maintain his hold on loyal, but contracted territory, mainly in the coastal mountains, and secure Damascus and parts of Aleppo for as long as possible, in the hope that such a prolonged stalemate would force a negotiated, power-sharing settlement with him.
Iran supports this endgame, as evident from its recent call for a contact group on Syria, as well as from the statement by Hezbollah MP Nawaf Musawi that the solution in Syria can only be a Lebanon-style "no victor, no vanquished" compromise settlement.
The endgame for the US and its regional and international allies, however, should remain unchanged: the total eradication of the Assad regime. As for Syria's minorities, one can only hope they don't foolishly choose to allow Assad to ride on their backs. Either way, tailoring policy to their contours is not the way to go.
