SYRIAN TRAGEDY – AT 11:18 P.M. ET:  Friday is the major day for demonstrations in many Arab countries.  Today was no exception in Syria.  There was bloodshed, and plenty of it, as the regime cracked down once more.  And there was the usual wringing of hands in Western capitals.  From Fox: 

BEIRUT -- Defying government guns, thousands of Syrian protesters poured down city streets and a main highway Friday to press demands for President Bashar Assad's ouster. Security forces opened fire, killing at least 15 people, including two children, activists said.

"Our revolution is strong! Assad has lost legitimacy!" a YouTube video showed protesters chanting in Zabadani, a suburb of Damascus, the Syrian capital.

Syria's streets have become the stage for a test of endurance between a 3-month-old pro-democracy movement, bloodied but resilient, and an iron-fisted but embattled regime. The latest round of protests and killings came as international pressure mounted on Assad.

"We will not stand by while the Syrian regime uses violent repression to silence its own people," British Foreign Secretary William Hague said after the European Union expanded sanctions -- asset freezes and travel bans -- to more members of the Syrian leadership.

Take that, dictators!  Asset freezes!  Travel bans!  That's right, some Syrian leaders will no longer be able to visit Belgium!!!

The Syrian opposition says 1,400 people have been killed as the government has cracked down on a movement demanding an end to four decades of Assad family rule -- a popular uprising renewed each Friday after weekly Muslim prayers.

Five people were killed by security forces' gunfire this Friday in Barzeh, a Damascus district 3 miles from the city center, said the Local Coordination Committees, which track the protests. But Syrian state television offered another version, saying gunmen, otherwise unidentified, had opened fire on security personnel and civilians, killing three civilians and wounding several security force members.

The Syrian regime late Friday said that the demonstrations consisted of 64,000 "thugs."   Lots of thugs, apparently, in Syrian streets.

The Friday protests show no signs of letting up.  At the same time, the regime shows no signs of stepping down.  It's an ongoing tragedy, and the wrist slaps by the West are having no apparent effect.  Indeed, the Western countries, flying the NATO flag, can't even get rid of Gadaffi in Libya.

American leadership is nowhere to be found. 

June 24, 2011