Ammar Abdulhamid is a Syrian dissident and pro-democracy activist. A profile of him in today’s New York Times magazine is worth reading.

While he “harbors mixed feelings about the United States’ decision to invade Iraq, he says he believes that the American presence in the region is vital to the prospects for reform.”

Writer Lee Smith also notes that for “the last half-century, the Islamist movement and Arab regimes themselves have pushed Arab liberals to the sidelines. As a result, the Arab world’s democracy activists and intellectuals do not enjoy the same advantages their Central and Eastern European counterparts did back in the 80’s: whereas the generation of Havel and Walesa was backed by the Catholic Church and its Polish-born pope, Arab activists enjoy no such solidarity with any established Muslim institutions. … Even so, the liberals seem to be gathering a little momentum.

Martin Kramer talks about Abdulhamid here.