Slim chance for peace envoy’s call for festival truce

The Tunisian diplomat Lakhdar Brahimi's effort to negotiate a Syrian truce for the Muslm Eid festival next week has little chance of succeeding although Turkey and Iran joined the call. DEBKAfile: Assad will not respond, aware that the mediator will do everyting he can to extend a limited truce. He will therefore hold out for assurances of the rebels’ drawback from their positions in the main battle arenas and the stoppage of Turkish, Saudi and Qatari assistance to the forces fighting him as his price for accepting a ceasefire.