It was Deraa that sparked the revolution and it is the flame that the regime hopes to finally extinguish

For years, the southern Syrian city of Deraa has been expecting this moment. Now into its second week, the Assad regime's offensive against the rebel-held area has already killed dozens and displaced tens of thousands of civilians. There will be more deaths as government helicopters continue to drop barrel bombs and Russian fighter jets patrol the skies above.

The Free Syrian Army (FSA), which still controls the city, has vowed to keep fighting but with the eyes of the world turned elsewhere – and with the regime intent on using the same brutal tactics it has used to retake other rebel areas – it might only be a matter of time.

Deraa has long expected the wrath of the regime to fall upon it because, of course, that was where the uprising first began. It was in the southern city that in 2011, as uprisings swept Egypt and Tunisia, the first graffiti, then the first chants, then the first protests demanding the fall of the regime began. It was Deraa that sparked the revolution and it is the flame that the regime hopes to finally extinguish.

What started in Deraa spread to every corner of the country and the uprising that became a war has devastated Syria. The southern city is one of the last places that still has a significant FSA presence but, with a “de-escalation” agreement falling apart, with Russian jets pounding the city and with the US telling the FSA that Washington will not intervene, it certainly appears to be a matter of when, not if, the FSA is driven out.

Certainly the regime thinks so. In the run-up to this latest – and the regime hopes, last – offensive against Deraa, the Syrian army dropped leaflets warning that “being stubborn and persistent with carrying your weapons won’t change the end result”. The Assad regime is intent on killing the revolution in the city in which it was born.

Whether or not it can do that does not depend on the weapons of the regime but on the ideas of the rebels.

There has long been a distinction between the armed opposition and the “revolution”, between the means of achieving the fall of the regime and the ideas that animate that desire.

The ideals of freedom and justice that still motivate many Syrians around the world exist mainly through an amorphous collection of activists, civil society practitioners and journalists. The ideals certainly continue to exist but what that "revolution" would look like in practice today is very difficult to say.

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The Syrian revolution is not dead, say its most implacable supporters. And yet most of the political vehicles for the ideals of the revolution – the opposition-run councils in rebel areas – have gone or been taken over by armed militias. The civilians and civil society activists who started the intellectual and political side of the revolution have been killed, jailed or exiled.

As the war devolved into brutal fighting between hydra-headed militias, outside funding dried up to all but the most effective and extreme groups.

Even those inside and outside Syria who started off sympathetic to, or even openly supportive of, the revolution have walked away, repelled first by the brutality of the conflict and then by the sheer destruction the revolution unleashed. It began to seem as if the slogan of the Assad regime was really true: it was “Assad or we burn the country” – and the country was burning.

If the revolution still exists, then, it will need to be rediscovered, and in exile or underground within Syria.

It will mean taking the ideals of the revolution, of throwing off the chains of a security state and building a society rooted in (as the early protestors repeatedly demanded) dignity and translating that into both a political platform and one with a road map to power. That will not be easy for a divided, exiled and leaderless group of activists.

Yet the number of civil society initiatives and councils that were set up across Syria in rebel-held areas, even under extreme military pressure, suggests there remains a desire to see the revolution work in a concrete way. If that revolutionary spirit can be channelled, then the revolution might survive.

The Syrian revolution –at least, this stage of it – will not end with Mr Al Assad leaving power. It will not lead to the fall of regime, in the way the first protesters in Deraa hoped. But if those who still believe in the ideals of the revolutionaries can find a way to rethink its goals and organise an opposition movement, it can still have an impact.

Part of why the revolution struggled to succeed was because it did not have an answer to what Syria would look like without Mr Al Assad. Now those who still believe in the aims of the revolution must ask what it will look like with him still in power.

If they can do that, the revolution does not need to die in Deraa.

Skewed figures

In the village of Mevagissey in southwest England the housing stock has doubled in the last century while the number of residents is half the historic high. The village's Neighbourhood Development Plan states that 26% of homes are holiday retreats. Prices are high, averaging around £300,000, £50,000 more than the Cornish average of £250,000. The local average wage is £15,458.

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Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.

Real estate tokenisation project

Dubai launched the pilot phase of its real estate tokenisation project last month.

The initiative focuses on converting real estate assets into digital tokens recorded on blockchain technology and helps in streamlining the process of buying, selling and investing, the Dubai Land Department said.

Dubai’s real estate tokenisation market is projected to reach Dh60 billion ($16.33 billion) by 2033, representing 7 per cent of the emirate’s total property transactions, according to the DLD.

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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.

Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.

“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.

“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.

Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.

From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.

Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.

BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.

Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.

Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.

“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.

“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.

“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”

The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”