The real rule in Syria is by the mullahs of Iran

NCRI - The major power in the region without whose military support Assad would long ago have vanished: the dictatorship run by the Shia mullahs in Tehran. 

Syria shelling

Ever since his country fell apart, Assad's main support has been the Quds Force, the extra-territorial arm of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Crops. For years it has been fomenting terror across the Middle East, from Lebanon to Afghanistan and not least in Iraq, where its backing for Shia militias posed the most deadly threat to US and British forces throughout their post-2003 occupation.     
But in recent months the Quds Force in Syria has taken a very serious hit. Many of its senior officers, including its commander, Brigadier-General Hossein Hamedani, have been killed – and even the Force’s overall commander, Qassem Suleiman, has reportedly been injured.