Assad of Syria rejoins the Arab community after years of exile

 Twelve years after being spurned, Arab nations have gradually accepted Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime back into the fold as the winner of an ongoing conflict. 

Even while Assad does not yet have complete control over Syria, the Arab support for his government helps to legitimize it in the poor, war-torn nation.

"Assad has simply rejected compromise and waited for his enemies to give up, and it worked," said Aron Lund of the think tank Century International. They are gradually returning to shake his hand and act as if the previous ten years never occurred.

More than ten years ago, Saudi Arabia and a number of other Arab nations severed ties with Assad, and in 2011, as several major powers bet on Assad's downfall, the Arab League, which is located in Cairo, suspended Damascus's membership.

But before nine Arab states gathered in Jeddah on Friday to discuss allowing Damascus back in, Syria's Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad traveled to the region's economic superpower Saudi Arabia on Wednesday for the first time since civil war broke out in 2011.

Lund told AFP that rehabilitation sends ‘a message to the opposition that Assad will ultimately triumph and that their foreign backers will betray them.’

Syria’s war started when the suppression of nonviolent anti-government rallies in 2011 turned into a bloody battle that drew in outside forces and Islamists from around the world.

Around half of Syria's pre-war population has been evicted from their homes, and more than 500,000 people have been dead.