Syria continues hitting top of the world news and concern. President Bashar Al-assad government carries on crackdown against armed and unarmed protestors across Syria. Opposition groups encourage anti-Assad regimes to help them launch a widespread military resistance to topple down the dictator. Western powers treat the problem with great circumspection. Assad's regional allies lobby for a diplomatic solution to end the crisis to save an Arab friend.

And the Syrian civilians continue suffering from bombardment, shortage of food, potable water, fuel, medicine and limitation of movement. Human rights groups are having eyes on the civilian death toll increasing rapidly. Next month will mark the first anniversary of year-long bloody demonstrations in Syria, with some public uprisings now concluded elsewhere across the Arab world.

It seems everybody is fed up with the situation and can no longer wait and see murders, tortures and arbitrary arrests by government forces in Syria. A year after the protests began with continued crackdown by Assad Forces, the Islamist Hamas, traditionally an ally for the Iran-backed Bashar Al-assad government, broke its silence on the year-long incidents in Syria.

Gaza premier Ismail Haniya hailed on Friday the "heroic" Syrian struggle for democracy during a rally at Cairo's Al-Azhar mosque, in a departure from the Islamists' refusal to criticise Damascus. "I salute all the people of the Arab Spring, or rather the Islamic Winter," Haniya told several thousand cheering people who attended a rally in support of the Palestinians and Syrians.

"I salute the heroic Syrian people, who are striving for freedom, democracy and reform," he added. Until now, the Hamas political leadership has refused to criticise President Bashar Al-Assad's crackdown on an 11-month long uprising, even when Assad's forces targeted a Palestinian refugee camp. Hamas's declaration of support for Syrian pro-democracy groups marks a fresh juncture in regional alliance of the Syrian government.

Exhausted by the growingly tough responses by Assad forces, the opposition groups are making repeated calls for regional and global help to end Assads period in Syria. The main opposition umbrella group the Syrian National Council (SNC) said on Wednesday it was coming to the view that military intervention was the only solution to the nearly year-old crisis that has killed thousands.

"We are really close to seeing this military intervention as the only solution. There are two evils, military intervention or protracted civil war," Basma Kodmani, a senior SNC official, had told a press conference in Paris. Attempting to break the last chains of regional supports for Syria, Kodmani said the SNC was also proposing that Russia, which has vetoed action against the Syrian government in the UN Security Council, help persuade Damascus to guarantee safe passage to humanitarian convoys ferrying aid to civilians.

The Syrian opposition groups hope and the world suggests the last toughest attempts unseat Assad. US president Obama has asserted the time has come to present Syrians with freedom, democracy and an era without Assad.

The European Union has made frequent calls to end the remaining regional supports for Syrian government and create an Assads-free Syria. With the Syrian opposition groups waiting for help, the Arab nations have been pushing for tougher actions against the incumbent regime. On Friday, western and Arab nations ratcheted up pressure on Syria's Bashar al-Assad. A meeting of more than 60 foreign ministers in Tunisia saw calls for Arab peacekeepers to intervene and for the arming of the opposition, as well as a US warning that Assad would pay a heavy price for defying international will.

In Tunis, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Assad would pay a "heavy cost" for ignoring the will of the international community after almost a year of brutal crackdowns on protesters. Host nation Tunisia called for an Arab peacekeeping force to be sent in to help end to the killings, and for Assad to be granted immunity to persuade him to stand down.

"The current situation demands an Arab intervention in the framework of the League, an Arab force to keep peace and security, to accompany diplomatic efforts to convince Bashar to leave," Tunisian President Moncef Marzouki said. "A political solution must be found, such as granting the Syrian president, his family and members of his regime judicial immunity and a place to seek refuge, which Russia could offer." He added.

Since few months later than uprising began in the Syria, President Assad's government offered certain political reforms and took steps to pacify the angry protestors. In the most recent political reform proposed by his administration, President Bashar al-Assad ordered a referendum on a new constitution that would create a multiparty system in Syria.

Syrians are today voting on a new constitution that could end 50 years of the rule of the Baath Party, though keep wide powers with the president. Such a change would have been unheard of a year ago, and Assad's regime is touting the new constitution as the centerpiece of reforms aimed at calming Syria's upheaval.

But after 11 months of bloodshed, with well over 5,000 dead in the regime's crackdown on protesters and rebels, Assad's opponents say the referendum and reforms are not enough and that the country's strongman must go. The White House also dismissed the referendum. Press secretary Jay Carney called the move "laughable" in light of ongoing brutality by the Syrian military and said it "makes a mockery" of the uprising.

The Syrian National Council has warned that military intervention might be the "only option" to end the crackdown. Western and Arab nations however have so far rejected the idea of a foreign mission like the operation that helped topple Moamer Kadhafi's regime in Libya.

But Saudi Arabia's Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal backed the idea of arming Syria's opposition. But the US President Barack Obama's administration said last Tuesday it did not favor arming Syria's opposition but did not rule out the idea completely amid deadly clashes with Bashar al-Assad's regime.

Senator John McCain, a senior Republican and Obama's rival in the last presidential election in 2008, made a new call on a visit to the region for Syria's rebels to be given weapons to "defend themselves." "From our perspective, we don't believe that it makes sense to contribute now to the further militarization of Syria," State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland had told reporters. "What we don't want to see is the spiral of violence increase. That said, if we can't get Assad to yield to the pressure that we are all bringing to bear, we may have to consider additional measures," she said.

Russia and China however were notable by their absence, highlighting the difficulty in building an international consensus on Syria. Both countries have frustrated efforts to rein in Assad's regime, including by vetoing UN Security Council resolutions.

However, militarization of solutions to end Assad's rule on Syria remain quiet prevalent and get more supporters. With the efforts remaining in vain, President Obama's administration is said to be searching for intervention measures to help the Arab Spring succeed in Syria.

A US official told the newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat that the Pentagon is readying for the possibility of a military intervention in Syria. According to the official, if the UN Security Council does not pass a resolution to take action against the massacre of civilians in Syria, the US will create a buffer zone for refugees near the Turkish border, provide them with medical aid and might also announce an aerial blockade on parts of the country.