BEIRUT: Former Prime Minister Saad Hariri said Monday Syrian President Bashar Assad will fall and called for putting an end to “massacres” carried out by Syrian authorities in Homs and other Syrian cities. “Bashar thinks he can outsmart the Arab League and the world, he will fall so hard,” Hariri wrote on micro blogging website Twitter.

Tweeting in the evening, Hariri lashed out at the Syrian authorities and described the Syrian President as a “liar.”

“From now on I am not going to be diplomatic about the Syrian regime or anyone that supports them,” he wrote.

Hariri said the Syrian government should be stripped from all powers, suggesting that a no-fly zone be imposed and called on Arab countries to join forces with Turkey to oust it.

“This Syrian regime has no respect for any holiday in Ramadan the killing increased and now Christmas the same [thing happened],” he added.

Hariri is one of the most prominent people on Twitter in the Middle East, according to the pan-Arab newspaper Ash-Sharq al-Awsat.

With 63,206 Twitter followers, Hariri, the only Lebanese mentioned in the report, came in eighth place.

The recently published list puts the Future Movement leader in the company of well-established Twitter users, such as Jordan’s Queen Rania, who topped the list with nearly 1.8 million followers, Egyptian activist and IT executive Wael Ghonim, coming in second, with nearly 3 million followers and Queen Noor – the former queen of Jordan – in third place, with nearly 124,000 followers.

This report comes less than two months after Hariri started engaging in live Twitter sessions with his followers, discussing everything from sensitive political issues – such as violence in Syria and the Special Tribunal for Lebanon – to his personal daily life in Saudi Arabia, where he currently resides.

“Well it’s about time to make this more up close and personal, you’ll be hearing from me more often and I’ll be around as much as I can,” the former prime minister tweeted in his first live Twitter session on Nov. 5.

This was followed by at least a week of nearly daily live Twitter sessions. Since then, Hariri has engaged with his followers nearly daily.

Ayman Itani, a Beirut-based social media consultant, said that assuming the public figures were the ones really posting messages on their Twitter accounts, “this gives them a way to have further insights. Usually they get reports from aides and other sources.”

Speaking to The Daily Star Monday, Itani said: “It is a good way for [public figures] to get feedback.”

Over the past several years, Twitter has become an important political tool, particularly in the Middle East, where ordinary citizens have used the micro-blogging site to break news and organize demonstrations.

Other Lebanese politicians have also embraced Twitter, allowing their constituents unprecedented personal contact with them.

Hariri Monday said National Dialogue sessions if revived will not bear fruit and will not come up with a solution concerning Hezbollah’s arsenal. “I think dialogue about the defense strategy is a joke because you are talking to someone who doesn't listen,” he said in reference to the armed group.