BEIRUT: Former Prime Minister Saad Hariri, his Future parliamentary bloc and other leaders in the opposition March 14 coalition Tuesday lambasted embattled Syrian President Bashar Assad for his defiant speech in which he vowed to crush his opponents with an “iron fist.”

The Future bloc criticized Assad for failing to talk in his speech about a peaceful transition to power after 10 months of massive public protests demanding his removal. However, Assad’s speech won praise from the rival March 8 camp, with a Muslim religious leader saying that the Syrian president’s “historic speech” has put Arab political action on the right path of “confronting conspiracies and strife.”

Hariri dismissed Assad’s speech as “ridiculous.” Asked by one of his followers to comment on Assad’s speech, Hariri said on the popular social networking website Twitter: “It’s actually ridiculous.” Assad “is in self-denial.”

Hariri, the head of the Future Movement which is leading the March 14 coalition, said Assad’s speech resembled his previous ones since a popular uprising engulfed Syria in mid-March, posing the most serious challenge to the Syrian leader’s 11-year rule. “[It’s the] same thing, it’s all a conspiracy,” Hariri tweeted.

In a speech lasting nearly two hours, Assad blamed what he called “a foreign conspiracy” for 10 months of public protests against his regime, pledging to restore order and strike terrorism with an “iron fist.” He also slammed some members of the Arab League as serving foreign interests and defended his conduct in dealing with the unrest in Syria.

“The foreign conspiracy is no longer a secret to anyone because what was planned behind closed doors is now clear before the people,” Assad said in his fourth public speech since the uprising began in March 2011.

“The priority today is to restore security and this will be achieved by striking terrorists with an iron first. There will be no compromise with terrorists or those who terrorize citizens or those who conspire against this country,” Assad said at Damascus University.

Assad scoffed at calls, mainly by the U.S. and French presidents, to step down as the only solution to end the bloodshed in Syria. He gave no sign that he was willing to relinquish the power he inherited on his father’s death in 2000. “I am not someone who abandons responsibility,” Assad said.

Hariri’s parliamentary Future bloc criticized Assad’s speech for ignoring the main objectives of the Syrian revolution: freedom and a peaceful transition to power.

“What was contained in President Bashar Assad’s speech today explains the Syrian regime’s ignorance of the magnitude of the political crisis facing the regime and its members. The main objectives of the Syrian revolution such as freedom, justice, dignity and a peaceful transition to power were completely ignored in today’s speech, while it contained a continuing and repeated condemnation of the Arab League and its role in protecting Syrian civilians and their just demands,” the bloc said in a statement issued after its weekly meeting chaired by former Prime Minister Fouad Siniora.

The bloc again stressed the need for the Syrian regime to comply with all provisions of the Arab League initiative to end the bloodshed. It said the Syrian regime’s obstruction of the Arab initiative was part of a policy “to pursue military operations against the Syrian people.”

The bloc also strongly regretted the continued killing by the Syrian regime’s forces of peaceful demonstrators despite the presence of Arab League observers.

A team of Arab League monitors has been in Syria since Dec.26, trying to assess whether the Assad regime is complying with the Arab League initiative aimed at ending its deadly crackdown on dissent. Although the initiative calls for an end to Syria’s violent crackdown on protesters, withdrawal of the Syrian army from restive cities, release of political prisoners and the granting of access to Arab observers and international media, the violence has continued unabated claiming more lives from both protesters and Syrian troops every day.

At a meeting in Cairo Sunday, an Arab ministerial committee gave their widely criticized observer mission to Syria the green light to carry on and pledged to boost the number of monitors. The committee’s decision came amid growing calls by Syrian opposition groups and protesters for the Arab League to cede to the U.N. the lead role in trying to end the bloodshed in Syria.

Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea, Hariri’s ally, criticized Assad’s speech, saying that it did not touch on the “reality of the crisis.”

“Ten months after the Syrian crisis began, Assad’s speech dealt with everything except the reality of the crisis. My first impression is that what he [Assad] presented were garbled ideas in a Byzantine logic. Assad painted a situation that has nothing to do with the existing reality,” Geagea told reporters at his residence in Maarab, north of Beirut.

He scoffed at Assad’s argument that “a foreign conspiracy” was behind the turmoil in Syria.

“Are all media outlets throughout the world participating in a conspiracy against Assad? I do not understand what is this conspiracy that can mobilize at least hundreds of thousands of Syrians since the revolution began? How can more than 10,000 Syrians be killed? Is it because they are agents of foreign powers?” Geagea asked.

As a solution for the Syrian crisis, Geagea called for a U.N.-sponsored referendum which, he said, can determine whether Assad should or should not stay in power.

Meanwhile, Sheikh Abdul-Amir Qabalan, vice-president of the Supreme Shiite Council, praised Assad’s “historic speech” which, he said, was characterized by “courage, transparency and clearness.”

“The speech re-redirected Arab political action toward confronting conspiracies and strife hatched by imperialist departments,” Qabalan said in a statement. He said the speech gave momentum to all free and honorable people in the Arab nation to rise up and confront the “dens of collaboration and terrorist gangs that are threatening Arab security in Syria.”

“President Assad has enhanced Syria’s standing and its regional role in embracing the plan to resist imperialist projects. This has buttressed Syria’s standing as a resistance fortress defending the dignity of the nation,” he said.