With the world’s attention focused on the nations listed in President Bush’s Axis of Evil, one rogue Middle Eastern country is getting a free ride: Syria. The Syrians have been detaining the Damascus correspondent of the London-based newspaper Al-Hayat, Ibrahim Hamidi, since December 23, 2002. His crime? Apparently he published “false information.” Mr. Hamidi quoted sources in a December 20 dispatch saying that the Syrian government was preparing to take in up to 1 million Iraqi refugees if America attacks Baghdad. In Syria, publishing “false information” can carry a penalty of up to three years in prison and a $19,500 fine, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, a New York-based group that terms Mr. Hamidi’s detention “a flagrant violation of the internationally guaranteed right to freedom of expression.”

The New York Sun certainly doesn’t see eye to eye with Al-Hayat or Mr. Hamidi on many issues. But, here in America, government officials and others manage to have disagreements with journalists without throwing them in prison. This latest by the dictator at Damascus, Bashar Al-Assad, reinforces what almost everyone knows but nearly everyone keeps quiet about: Mr. Assad is one of the worst despots in the Middle East. But the international community, America included, insists on letting him be. The Syrian tyrant openly supports Palestinian Arab suicide bombers, houses terrorist organizations like Islamic Jihad and Hamas in Damascus, illegally pumps and sells Iraq’s oil, and is reportedly hiding weapons for Saddam Hussein. Not to mention Syria’s 25-year-old occupation of Lebanon.

All this and Mr. Assad still gets invited to 10 Downing Street for a meeting with Prime Minister Blair and has an audience with Queen Elizabeth. Senator Specter, a Republican of Pennsylvania, met with Mr. Assad Sunday at Damascus, where the senator expressed “appreciation” for Syria’s efforts to help “the Middle East be a more secure and stable region.” No word from Mr. Specter on whether it’s worth jailing journalists to achieve stability. The State Department has long been too deferential to the Assad regime. Its spokesman, Richard Boucher, said Foggy Bottom is “troubled” by Mr. Hamidi’s arrest. But it’s time America did more than express its concern about Syria and took some real action.