Just how did that happen? Mysterious regime methods in Syria

"Assad’s intelligence apparatus did everything it could to stoke sectarian fears and blunt the protesters’ message of peaceful change."  I am really eager for someone to explain to me how this happened? How did they "stoke sectarian fears" and how did they "blunt the peaceful message" of protesters? You mean to tell me that the same people who were early supporters of Nusrah and the various Islamist brigades were actually secular democrats but were transformed by the mysterious never-defined process by the which the regime "stoke sectarian fears" and "blunted the peaceful message"?  How did this happen?  The New York Times was specific and they kept referring to a way in which Bashshar "stoked sectarian fears": they said (through Anne Barnard) that he kept referring to rebels and protesters as "Sunni extremists".  But when I pointed out that the never ever used such words, they had to print one of their defensive corrections.