Previously undisclosed Pentagon plans for withdrawing 2,000 US troops from eastern Syria received scant attention last week, overshadowed by Donald Trump’s surreal Gaza pantomime. The troops help local Syrian Kurdish forces contain the residual threat posed by Islamic State jihadists, 9,000 of whom are held in prison camps. If the US leaves, the fear is of a mass breakout and, over time, a reviving IS terrorist threat to Europe, Britain and the west.
The mooted American pullout is one piece in a complex Syrian jigsaw puzzle that is challenging friends and foes alike following December’s toppling of Bashar al-Assad’s dictatorship. Unlike Trump, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states – competing for influence – want to get more involved in Syria, not less. Europe wants a stable, democratic state to which refugees can safely return. Israel, aggressively paranoid, sees only potential threats, while vanquished Russia and Iran seek to regain a foothold.
Caught in the middle is Ahmed al-Sharaa, former al-Qaida fighter, leader of the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) Islamist militia that ousted Assad, and Syria’s newly appointed interim president. On him, to an uncomfortable degree, depends the future of this devastated, divided country. Around him, the Middle East’s political geography and balance of power are being radically reshaped.
One question predominates. The fall of Assad was a rare good news story in a region desperately short of hope. Is the opportunity this popular revolution represents now in danger of being squandered?
In meetings with Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and Qatar’s emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani, Sharaa said his priorities were to protect Syria’s territorial integrity, unite rival factions in a national army, create an inclusive, elected administration and rebuild after 13 years of civil war. The task is enormous, Sharaa is inexperienced. Some doubt he has abandoned his radical roots. Yet, lacking good alternatives, helping him is a gamble regional leaders have to take.
Erdoğan, who backed the HTS rebels in their Idlib base, has his own selfish priorities. He hopes to exert long-term influence over this former Ottoman possession. He wants 3 million displaced Syrians in Turkey to go home – and lucrative reconstruction contracts. Above all, he wants an end to what he views as the Kurdish terrorist threat.
Sharaa’s proposed integration of Syrian Kurdish fighters – grouped in the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) – into his new national army suits Turkey. Erdoğan makes no distinction between the SDF and the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK), which has waged an insurgency in south-east Turkey since the 1980s. Turkish troops occupy areas of northern Syria. And Ankara sponsors the Syrian National Army – ragtag Arab militias that frequently clash with the SDF.
Turkey argues that it can lead the fight against IS, so there is no need for US forces to continue collaborating with Syria’s Kurds – a dubious proposition. But that conceit appeals to Trump, who unsuccessfully sought a US withdrawal in his first term. Now Trump says, shortsightedly, that Syria is “not our fight”. And it’s true that a US decision to dump its Kurdish allies would remove a key irritant in US-Turkey ties.
But there’s a snag – several, in fact. Syria’s Kurds understandably prefer to maintain the hard-won autonomy of their Rojava homeland. They don’t want to be absorbed into an army run by Sharaa, whose militia they once fought. And they have zero interest in helping Turkey crush the distant yet long-cherished dream of national self-determination in Kurdish majority areas of Syria, Iraq, Iran and Turkey – even if, as is reported, the jailed PKK leader, Abdullah Ocalan, is ready to throw in the towel.
Once again, the Kurdish cause faces a turning point – and risks a simultaneous collision with Damascus and Ankara.
Other regional actors may be happy to see Sharaa fail. Israel exploited the chaos surrounding Assad’s fall to devastate Syria’s armed forces. It has entrenched its occupation of the Golan Heights. Despite Sharaa’s calls for peaceful coexistence, Israel remains deeply suspicious of him and his ally, the Hamas-supporting Erdoğan, who is viewed as a possible future adversary. A weak, though not anarchic, Syria suits Israel’s purposes.
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Assad’s former backers, Russia and Iran, still lurk menacingly in the shadows. After its humiliating retreat in December, Tehran is talking about rebuilding influence via the back door, using “resistance cells” and covert networks. Russia, meanwhile, is shamelessly bargaining to retain its two military bases. In talks last month with Sharaa, whom Vladimir Putin spent a decade trying to kill, Russian diplomats were told that Moscow “must address past mistakes”. Sharaa also demanded that Assad be sent back from Moscow to face justice. But he was careful not to burn his Russian bridges. Western powers take note.
Sharaa faces myriad other problems, including how to advance a “national dialogue” and move towards promised elections, ensure minority rights really are protected and rebuild national institutions in a fractured land, most of which he does not physically control. It’s truly daunting. Whatever his past record, Sharaa – and the Syrian people – needs help in the present, for the cost of failure, measured in renewed chaos and misalliances, could be high.
Which is why another key problem – unconscionable delay in lifting Assad-era western sanctions – is so harmful and self-defeating. The EU, the UK, even Trump’s America, must stop prevaricating, stop calculating advantage and fully open the aid, financial, trade, security assistance and reconstruction spigots, working with local partners and the Arab states. It’s a rare opportunity to turn good news into a lasting success story – and serve western interests by building a friendly, prosperous, tolerant, democratic Syria.
It is a once-in-a-generation chance. It won’t come again. It could easily be missed.
