There are ‘good guys’ in Syria — and the U.S. should continue to support them.
There are ‘good guys’ in Syria — and the U.S. should continue to support them.
T he recent scenes from Syria — bearded Islamists conquering the capital and toppling statues — are by now too familiar to Americans. President Joe Biden’s claim to share credit for the fall of Bashar al-Assad and the humiliation of Russia is risible, since it was his administration that gave sanctions relief to Iran — which, alongside Russia, had been propping up the Syrian regime — and withheld military aid to Israel, which is fighting Iran’s proxies. Besides, Biden’s presidency began with a comparable spectacle of humiliation during America’s withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Americans weary from failures at home and abroad welcome, now more than before, President-elect Donald Trump’s criticism of Biden’s and institutional elites’ failures. However, the U.S. can boast one success in the Middle East: the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES). That region’s Kurds, Christians, and Arabs, among others, not only produced the most reliable military force to combat ISIS — the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) — but also a pluralistic democracy, a rarity in the region. It would be unprincipled, and perhaps unwise, to abandon them now.
When Syria’s civil war began, almost 15 years ago, Christians — one of several minorities “protected” by the Assad regime — made up 10 percent of the population. In 2014, ISIS emerged as the strongest rebel faction and established a de facto caliphate across much of Syria and Iraq, even as Russia, Iran, and Hezbollah kept Assad in power in Damascus and other urban centers in Syria’s south and west. The U.S. initially tried to build an anti-regime force, a covert operation that failed abysmally. By then, ISIS had emerged as the most prominent threat. The Pentagon assessed that the most reliable partner was the emergent SDF, led by various Kurdish militias that included local Arabs, Syriac and Armenian Christians, and other minorities and anti-ISIS foreign volunteers. The SDF proved to be highly effective against ISIS and also managed to keep its territory largely independent of the Assad regime.
The Kurdish regions of Iraq and Syria, though politically and ideologically opposed, are among the most pluralistic and democratic in the Middle East. Like Israel, Kurdish areas are safer for Americans, Christians, and minorities. And, like the Israelis — and unlike many so-called U.S. partners in the Middle East — the SDF aren’t asking the U.S. to fight their battles; only for aid. With an Islamist government in control, the autonomous zone in Syria is in peril, as are the region’s Christians, Kurds, and others. Many experts believe that it’s only a matter of time before the new Islamist regime in Damascus, backed by Turkey and Qatar, replicates what it did while in control of the Idlib province. Its constituent factions have already conducted reprisals, stormed Shiite mosques, and threatened Christians.
“HTS is on their best behavior simply because they’ve gleaned lessons from the strategic blunders of ISIS and al-Qaeda,” said Rich Ghazal, a former U.S. intelligence officer, Syriac Christian, and president of In Defense of Christians. “Their current media campaign characterized by moderate rhetoric will not last; we know this simply from their Salafi ideology, supported by observation of increasing violence and harassment toward Christians. This is just chapter one.”
It’s not clear whether President-elect Trump will continue U.S. support for the SDF. He recently said he doesn’t think the U.S. should be involved in Syria. It should also be recalled that President Trump wanted a complete withdrawal of U.S. forces because he was furious that a senior official had misled him about actual troop figures, which were higher than the official reported; nor did it help that the official bragged about misleading Trump. That was a disgrace, to be sure, but one for which that official — not our reliable partners — should suffer the consequences.
Nor should Turkey and Qatar benefit. Turkey has long regarded Syria, once part of the Ottoman Empire, through a revanchist lens. The Syrian civil war gave President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan the excuse to attack the Kurds, the largest stateless nation in the world, in Syria. Now, Turkey is asserting neocolonial control over much of Syria, and conflict between the SDF and Turkey’s Islamist proxies is already under way.
Qatar, whose petrol-wealthy elite have funded Islamist extremism around the world, openly supports the Islamist regime in Damascus. Like Turkey, Qatar also supports Hamas. Almost as troubling is Qatar’s malign influence campaign in America: through think tanks, major gifts to universities, and funding of radical — and often violent — anti-Israeli and anti-American groups on U.S. campuses. Whether Trump’s team will recognize that material support for radicals on American campuses, for HTS, and for Hamas come from the same sources — and treat them accordingly — remains to be seen.
“Trump values counterterrorism,” Max Abrahms, professor and national security expert, noted in a call this week. He added:
Trump was very strong during his last presidency against the Islamic State, and the SDF and the Kurds more broadly were absolutely instrumental in destroying the caliphate. On the other hand, Trump has campaigned on “America first” and his advisers are intent on realizing this value by drawing down American forces in the Middle East especially. So, it’s very hard to predict which of these two arguments will end up carrying the day.
It may be that Trump, who prizes success above all else, will weigh Israel’s counsel heavily on the question of support for the SDF. Israel’s pronounced military successes against Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran, which paved the way for Assad’s rapid fall — and Israel’s subsequent destruction of Assad’s weaponry in days — puts it in enviable contradistinction to the national security “blob” and the Biden administration, which appears to have produced stalemate everywhere. The Israelis may also likely point out that the SDF can play a role in countering both Sunni Islamists and the resumption of Iran’s terror supply line through Syria. Whether such arguments will persuade President Trump remain to be seen.
In any case, the future of Syria’s autonomous region is precarious — so too is the safety of Christians there. Beyond the northeast, Syria’s Christians, perhaps 300,000 all told, previously lived in Assad regime–controlled areas, especially Damascus, the Latakia province on the Mediterranean, and Wadi al-Nasara, the famous “Valley of the Christians” between Homs and the coastline.
U.S. support for the Syrian autonomous zone and the SDF remains the best means to counter Islamist terrorists in the region, to protect Christians and other vulnerable minorities, to prevent a recurrence of genocide, and to deny Turkey and Qatar the opportunity to fill the terrorist vacuum created by the strategic defeats of Russia, Iran, and Hezbollah.