Legitimizing Assad? A short-sighted and self-defeating strategy

17 Nov

Rime Allaf, November 17, 2021

Download the paper: https://www.kas.de/en/web/syrien-irak/single-title/-/content/legitimizing-assad

Despite proclamations to the contrary just one year ago, there is now little doubt that the US and the European Union (EU) have given their tacit agreement to some countries’ normalization with the Assad regime, even as the latter’s grip on power continues to cement and strengthen the hold of Iran and its militias on the region. If Assad’s rehabilitation happens without exacting concessions from the regime and its main supporters, the ground is being laid for long-term failure and continuous instability in Syria and the region, leading to an inevitable perpetuation of the cycle of revolt and repression.

Functional Paralysis

Foreign policy under President Donald Trump was considered erratic by most observers. With the exception of his position on Iran, made clear at the beginning of his term with the annulment of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), Trump repeatedly surprised allies and foes alike with random decisions that didn’t seem to fit into a studied strategy. It was expected that the election of President Joe Biden would bring American leadership back to the world stage, a hope that was partly based on Biden’s own declarations to that effect. In February 2021, he confidently told allies gathered at the Virtual Munich Security Conference that “America is back.”[1]

As he nears his first anniversary in office, however, Biden has not met most foreign policy expectations, leaving allies unsure about the direction the US is choosing to take. The recent AUKUS[2] political fiasco (whereby the US pressured Australia to renege on a $66 billion deal with France for the sale of French diesel-electric submarines, and purchase US-made nuclear submarines instead) was an unexpected indicator that US-EU relations were neither a priority for Biden, nor considered a solid basis for confronting current global challenges. Biden has decided to focus on South East Asia, in particular on future challenges with China. This not only leaves Europe alone to deal with issues closer to home, such as Russia, but also disregards the potential of change with new leadership in Germany and possibly in France. These factors not only affect cooperation between global powers themselves, but also affect the weight of their influence over trouble spots such as the Middle East, and above all Syria, where China will also be consolidating its political and financial presence.

By having provided no direction on his policy for the most pressing and central issue of the Middle East, Biden has by now made it clear that he is unwilling to spend either additional time or resources there. Syria has barely been mentioned in US foreign policy addresses, whether by the president or by Secretary of State Antony Blinken, whose diplomatic team is still missing a Special Representative for Syria Engagement following the departure of Ambassador James Jeffrey; this leaves only Ethan Goldrich, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Levant affairs and Syria Engagement,[3] in charge of the Syria dossier. US officials have limited themselves to making occasional statements, such as the obligatory protests at the Security Council when debating the border crossings allowing humanitarian aid to flow into Syria. The US has presented the ensuing resolution UNSCR 2585,[4] allowing a mere 6-month extension of the current open border crossing of Bab Al Hawa (to be renewed for another 6 months), as a success[5] of its diplomacy, even though the UN-approved border crossings have gone down to just one.

Looking the Other Way

As concerning as this apparent detachment may be, it is not this intentional inaction that is the most worrying aspect of US policy under the Biden administration. The current lack of US direct engagement on Syria is supplemented by a clear – if not yet entirely overt – decision to facilitate the rehabilitation of the Assad regime by traditional allies in the Middle East, such as the Arab Gulf states. This casual largesse is also noticeable from a number of EU governments. While the US continues to claim it will not support such a rehabilitation or normalization,[6] it has not protested other countries’ overtures, unconvincingly claiming it was a step it would “not encourage.” Moreover, the US is also disregarding the stated desire of some European countries, including EU states, to re-establish relations with the Syrian dictator.

The US has also allowed regional transactions for oil, gas, and electricity from Egypt and Jordan to pass through Syria, under the guise of helping Lebanon avoid economic collapse.[7] By blessing these deals, the US is contravening its own obligations under the Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act,[8] which mandates that countries, entities, and individuals dealing with the Assad regime be sanctioned.

All of this points to a notable shift in US policy on Syria, despite the perceived inaction of the Biden administration. With none of Trump’s rash judgements and knee-jerk diplomacy, Biden is following a deliberate policy of delegating – and even sub-contracting – the problem to forces already in place to work it out among themselves, leaving the rest of the region to fall back into tried and tested arrangements.

America’s withdrawal from Afghanistan has led to questions on US troops still stationed elsewhere in the world; for the time being, this is not likely to have a direct effect on some 900 US troops in northeastern Syria. Stated US policy on the subject is that the small contingent will remain as long as the US continues to support the fight against the terror organization Islamic State.[9]

However, with the much publicized abandonment of many Afghan nationals who had worked with the US,[10] the assurance of future US support now carries lighter weight, leaving local allies such as Kurdish factions and the Syrian Democratic Forces uneasy about the reliability of their strongest sponsor.

As long as they do not drag the US further into the Syrian quagmire, Biden is resigned – if not outright happy – to let Russia, Turkey, and various regional actors deal with Syria and other troubled spots. While US policy previously appeared to be indecisive, signs now point to determination in this calculated estrangement from the region, with the rationale that it has no impact on America. In reality, this distancing does nothing to protect US or global interests, and is a de facto embrace of Iran’s entrenchment, through its numerous violent militias, in every country to its western border, namely Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon.

Regression of International Principles

Like the United States, international organizations are slowly but surely reverting to treating the Assad regime’s survival as a fait accompli; in turn, this means considering Syria to be a regular, functioning member state on the global arena, despite the immense amount of evidence documenting the regime’s crimes against humanity, and despite the ensuing sanctions that Western democracies have imposed on the ruling clique. Suddenly, none of that seems to count or matter.

Most notably, in May 2021, with no objections from its member states, the World Health Organization appointed Syria to sit on its Executive Board.[11] This was allowed to happen even though the United Nations had already declared that the Syrian regime and its allies were deliberately attacking hospitals, clinics, ambulances, and first responders (often with the help of the Russian air force), and had even launched an inquiry[12] on these attacks. The airstrikes on hospitals in Syria have also been thoroughly documented by international medical organizations and independent media.[13]

In October 2021, Interpol[14] announced it had allowed Syria to rejoin its network, giving it renewed access to its database – a powerful tool for a regime with no tolerance for dissent. The Syrian regime had been subject to “corrective measures” since 2011, as the regime’s military repression of the peaceful uprising began. For many Syrians around the world, this move has triggered fears that the regime would now find it easier to pursue its critics, wherever they are.

A study by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, published in October, highlighted how the Assad regime was appropriating for itself millions of dollars in humanitarian aid,[15] by forcing the United Nations to use its Central Bank’s official exchange rate. In 2020, this amounted to $60 million, or half of the foreign aid money, going straight into the pockets of the Syrian regime. The amount increases to $100 million[16] when taking into account transactions made in 2019.

Many Syrians were taken by surprise when the United Nations declared in October that the death toll, in what the UN terms Syria’s civil war, is now calculated to be “at least 350,000”[17] (a far lower figure than most human rights organizations’ tolls). While the UN did state that this figure was an undercount, it contradicts its own previous Special Envoy to Syria, Staffan de Mistura, who five years earlier had already estimated the death toll to be at least 400,000 Syrians.[18] Given that de Mistura’s estimate preceded the Syrian regime’s and Russia’s fierce military assaults on Aleppo (2016), Ghouta (2018), and Idlib (ongoing), in addition to the regular regime and Russian airstrikes, or killings by torture all over Syria, it is challenging to accept that the UN could find no further victims in the last five years. In contrast to the UN, the Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect estimates that at least 580,000[19] Syrians have been killed since 2011. The estimates of most Syrian organizations are much higher.

With its questionable arithmetic, the UN contributes to the weaving of a new narrative that conveniently fits proponents of normalizing the Assad regime. A lower death toll to be touted as the civil war’s sad result, and a blurring of the lines between civilians and armed combatants, makes it easier to justify the increasingly rampant storyline that Syrians and the world should now turn the page and rebuild the country. No regard is given to achieving justice, or even the prerequisite accountability for the massive crimes against humanity committed by the regime since 2011.

At the same time, however, the United Nations, and the international community, persist in paying lip service to the Constitutional Committee mandated by UNSCR 2254, even as Special Envoy Geir Pedersen continues to describe the rare talks as a disappointment,[20] blaming the regime for the latest failed round.[21] This comes after Pedersen’s ever vaguer and weaker stipulations that the talks should follow a “step-for-step, step-by-step” approach. In the current climate of pre-rehabilitation of the regime, with not even the slightest pressure on Assad to budge on minor points, it is clear that no real pressure will be exerted on Assad to comply with the other basic demands of Resolution 2254, such as the release of up to 200,000 arbitrarily detained persons who have disappeared in the regime’s prisons.

Elsewhere on the international arena, Assad allies, and allies of his allies, are using refugees and migrants as pawns. To retaliate against European sanctions, imposed because of President Alexander Lukashenko’s repression of peaceful protests and his hijacking a flight to arrest a journalist,[22] Belarus has resorted to weaponized migration[23] by luring Syrians and nationals of other countries to Minsk, and then depositing them on the border with Poland. The latter throws them back into freezing woods, triggering the “Fortress Europe” advocates and reigniting the debate on how to send them – and other refugees – back. Lukashenko is also giving Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has faced minimal consequences for his invasion of Ukraine and annexation of Crimea, another chance to flex his muscle with the EU.[24]

In Denmark, after arbitrarily deeming Syria a safe country to which refugees could return, authorities have revoked the temporary residence from dozens of refugees[25] and forced them to choose between immediate return to Syria or life in a deportation camp.[26] All respected international human rights organizations, however, continue to decry such practices and stress how unsafe Syria remains for Syrians, including in the latest Human Rights Watch report describing the abuses Syrians face upon return.[27]

And while nobody seems to attach great importance to the matter any longer, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) has just confirmed, yet again, that the Syrian regime continues to use chemical weapons, including a “new chemical weapons agent found in samples collected in large storage containers in September 2020.”[28] The Assad regime’s well documented[29] usage of chemical weapons in attacks on civilians continues to have long-term repercussions, causing a wide range of physical ailments in survivors and deformities in newborn babies on which more studies are necessary.[30]

The New Arab Dome

There is certainly no love lost between even the closest Arab regimes, and Bashar Assad had particularly excelled in infuriating various leaders at different times of his reign. Today, they all seem to agree that their collective interest supersedes their personal distaste for the Syrian dictator. For the Arab League’s members, the time is nigh to put to bed, once and for all, notions that protests and revolutions could be tools of change or reform in the region. In this respect, once again, united they stand.

In 2018, the United Arab Emirates was the first to re-open its embassy in Damascus, and to speak of a new economic and financial relations era. While several Arab countries such as Bahrain and Oman quietly followed suit, no substantial changes were made until recently. The pace of normalization quickened considerably at the United Nations General Assembly this year, where Assad’s foreign minister met with a dozen of his Arab counterparts. A phone call between Assad and King Abdullah of Jordan ensued, leading to a resumption of flights between Jordan and Syria, and to renewed cooperation between their respective intelligence chiefs. In preparation for this rapprochement, Jordanian authorities had begun targeting Syrian organizations and media, even forcing Syria Direct to close its Amman office.[31]

To further facilitate Assad’s reintegration, even when important states such as Saudi Arabia have not yet taken a public stance on rehabilitation, Egypt is now openly lobbying for a return of Syria to the League of Arab States,[32] a simple formality which would mark the official end of Assad’s estrangement from the Arab fold. On November 9, 2021, the UAE’s Foreign Minister arrived on an unannounced visit to Damascus with a senior delegation to meet with Bashar Assad.[33] The taboo has been broken, allowing other Arab countries to extend their hands to the regime.

As Arab world leaders begin to rally once more around their collective need to kill – figuratively and literally – the younger generations’ dreams of democratization and freedom, some European countries have also begun to normalize relations with Damascus, while others are speaking about the necessity of re-establishing diplomatic ties. They include Greece, Hungary, Austria, Cyprus, and Bulgaria, and a growing number of political parties in other European countries that are pushing the issue, and the expulsion of refugees, into the public agenda.

Full reintegration into the Arab League is just a matter of time, and Assad is gradually being liberated from the burden of waiting for the EU’s financial contributions to the selective reconstruction he will choose to make; soon, he will be able to rely partly on Arab funding – with a push from select European states – to direct money to the areas and the fields he wants.

These developments impact not only Syrians, but also indirectly affect the lives of a majority of people in the region. For the most part, all pretense of reform in the Arab world has evaporated as the old mantras of stability and security retake precedence, and as advancements on democratic, judicial, and all social indicators are relegated to a fleeting period of history. All over the Arab world, people are being given the illusion of choice between two absolutes: a strongman, or chaos (or worse).

Civil liberties are eroding even further for Arabs, while stagnation in the economy and other sectors continues. For the ever-growing youth component in the region, prospects are dim. For Syrians, hope has practically evaporated. In all cases, frustration and despair are inevitable consequences of this regression, with serious repercussions of their own.

Déjà Vu

While these developments are in many ways unprecedented, given the sheer magnitude of the toll paid by Syrians and others, this is not the first time that the region has witnessed a volte-face of this nature. For the Assad regime, it is déjà vu.

After the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafic Hariri in February 2005, attributed to Assad and his ally Hezbollah, Syria experienced a sudden isolation similar to one it had gone through in the 1980s; that had followed Hafez Assad’s entanglement in the attempted downing of an El Al flight from London, in what became known as the Hindawi Affair.[34] Hafez Assad had reintegrated the international community with the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990, and with his agreement to take part in the coalition to liberate the Gulf state in 1991. For his troubles, Assad was offered the multilateral Arab-Israeli peace process launched in Madrid,[35] after having gained support for Syrian influence over Lebanon with the Taif Accord.[36]

The assassination of Hariri and the forced retreat of Syrian troops from Lebanon pushed Syria into isolation again, both from the international community and from the Arab world. After Israel attacked Lebanon in July 2006, destroying much but unable to crush Hezbollah, the latter grew even stronger and began dictating its demands on other Lebanese parties, paralyzing the country for nearly two years before turning its arms on fellow Lebanese in May 2008.[37] This precipitated the Qatar-sponsored Doha Agreement,[38] which catapulted Bashar Assad, Hezbollah’s ally, back to the international arena. Weeks later, he was seen beaming in Paris as he mingled with other heads of state on the Champs-Élysées, watching the July 14 parade.[39]

In its 51 years of power, the Assad regime has learned the lesson well: as long as there are no credible threats to its survival or serious pressure to change its actions, it pays to wait, especially with the support of consistent and dedicated allies with long-term imperial ambitions, like Russia, or with unshakable religiously-mandated goals, like Iran.

This looming rehabilitation, however, does not resemble previous rehabilitations the Assad regime has been granted. This time around, it comes after the complete destruction of Syria (mostly through the regime’s and Russia’s airstrikes, missiles, and heavy artillery), the killing of hundreds of thousands of Syrians, the forced disappearance, arbitrary detention, and torture until death of tens of thousands, and the creation of well over 13 million refugees and displaced persons. Under every definition and according to every legal document to which UN member states adhere, the Assad regime has committed massive crimes against humanity – including several chemical massacres – for nearly 11 straight years.

In anticipation of his return, Bashar Assad treated himself to an unparalleled celebration for his so-called re-election, taking the notorious Assadist cult-of-personality obsession to insane new heights. Videos taken in the streets of every Syrian city, and particularly Damascus, showed an Orwellian scene of giant posters of Assad lining practically every inch of the city’s main avenues. The icing on the cake was an alleged score of 95.1%[40] of votes he accorded himself (with voting only allowed in government-controlled areas,[41] and in Syrian embassies abroad). And with 95.1% of 14 million votes, Assad even managed the prodigious feat of receiving more votes than there were people eligible to vote (under the regime’s own rules) in the first place.[42]

The victorious Assad was merciless with Syrian opposition after the events of 2005 and 2006, jailing many of the Syrian writers and intellectuals who had dared express their support to the Lebanese[43] seeking justice; there is little doubt he would be even more ruthless today with all those who stood in opposition to the regime over the last decade.

Cui Bono?

It is once again through the good graces of Iran’s regional militias, primarily Hezbollah, that circumstances are returning Assad to the limelight. The effect of Russia’s military intervention in Syria since 2015 was certainly catastrophic, with relentless airstrikes and carpet bombing all over the country. However, it was Iran’s militias that were the actual boots on the ground for most of the war, sent to repress the peaceful uprising from the beginning. On behalf of the regime, these militias besieged towns and areas, carried out urban warfare on a massive scale, committed massacres, and actively organized and implemented the demographic engineering that has changed the face of the Syrian landscape. Without them, Russia would have had to bomb a lot more Syrians, over a lot more ground, for a lot longer.

The impunity of Hezbollah is manifested not just in Syria, but even more so in Lebanon where the powerful militia no longer pretends to play politics. Not only did Hezbollah demand that Judge Tarek Bitar[44] be removed from the inquiry over the August 4, 2020, explosion in Beirut, but its leader Hassan Nasrallah then boasted, threateningly, that his militia counts over 100,000 fighters.[45] Hezbollah also arranged for Iranian oil shipments[46] to enter Lebanon, demonstrating that Iran’s flex in the country is now stronger than it has ever been, and that circumventing sanctions was feasible in broad daylight.

Iran’s militias have dug their heels in the rest of the region as well, becoming the most powerful and most lethal non-state actors. In Iraq, while no group has claimed responsibility for a failed assassination attempt by drone on November 7, 2021 on Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa Al-Kadhimi,[47] the Iran-backed militia Kata’eb Hezbollah gave a sinister statement claiming there were “less expensive and more guaranteed ways to cause harm to the prime minister.”

Before he took office, some observers had hoped that President Biden would try to condition a re-negotiated nuclear deal with Iran and exact some concessions from the Islamic regime, curbing Iran’s influence and interventions in the region. The US is said to seek the removal of the JCPOA’s sunset clause, and to address Iran’s missile program in a new agreement.[48] At his General Assembly speech in September, however, Biden stated he was prepared to return to full compliance if Iran was ready to do the same.[49] In response, Iran has demanded that the US first guarantee it would not leave the deal again.[50]

The rehabilitation of Assad, and the full normalization of relations between Arab states and Syria, is of huge political, military, and financial benefit to Iran. If Arabs revive economic and trade ties, they will be lifting some of Iran’s financial burden in supporting the Assad regime, leaving it more flexibility in financing the never-ending war efforts of its various militias. Ironically, while Arab states, led by the Gulf, have tried to limit Iran’s reach over the past years, even orchestrating an embargo on Qatar in the process to counter some influence, it is those same Arab states that are strengthening Iran even more by normalizing with Assad, and by imposing an embargo[51] on Lebanon in protest at statements critical of Saudi Arabia’s role in Yemen, made by its Hezbollah-backed minister of information.

Russia also stands to gain considerably from a reset on Syria. While it has enjoyed the clout of serious influence over a region once dominated by US interests, it now needs to claim total victory, and to reap the financial rewards that will come with it. For now, US and European sanctions stand in the way. During his October meeting in Sochi with Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennet, Russian President Vladimir Putin even asked for Israel’s help in easing US sanctions on Syria.[52]

Putin also recognizes that he needs a long-term solution to Russia’s cohabitation with Iran, with Turkey, and with the small US presence in Syria. While the overall status quo in Idlib is unlikely to change drastically in the near future, Assad’s reintegration into the international community would certainly give Putin some advantages over his Turkish counterpart, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, with whom he dances the most delicate pas de deux.[53]

Both need to navigate relations with the European Union. President Erdogan does hold several cards that hold sway over Europe, and to a certain extent over the US and other fellow NATO members, most important of which are the Syrian refugees over whom Erdogan has made a lucrative deal with the EU to prevent their migration. At the same time, on the same subject, he is facing increased popular resentment and intense backlash from Turkish opposition leaders, some of whom have publicly promised they would send Syrians back if elected.[54] On the other hand, President Putin holds the “Nord Stream 2” card, forcing Europeans to rely on Russia for the flow of gas.[55]

If Assad is rehabilitated with no counter-concessions from his sponsors, Assad will have won big, but Putin will have won even bigger, on a much broader world stage.

Syrians Still Waiting for Godot

Meanwhile, as various powers decide on their fate, Syrians have been dutifully waiting for the justice and accountability they have not only been promised, but that they have been made to learn and adopt in their civil society initiatives in exile. Countless millions of dollars continue to be spent on Syrians to cruelly make them parrot, if not apply, noble norms of democracy, inclusivity, and other aspirational concepts – even while reality shows them that they are unattainable, and even while bombs continue to fall on Syrian areas that the regime and Russia are keen to recapture. Some European governments simultaneously hold on to a different fantasy, that of Syrian refugees’ prompt return to the motherland, en masse, as soon as the world has declared that the war is over.

As they wait, Syrians are being forced to pay extortionate amounts of money to the regime to delay their military service ($8,000) or to renew their passports ($800).[56] In all areas where the regime is in control, Syrians are just as much prisoners and hostages to the regime as their displaced or exiled compatriots are. And yet, the economic downfall in Assad-controlled Syria is now increasingly portrayed as a consequence of Western sanctions, rather than of Assad’s destruction and plundering of the country. To continue financing the regime, in addition to the millions siphoned off Syrian citizens and international humanitarian aid, Syria has become a narco-state,[57] with the mass export of the drug Captagon bringing the regime more of the hard currency it needs.

For millions of refugees and displaced Syrians, there seems to be no way out of their predicament. Even if they were able to come back to Syria, or to move back to their original areas within Syria, their homes have either been bombed, confiscated, or assigned to others in the extensive demographic engineering strategy that has redrawn lines in numerous cities. Returning refugees (over 6 million between Turkey, Lebanon, and Jordan) would have no prospects, even if they were lucky enough to escape arrest, or worse, upon their return to the country.

Refugees are not even certain of their future in their current host countries. The mood is increasingly anti-refugee in Lebanon as the country collapses, and there is uncertainty about refugees’ fate in Jordan following the reconciliation between the two regimes. In Turkey, home to the largest Syrian refugee community in the world, anti-Syrian sentiment is also rising and more vocal, and the Turkish government is taking stringent measures following even the most banal incidents. For instance, the recent planned expulsion of several Syrians has created much uproar in the diaspora; their offense was posting sarcastic videos of themselves eating bananas on TikTok,[58] in response to Turkish citizens’ complaints about inflation and their inability to afford the fruit.

Everywhere they find themselves, in varying degrees of danger and uncertainty, Syrians’ resentment and bitterness is growing, especially when they begin to consider that all their suffering may have been for nothing as the world continues to turn away from them. Societal chasms have multiplied and expanded everywhere, and it is difficult to imagine that anything short of accountability, justice, and some form of transition could allow the country to move forward – especially when this is what Syrians have been told was needed for over a decade.

Accepting the prevailing situation and moving on, as the international community is pushing them to do, still leaves an entire generation of Syrians without education, without sustenance, without prospects. Just as importantly, it also still keeps them under the suffocating stranglehold of a ruthless regime on its way to a second half-century of power.

Relentless Dereliction of Duty

President Biden has promised Americans and the world that relentless diplomacy[59] would henceforth replace relentless war. While this is an admirable aspiration, the past decade has amply demonstrated that diplomacy, statements, and empty warnings have failed to deter perpetrators of horrific crimes against humanity. In fact, they have had the opposite effect: they have empowered authoritarian regimes and their authoritarian sponsors, and given the latter an ever-expanding realm of influence as they carry out repression with increasing audacity. Aspiring dictators have taken note of this indifference and have been encouraged to up the ante: if nobody stopped the genocidal Assad regime, nobody will stop them either for similar crimes.

With Syria, the international community has consistently demonstrated an acute lack of leadership and a relentless dereliction of duty. This has cost Syrians nearly everything, but it has also cost the region –and even Europe – much as well.

As history has shown time and time again, appeasement cannot be mistaken for diplomacy. Normalization with proven perpetrators of war crimes and crimes against humanity is guaranteed to be a harbinger of even bigger problems yet to come, especially as this will be at the expense of real stability, peace, and democracy – and not just in Syria.

On the sidelines of global diplomacy and backstage bargaining, disinformation on Syria, and on the alleged conspiracy that has been in the works for a decade against Assad, is adding to the social unrest in the region and beyond, fueling both extreme left and extreme right political discourse. Such disinformation is “proving” that Western intentions had always been bad and are nefarious by default, whereas the involvement of Russia and China brings the necessary balance to help people live in peace.

It is dangerous for democracies to remain passive as authoritarian regimes gain increasing control (both physical and ideological) over hotspots, from the Middle East to various points in Eastern Europe and beyond. And it is sheer folly to allow them to control the narrative, creating a revisionist version of events that brazenly denies facts and discredits people’s sincere ambitions to live in basic dignity, one of the most important triggers of the peaceful Syrian uprising of 2011.

Diverting from the Incoming Impasse

The only solution to ending Syria’s war has so far been a military one, waged by the regime, Russia, and Iran and its numerous militias which are running wild all over the region, exerting significant control in four Arab countries (Yemen, Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq). There is no place any longer for traditional diplomacy, as relentless as President Biden promises it would be.

That said, the window to empower defected Syrian soldiers and armed resistance to the regime has closed years ago, as has the window for the no-fly-zone that Syrians pleaded for and that would have prevented much of the catastrophe.

The only real tool available remains strong and consistent sanctions, but only coupled with real pressure to comply with the only legal instrument that could start to fix Syria: UNSC Resolution 2254. Both proponents and enemies of Assad know full well that for the time being, there is absolutely no serious international will to make this happen – perhaps a reflection of the international community’s own conviction that this is only a pretend solution. Even so, this inadequate and weak resolution is rumored to have become outdated for Russia, now said to be looking for ways to re-negotiate previously accepted parameters on the way forward for Syria.

It is not enough for the United States to declare it does not encourage countries to normalize ties with the Assad regime. It is not serious for the US to pretend adherence to its own sanctions regime when it allows for waivers that maintain the regional status quo, while simultaneously imposing the most puzzling sanctions this summer on selected Syrian prisons, which one would assume would have been subject to sanctions anyway.[60]

It is ludicrous and immoral to push Syrians back “home” while doing absolutely nothing to retrieve their dwellings and create the conditions (above all, safety) enabling a real mass return. The international community is merely delaying the inevitable outcome: the implosion, once again, of a people that have nothing left to lose, and the renewed vicious cycle pitting the Davids of the region against the Goliaths that America and Europe have allowed to grow, unhindered.

Neither rehabilitation, normalization, nor ad hoc sanctions relief can help Syrians and the region move forward and rebuild. There must be accountability and justice, and the region’s authoritarian leaders and their swarms of violent non-state actors must be reined in to avoid more wars. Imagining that the whiplash will be contained regionally is pure fantasy; for 11 years, what happened in Syria has reverberated across the world.

As longtime advocates of human rights, democratic values, and personal freedoms, the US and the EU should stop selectively practicing what they preach and demand war criminals’ accountability. Anything less than that would be Chamberlainian.

[1] https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2021/02/19/remarks-by-president-biden-at-the-2021-virtual-munich-security-conference/

[2] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/oct/29/biden-admits-macron-us-was-clumsy-submarine-deal

[3] https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2021/09/biden-administration-appoints-new-syria-policy-chief

[4] https://reliefweb.int/report/syrian-arab-republic/security-council-extends-use-border-crossing-humanitarian-aid-syria

[5] https://usun.usmission.gov/remarks-by-ambassador-thomas-greenfield-at-a-un-security-council-stakeout-following-the-adoption-of-a-resolution-on-the-syria-cross-border-mechanism/

[6] https://apnews.com/article/abdullah-ii-antony-blinken-bashar-assad-damascus-lebanon-ffcf492a15c5b9363c9cf8e5c531ff54

[7] https://english.alaraby.co.uk/analysis/lebanons-desperation-gives-opening-assads-salvation

[8] https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/31/text

[9] https://www.politico.com/news/2021/07/27/troops-to-stay-in-syria-biden-500848

[10] https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/u-s-withdrawal-leaves-afghan-allies-grappling-fear-anger-panic-n1278144

[11] https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2021/06/12/1005283283/syria-bombs-hospitals-now-it-will-help-lead-the-world-health-organization

[12] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-syria-security-un/strikes-on-syrian-medical-facilities-appear-deliberate-u-n-idUSKBN1XI1JG