Washington, DC, December 10, 2024 --  

The civil war to overthrow Assad has ended. Now starts the battle over what comes next.

After Syria's former dictator Bashir al-Assad fled to exile in Moscow and opposition fighters arrived in Damascus, the 13-year civil war against the Assad regime came to an abrupt end. An exhausted Europe, which bore the brunt of the Syrian refugee crisis, is seizing on the opportunity to send back hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees. Austria this week announced plans to start deporting 100,000 refugees ¹ and many other European countries froze their asylum programs for those fleeing the Syrian Civil War.

If we had only the actions of European politicians to go by, you'd think a bunch of peace-loving hippies had taken over Damascus, singing Kumbaya and handing out cookies to children. Instead, the de-facto leader is an Islamist warlord named Abu Mohammed al-Golani with a two decade-long resume serving various Al-Qaeda and Islamic State factions. Hatred of Assad aside, he has little in common with other rebel groups in the country which include Kurdish and Druze factions, Turkish-backed militias, and pockets of Islamic State control. And this does not even include the remnants of the Assad regime, which included Alawite and Christian soldiers who shed their uniforms as rebel forces approached, unwilling to fight for Assad, but undoubtedly willing to fight for the future of their own families.

Much has been made of the transformation of rebel leader al-Golani from hard-core Islamist to a more moderate leader. Some of this transformation is clearly for show as he tries to consolidate power over all of Syria, but some appears real. He broke with the Islamic State and al-Qaeda in 2016, and after negotiating a cease fire with Assad in 2020, the group has spent the last four years focussed on pragmatically governing Idlib province under its Syrian Salvation Government. This Sharia-inspired government notably excludes women from the administration.²

In a best-case scenario, al-Golani and his entourage will work collaboratively with a broad coalition of the Syrian opposition to form an inclusive democratic government with liberal ideals. But is this really likely? Consider that for all his evidence of pragmatism, al-Golani is no liberal.

Much has been written on the subject of who is al-Golani. The truth is that nobody knows. Even al-Golani doesn't know. He is a work in progress -- for better or worse -- destined for further transformed by both allies and enemies throughout Syria. While this evolution will hopefully prove benevolent, history shows that it often does not work that way. Libya disintegrated into warring regional fiefdoms after the overthrow of Gaddafi. And neighboring Lebanon, with a similar ethnic and religious mix as Syria, suffered 15-years of sectarian civil war through 1990, and ever since subsisted with a weak central government with local dominance by regional militias.

Regional and global powers are preparing for the worst in Syria, realizing it is unclear who will end up controlling different parts of the country. Since the fall of Assad, the Israeli Air Force has been relentlessly striking the abandoned remnants of Assad's once-powerful military.³ The United States has been bombing Islamic State camps in eastern Syria⁴ and Turkey has been attacking Syrian Kurdish forces in Manbij just south of its border.⁵

Such Machiavelian behavior extends to Europe's treatment of Syrian refugees, too. Austria's Chancellor Karl Nehammer is no blind optimist who believes peace has forever landed on Syria's doorstep. He is just an anti-immigration hardliner who wants to quickly get rid of the refugees before fighting starts up again. However nefarious his motivations, let us all hope his purported optimism proves correct. Syria deserves every minute of peace it can get.

Related Web Columns:

A Bigger, Messier Lebanon, April 13, 2013

Notes:

1. Politico, Austria prepares to deport Syrian migrants after Assad regime falls, December 9, 2024

2. Syria Direct, ‘A long way to go’: Women left out of leadership in northwestern Syria, July 1, 2024

3. New York Times, Israel Says It Destroyed Syria’s Navy, Part of Wave of Post-Assad Attacks, December 10, 2024

4. Air and Space Forces Magazine, B-52s, F-15s, and A-10s Conduct Massive Anti-ISIS Airstrikes in Syria After Fall of Assad, December 8, 2024

5. Voice of America, VOA Kurdish: 3 Members of the Security Forces Were Killed in Turkish Airstrikes Near Manbij, December 10, 2024