Syria's Political Earthquake: What Happens Now is Difficult to Predict

The collapse of the Bashar al-Assad regime in Syria is testimony to the fate of authoritarian regimes. The end comes suddenly – and with a speed that is sometimes baffling. Last month, the Bashar al-Assad regime appeared solid and all-pervasive, and on Sunday, 8 December, it was gone.The Assad family’s brutal 54-year-long dictatorship had seen many ups and downs, including a long civil war that began in 2011 but which had ended in a stalemate with rebels occupying large parts of the country.What the world and the region confront now is yet another political earthquake in the year which has seen war in the Middle East. The future of the country remains unclear, but Assad’s downfall has implications for Syria’s allies like Russia, Iran, and Hezbollah who had helped Assad to remain in power since the uprising of 2011.As Bashar al-Assad’s Regime Falls in Syria, What Changes in the Middle East?Assad’s defeat took less than two weeks, beginning with an offensive that the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) rebel alliance launched on 27 November – the day the Israel-Lebanon ceasefire took effect – from the small northwestern enclave they controlled in Syria. Two days later, on 29 November, they took Aleppo, Syria’s second largest city, and kept going south as the Assadist army simply melted away. By 5 December, they had captured Hama, and then Homs, the third largest in the country.As the HTS forces entered the city, Assad fled Damascus by Sunday morning for Moscow, leaving the capital to an assortment of rebels who had risen in southern Syria and moved from Deraa northwards to Damascus. Other rebel groups are also on the move, notably the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a Kurdish militia that controls large parts of eastern Syria and is being helped by the US in its fight against the Islamic State (IS) and the pro-Assad forces.The denouement is an unintended outcome of two different conflicts – one in Lebanon and the other in Ukraine. The assistance provided by Russia, the Hezbollah, and Iran had given us the illusion of stability in Syria. But with Russia mired in Ukraine, Iran weakened, and the Hezbollah defeated by Israel, the edifice came apart like a house of cards even as Assad tried futilely to enlist support from various Arab regimes. So, he fled as Syrian Prime Minister Mohammed Ghazi al-Jalali announced that he was ready to cooperate with any leadership chosen by the people.The HTS began life as an al Qaeda outfit, but it shed that baggage in 2017 and emerged as a locally focused group whose goal is to establish Islamic governance in Syria. This has enabled it to incorporate various other Syrian opposition groups under its fold. It has even appealed to the Christian and Alawites and other minorities not to leave Syria. The HTS leader Abu Mohammed al-Golani has signalled stability when he declared that public institutions “will remain under the supervision of the former prime minister until they are officially handed over.”The Syrian events have their origin in the March 2011 protests and civil unrest in Deraa against President Assad’s regime inspired by the Arab Spring. As is the norm in Syria, these were violently put down and spurred widespread protests across the country.By April 2012, most observers began to term the situation in the country as being akin to a civil war. 2013 saw the emergence of extremist factions, including the IS and the Jabhat el-Nusra, which made the civil war more complex. The ISIS originated from the al Qaeda in Iraq and expanded into Syria around 2013, and for a while, controlled an area with a population of over 12 million, ruling with extreme brutality. But countered by American, Iraqi, and Kurdish forces, the Islamic caliphate collapsed by 2019. Today, it controls only small pockets of territory in central Syria.Old Images Peddled as Recent Visuals of US Military Carrying Airstrikes in SyriaIn 2015, Russia intervened militarily to support Assad’s regime and altered the balance of power there – and this led to a recapture of Aleppo by the Syrian and Russian forces in 2016.The victory was a major turning point and solidified Assad’s control and weakened the opposition. By 2019-2020, the situation had developed into a stalemate with the Assad government controlling the bulk of the country, but the HTS established in Idlib province, the Kurds in north-western Syria, and the IS in controlling pockets of eastern Syria and Iraq.The war resulted in a severe humanitarian crisis in Syria, giving rise to the displacement of millions of people, some of whom fled abroad. Efforts to work out a political resolution foundered as the Assad regime consolidated itself across Syria barring rebel enclaves.Russia and Turkey undertook talks in Astana aimed at arriving at a ceasefire and the creation of de-escalation zones in 2017. This was a complementary effort to one initiated by the United Nations in Geneva which aimed at the creation of a constitution supported by the Syrian people and a free election under their supervision. But progress was hard to come by.Confronted with the current HTS offensive, officials from Iran, Russia, and Turkey met in Qatar on 7 December to discuss the developments, but there was little agreement given the swift pace of events.What happens now is difficult to forecast. The best organised force – the HTS – will want to govern Syria. It has over time broadened its appeal and runs a competent administration in the Idlib province. But there are other rebels in the equation itself, representing the diversity that is Syria. But the HTS may not have the wherewithal to run all of Syria.The biggest potential regional gainer is Turkey which has a 900-km border with Syria and hosts 3 million refugees. There is little doubt that the HTS was backed by Turkey in launching its offensive, though Ankara is linked to the Syrian National Army which is active in northern Syria and is involved in operations against the Kurdish rebels in Syria and Turkey. Donald Trump made the American position clear when he said, “This is not our fight," though the US has since carried out air attacks at suspected Syrian chemical weapons sites.The Israelis for their part have occupied small bits of Syrian territory, claiming that they are doing so as a temporary measure to ensure their security against unforeseen developments in Syria. The big losers here are Iran which loses the ability to supply the Hezbollah overland through Syria. There is also a big question mark about the future of Russian naval base at Tartus on the Mediterranean Sea and the Hmeimim air base near Latakia.Syria is a complex mix of Arabs, Kurds, Turkmen, Circassians, and smaller groups of Armenians, Assyrians, and Yazidis. Some 75 percent of the population is Sunni — Arabs as well as Kurds — and 11-12 percent Alawites, an Islamic sect close to the Shias and have held political power in Syria historically. The Assads, both his father Hafez and Bashar, are Alawites who also held privileged positions in the army and the government. Some 10 percent of the population is Christian and there are smaller Muslim sects like the Ismailis as well.The rebels are not a monolithic group, though the HTS is probably the best organised and effective, as are the Kurds in their northwestern enclave. There is every possibility that after an initial phase of calm, they will start fighting with each other and divide the country along sectarian lines.(The writer is a Distinguished Fellow, Observer Research Foundation, New Delhi. This is an opinion article and the views expressed above are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for them.)

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Syria's Political Earthquake: What Happens Now is Difficult to Predict

The fallout of the Syrian civil war is bound to impact Assad's allies like Russia, Iran, and Hezbollah.

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Topics: Syria Bashar al-Assad