Syria: The Progressive End of its Isolation
The Syrian Arab Republic, which was one of the six founding members of the Arab League in 1945, and a country that became a leader of Arab nationalism under the reign of Hafez al-Assad (1970-2000), has been isolated by its neighbors for more than a decade now.
While the Western world quickly became viscerally opposed to the regime of Bashar al-Assad, it was the Arab states that were the first ones to take action to put an end to the Syrian regime’s bloody repression of demonstrators in the spring of 2011. In October 2011, they forced al-Assad to pledge to stop the violence, release all detainees, withdraw troops and artillery from Syrian cities, and ensure the free movement of Arab League observers and international media. It was the violation of these commitments that led to the suspension of Syria from the Arab League, and the attempt to create a project of regime transition through dialogue and free elections, supervised by a government of national unity.
But a decade later, although the war is not yet officially over, Bashar al-Assad is still in power, about to emerge victorious from a civil war where fighting is becoming increasingly rare and where the stagnant situation suits him for the moment.
If the Syrian issue is not yet fully concluded, the issue of sanctions and the country’s isolation arises. Since 2011, the country has been under international sanctions and embargoes from the United States, the European Union, the Arab League, etc. But one of the most important sanctions taken, and still active to this day, is the Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act of 2019. The Caesar Act is a U.S legislation that sanctions the Syrian government for war crimes against the Syrian population and allows the sanctioning of all entities doing business with Syria. This was originally intended to compel Russian and Iranian companies to do business in Syria, but it also impacts the Middle East states and companies that would like to invest in the reconstruction of the country and offset years of economic losses due to the indirect consequences of their sanctions.
After more than a decade of war, there is a real regional desire to move on. In the past few years, relations between Arab countries and Syria have begun to warm up : the United Arab Emirates has planned to build a solar plant after the meeting between the two foreign ministers, Bahrain has reopened its embassy and resumed bilateral talks, Jordan has reopened its border, Egypt is trying to reintegrate Syria into the Arab world, etc.
The powerful earthquake of February 6, 2023, in Turkey and Syria, which killed more than 50.000 people (including at least 6.000 in Syria) and injured more than 100.000 people, has led to a major humanitarian crisis. Faced with the magnitude and urgency of this crisis, it has become vital to alleviate Syria’s isolation: the United States announced the suspension of sanctions for 180 days in order to facilitate humanitarian aid, and the European Union followed suit by easing its own sanctions.
This earthquake and the outpouring of Arab support are seen by Bashar al-Assad as a major opportunity to break out of his isolation. On February 20, the Syrian President quickly visited the Sultanate of Oman and welcomed the “joint cooperation” and “efforts to consolidate security and stability in the region”. A few days later, the Egyptian Foreign Ministry went to Damascus to meet with its Syrian counterpart for the first time in a decade, and Bashar al-Assad met a delegation of Arab parliamentarians from Iraq, Jordan, Palestine, Libya, Egypt, Oman, Lebanon and the United Arab Emirates.
This earthquake has accelerated the process of rehabilitation of Syria in the Middle East political space, which began a few years ago. This is a will shared by a significant number of countries in the region, led notably by the United Arab Emirates (where the Syrian President made a state visit on March 19), to bring Syria back into the Arab fold. These countries understood that Bashar al-Assad will not vanish anytime soon, and that the strategy of isolating Syria only strengthens the Iranian presence in the country, especially their military presence through its Shiite militias, which pose a threat to neighboring countries. All this is in line with the gradual withdrawal of the United States from the region over the past years, in order to make room for regional players.
After more than a decade of war, it is time for pragmatism. The geopolitical and economic realities of the Middle East make it necessary to reintegrate Syria into the regional political space, even though some of these same countries have worked hard to bring down the Syrian leader over the past years.
There is still a long way to go for Syria to regain the place it once occupied. This can only happen once the civil war has ended 500.000 deaths and 12 million displaced people later, the rebels no longer have the means to overthrow the regime, and the regime does not seem to have the means to recover uncontrolled territories for the time being. Even if a U.N solution to the conflict seems impossible due to the Russian veto, peace will only come through negotiation and concessions by the Syrian regime to the oppositions, which Bashar al-Assad does not seem ready to do so for the moment, but could be forced to do in order to be fully reintegrated into the Arab League and the Arab world.
Image Credits: Vyacheslav Argenberg — Edited by GorStra team