Turkey and the U.S. were the key backers of HTS - a former offshoot of ISIS turned Western ally - in its surprise victory over the Bashar Al-Assad regime in December.
Ankara hoped this would give it a role in rebuilding Syria under the HTS and also help eliminate the PYD/YPG threat in north-eastern Syria. However, neither goal materialized.
Only seven months after the power change in Damascus, it is not Turkey, but Israel, followed by the U.S. and Saudi Arabia that are now influential in Syria. Although Turkey remains dominant in the occupied northern strips of Syria, it failed to establish new bases, let alone an airbase in mid-Syria, because of Israel’s opposition. Furthermore, Turkey failed to curb the PYG/YPG through the so-called “Free Syrian Army” which it trains and finances, although the HTS government requires every militant group to join the new central army.
Furthermore, Turkish citizens, unlike Arab nationals, can only travel to Syria on a very expensive visa, and Turkish companies have so far failed to grab any major deals.
So far, the government led by Ahmed Al Sharaa, Syria’s interim president, has failed to integrate the YPG into the central armed forces. The Kurds in north-eastern Syria demand nothing short of autonomy. Sharaa’s meetings with YPG leaders and Mazlum Abdi, the military commander of the SDF (Syrian Democratic Forces - an umbrella organisation dominated by the Kurds but also including local Arab tribes), bore no fruit although on March 10 the Kurds agreed to recognise the central government as well as Syria’s political unity and territorial integrity. In exchange, the central government was obliged to recognise the Kurdish identity denied for decades under the old regime and work with Kurdish administrations in the north-east, decentralisation by the back door and autonomous rule in reality.
IS HTS THE RIGHT CHOICE?
Events have confirmed the concerns of many, including this writer, as to whether the HTS, with its “former” terrorist roots and jihadist ideology, was the right choice to bring peace and civilization.
The Kurds were first to come under attack. They could defend themselves because they had armed organisations, which some say are stronger than the central Syrian forces. However, Alawites and Christians lack such resources. In early March, jihadist groups massacred Alawite civilians in the Latakia region. The fact that these jihadist groups were attached to central government forces raised eyebrows in many countries, but no action was taken against the Sharaa government. Soon afterwards, Christians were bombed in their churches near Aleppo by ISIS affiliates. And lately, the Druze community came under attack by Bedawi groups and the jihadist groups that committed massacres in Latakia. The Druze were saved by Israel’s intervention and their own armed resistance. Israel, in its pursuit of defending the Druze, even bombed the Defence Ministry and the Presidential Palace in Damascus, which severely dented the Al Sharaa government’s prestige and authority.
Although the Sharaa government tries to distance itself from these massacres as a peaceful and neutral force, distrust is growing in opposition areas, especially Alawite, Kurdish and Christian communities. Meanwhile, the government gets undeserved credit from the U.S. and the West.
SYRIA IS MORE UNSTABLE THAN THE ASSAD REGIME
Despite support from Turkey and Arab countries, Al Sharaa’s Syria is more unstable than under Assad. Law and order have collapsed. Not only are jihadists attacking vulnerable non-Muslim and non-Sunni communities, but criminal gangs are carrying out kidnappings and armed robberies. On top of that, Israel has crippled the Syrian armed forces. If there is one military power to be reckoned with in Syria, it is the IDF.
Under these conditions, no community can be compelled to lay down arms and embrace the central forces. The only way out of this chaos is to allow every community decentralised powers through which they can enjoy security and create conditions to prosper. Otherwise, instability and violence will lead to greater disruptions, even civil war, which may end in the dismemberment of the country - a worst-case scenario for Turkey.
And here lies Turkey’s dilemma: if Ankara continues to pressure the Syrian Kurds to accept a centralised authority, this will alienate them more from any aspirations to a united Syria. This will even disrupt the ongoing Kurdish process in Turkey. Therefore, it is in Turkey’s best interest to let the Kurds of Syria seek their own way of integration within the country, a path that Ms. Ilham Ahmet, foreign relations representative of the SDF, recently mapped out.
