By Bret Stephens. / The New York Times
Things could still go badly for Syria following the abrupt downfall of Bashar al-Assad on Saturday and the end of 54 years of ruinous Assad family rule.
The Islamist militia that led the revolt, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (Organization for the Liberation of the Levant), has old ties to al-Qaida and remains on the U.S. list of designated terrorist organizations, though its leader now disavows terrorism. The experience of post-revolutionary Arab states — whether in Yemen, Libya, Tunisia or Egypt — has not been a happy one.
Foreign powers, particularly Turkey, may seek to replace Iran’s former dominance in the country with their own. And Syria’s ethnic and sectarian divisions among Alawites, Sunnis, Kurds and Arabs could still prove explosive, with spillover effects in Jordan, Lebanon and other neighbors.
Yet this is also a moment of opportunity for a country that has mainly known dictatorship since it became independent in the 1940s. Political prisoners — including one former pilot who spent 43 years in prison for refusing to bomb the regime’s domestic opponents — are being freed. Millions of Syrians driven from their homes by 13 years of civil war and repression have a chance to return.
The country can also put an end to the quasi-occupation by the foreign military powers that propped up al-Assad’s rule: Lebanon’s Hezbollah, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard and the Russian military. The sight of Syrians ransacking Iran’s embassy in Damascus, Syria — with portraits of Hezbollah’s Hassan Nasrallah and the Revolutionary Guard’s Qassem Soleimani torn to shreds — is evidence of just what Syrians think of the “Axis of Resistance” led by Iran.
It’s a good thing that Syrians are the principal agents of their own liberation. But it’s no secret that Assad’s downfall was largely brought about because his allies no longer had the will nor wherewithal to defend him. The Russian air force, whose planes smashed Aleppo, Syria, in 2016, was too enfeebled by losses in Ukraine to do much in Syria. Hezbollah, decimated by Israel’s exploding pagers, airstrikes and ground incursions, could no longer provide al-Assad with the foot soldiers he once used to starve his people into submission.
As for Iran, Israel’s retaliatory strike in late October on key military facilities left it too weakened and exposed to save al-Assad. Iran is now rapidly withdrawing its once-considerable military presence in Syria. Cut off from this military supply chain, Hezbollah has never been in a more precarious position, giving the Lebanese people their own rare opportunity to bring this terrorist militia to heel and restore their sovereignty after decades of de facto Syrian and Iranian occupation.
Victory, as the saying goes, has a thousand fathers. But credit for Syria’s liberation from al-Assad must also be given for Israel’s courageous decisions to ignore calls for cease-fire and pursue its enemies; whether in the Gaza Strip; Beirut; Hodeida, Yemen; Damascus; or Tehran, Iran. Each of these actions was denounced at the time for risking “escalation.” But victory over terrorists and tyrants has a way of paying dividends for the victorious and defeated alike.
Let’s hope the next leaders in Syria recognize the debt and finally seek peace, after 76 years of fruitless rejection, with their Jewish neighbor.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times, c.2024.
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