Power play taking shape in Syria’s war
President Assad asserts hold over IS-held areas
BEIRUT/AMMAN: Syria’s war has entered a new phase as President Bashar al-Assad extends his grip in areas being captured from Islamic State, using firepower freed by Russian-backed truces in western Syria.
Backed by Russia and Iran, the government hopes to steal a march on US-backed militias in the attack on Islamic State’s (IS) last major stronghold, the Deir al-Zor region that extends to the Iraqi border.
The eastward march to Deir al-Zor, unthinkable two years ago when Assad seemed in danger, has underlined his ever more confident position and the dilemma facing Western governments that still want him to leave power in a negotiated transition.
The war for western Syria, long Assad’s priority, has shifted down several gears thanks to the ceasefires, including one organised by Moscow and Washington in the southwest.
But there is no sign of these truces leading to a revival of peace talks aimed at putting Syria back together through a negotiated deal that would satisfy Assad’s opponents and help resolve a refugee crisis of historic proportions.
Instead, Assad’s face has been printed on Syrian banknotes for the first time, and his quest for outright victory suggests he may retrain his guns on rebel pockets in the west once his goals in the east are accomplished. Attacks on the last rebel stronghold near Damascus have escalated this month.
US President Donald Trump’s decision to end CIA support to rebels further weakened the insurgency in western Syria, while also depriving Western policymakers of one of their few levers of pressure.
They can only watch as Iranian influence increases through a multitude of Syiah militias, including Lebanon’s Hezbollah, that have been crucial to Assad’s gains and seem likely to remain in Syria for the foreseeable future, sealing Teheran’s ascendancy.
Assad’s opponents now hope his Russian allies will conclude he must be removed from power as the burden of stabilising the country weighs and the West withholds reconstruction support.
With hundreds of thousands of people killed and militias controlling swathes of the country, Assad’s opponents say Syria can never be stable again with him in power.
“There is little doubt that the Russians would like a political solution to the war. The war is costly and the longer it lasts, the less it will appear to be a success for Putin,” said Rolf Holmboe, Research Fellow at the Canadian Global Affairs Institute and former Danish Ambassador to Syria.
“But the Russians want a solution on their terms.
“The ceasefires do two things. They allow the Russians to take control of the political negotiations and look good internationally. But more importantly, they allow Assad and the Iranian-backed militias to free troops to grab the territory that Islamic State is about to lose.”
The eastward advance has on occasion brought government forces and their Iranian-backed allies into conflict with the US military and the forces it is backing in a separate campaign against IS.
But the rival campaigns have mostly stayed out of each other’s way.
Government forces have skirted the area where Kurdish-led militias supported by Washington are fighting IS in Raqqa. The US-led coalition has stressed it is not seeking war with Assad.
Andrew Tabler, a Syria specialist at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy think-tank, said Assad hoped to regain international legitimacy through the campaign against IS.
“They believe that by doing so they can get reconstruction money, that things are going to go back to the way they were before. That’s just not going to happen,” he said.
There has been no sign that Western states are ready to rehabilitate Assad, accused by Washington of repeatedly using chemical weapons during the war, most recently in April. Syria denies using chemical weapons.
Shunned by the West, the government hopes China will be a major player in the reconstruction.
Seeking to project an image of recovery, Damascus this week will host a trade fair.
“The regime is keen to imply by that it doesn’t care, that ‘we are really utterly prepared to sit atop ruins, and to speak to friends who will help us with our project’,” said a Western diplomat.
Mohanad Hage Ali, director of communications at the Carnegie Middle East Center, said the Assads have been “masters of the waiting game”.
Time is on their side, he said. “But they have two challenges: political normalisation with the world, and the economic challenge, which is significant.” — Reuters