Bashar al-Asad succeed his father Hafiz al Asad in 2000. Syria has been center of regional power struggle and resultant political turmoil and chaos since many centuries. Muslim conquered Syria from Byzantine Empire in 636 CE. Umayyad ruled Syria and large areas in Middle East that had been captured by Arab from 661 to 750 CE. This period witnessed turmoil and stability. When the Abbasid revolted against Umayyad in 750 CE, Damascus was conquered without much resistance. However, Abbasid persecuted Umayyad in a ruthless manner. Thereafter, Damascus became eclipsed under the governorship of Baghdad for many centuries till the overthrow of Abbasid in 1258 CE. During the Crusades, from late eleventh to early fourteen centuries, Syrian land witness untold turmoil and chaos, including killings and human sufferings, as many cities, especially Aleppo, Hums, Damascus and Jerusalem (Bait ul Maqdas) were frequently captured and recaptured by Crusaders, Seljuks, and Mukluks. Famous Muslim General Sultan Salah ud Din Ayubi (known as Saladin in the West) captured Damascus in 1174 CE, Hama and Homs in 1175 CE, Aleppo in 1183 CE and Mosul in 1185 CE. His army defeated the Crusaders decisively at the Battle of Hattin in 1187 CE, recapturing Jerusalem after 88 years of Christian occupation. During this period many battle were fought and untold number of residents were killed and displaced.
Thereafter, Ottoman ruled over Syria and Damascus for four centuries, beginning in 1516 CE, when Sultan Selim I defeated the Mamluks in the Battle of Marj Dābiq. They ruled over Syrian, all most whole of Middle East, West Asia,North Africa, and a large part of East Europe and Balkans till 1918 CE, the down fall and defeat of Ottoman Empire. In 1831, Syria was invaded and occupied by the Egyptians that lasted until the beginning of the 1840s. In 1839, the Ottomans introduced reform, known as the ‘Tanzimat’ that lasted until 1876. Syria was divided into provinces, each under a governor: Damascus, Aleppo / Tripoli and Ṣaydā, or Sidon.
History of the modern Syria can be traced back to early 20th century, i.e. Sykepicot Agreement (1916), Belfore Declaration (1917), and the French / British Mandate (1919/23). San Remo Conference of 1920 allowed Syria-Lebanon under French mandate and Palestine under British. Lebanon, at that time, was a distric or a sub-province of Syria. During 1920-21, Syria was divided into three autonomous regions by the French, allocating separate areas for the Alawites on the coast and the Druze in the south and Lebanon was separated off entirely. In 1925-26, there was a nationalist uprising against French rule. French forces bombard and destroyed Damascus. In 1936, France agreed to work towards Syrian independence and to dissolves the autonomous regions. The French government agreed to transfer the power to Republic of Syria on August 1, 1945 but this process was dragged for ten years. Eventually, the Republic of Syria achieved independence on April 17, 1946 when the last remaining French troops withdrew.
The Arab Socialist Baath Party was founded 1947 with the aim of seeking Arab unity and solidarity under the slogan of Pan-Arabism. After many coups and change of civilian governments, Syria and Egypt formed the United Arab Republic (UAR) in February1958. Egyptian president Jamal Abdel Nasser, who became head the UAR, ordered the dissolution of Syrian political parties, which came as a surprise and sources of discontentment to the Baath Party. The union proved to be short lived and, in order to undue Egyptian domination, Syrian army officers seized power in Damascus in September1961 and dissolved UAR. In February1966, after an internal coup within the Baath Party, Hafez al-Assad, who was Syrian Air Force officer, becomes defence minister. Just after one years, Israel in a devastating military campaign, defeated Egypt, Syria and Jordan and occupied the Golan Heights in June 1967. Israel also destroy much of Syria's air force in the Six Day War. It captured Senai Deseret and West Banks as well.
In November1970, Hafez al-Assad overthrew president Nur al-Din al-Atasi and assumed the power. In 1973, riots broke out against Hafiz al-Asad, which were ruthlessly suppressed by Syrian Army that was dominated by Alawites. It must be mentioned that Alawites are an ethno-religious group of Shia branch of Islam who are a significant minority in Syria with only 15 % of Syrian population. Since then Alawites have ruled Syria with iron hand, committing serious human rights violations that are tantamount to to ‘War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity. As a result of such mass killing of Sunni majority sect, Syrians have been rising against Alawites’ brutal and unjust rule. In 1980, there was a sizable uprisings and riots in Aleppo, Homs and Hama but a more serious and large scale uprising by Muslim Brotherhood (Akhwan ul Muslimeen) took place in February1982 in the city of Hama. It was brutally suppressed in a totally savage manner by Syrian Army, led by Hafiz al-Asad’s brother. Tens of thousands of unarmed innocent civilians were killed. Many reports indicate that at least twenty to forty thousand people were killed in Hama and buried in mass graves and many thousand were reported missing. During 1980s, Syria invaded and militarily interfered in Lebanon repeatedly.
In June 2000, Bashar al-Asad became President of Syria through hereditary succession and not due to any other political process. In May 2004, the U.S. imposed economic sanctions on Syria for supporting terrorism. In May 2010 these sanctions were renewed and expanded. Asad Government had been accused of serious human rights violation and abuse of state power all along but a new wave of state terrorism was perpetrated after civil uprising during the Arab Spring. In March 201, Syrian security forces shot dead protesters in southern city of Deraa who were demanding release of political prisoners. In My 2011, Syrian Army tanks crushed anti-regime protests in Deraa, Banyas, Homs and suburbs of Damascus. In July2011, there were mass demonstrations in the northern province of Hama. In February 2012, Syrian Government stepped up the bombardment in Homs and other cities.
After such atrocities committed by Bashar al-Asad’s Army, many national resistance groups emerged that were supported by foreign governments. Syrian National Army (SNA) was supported by Turkiye and Kurdish Syrian Defence Forces (SDF) and Syrian Free Army (SFA) was supported by the U.S. Bashar al-Asad sought support from Iran and Russia. These countries were very forthcoming as their strategic interests were linked with removal of Bashar Government.
With foreign support, resistance to Bashar Government grew substantially. In July 2012, SFA seized parts of Aleppo. Meanwhile regional Arab states, including Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Qatar, also jumped in. In 2012 November, National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces was formed in Qatar. In December 2012, U.S., Britain, France, Turkey and Gulf states formally recognized National Coalition as legitimate representative of the Syrian people. The situation became more precarious when the UN weapons inspectors conclude in September 2013 that chemical weapons had been used in Damascus that killed about 300 people.
The Syrian conflict engulfed the region by June 2014 when Islamic State (IS) claimed to have captured Aleppo and the U.S. and five Arab countries launch air strikes against them. Later on , IS militants seized more areas. Meanwhile SDF also expanded its operations in Kurd areas and gained control of large territory which kept expanding. In September 2015, Russia, which has military basis in Syria, started air strikes against IS and other rebel groups. In 2016, Syrian government forces manged to retake some areas from IS with Russian help and air support. In an other development, Turkish troops crossed into Syria to push back so-called IS militants and Kurdish rebels. Same year, Syrian Government troops, backed by Russian air power and Iranian-sponsored militias, manged to recapture Aleppo, Syria’s largest city. In April 2017, the U.S. launched missile attack and announced to arm the YPG, a Kurdish group, alongside SDF and they shot down a Syrian fighter jet near Raqqa.
With involvement of so many internal groups and foreign players, the situation in Syria became too complex and intricate. In January 2018, Turkey launched an assault on northern Syria to oust Kurdish forces which were gaining strong hold on Turkish Syria border. During all these years, more than 3.5 million internally displaced Syrians had taken refugees in Turkey, which had a pronounced impact on Turkish economy and internal politics. In a dramatic development, by July 2018, Syrian Army recaptured almost all of the southern Syria up to the borders with Jordan and Israeli-held territory. As a result of U.S - Turkish understanding, the U.S. withdrew its troops from northern Syria in October 2019, allowing Turkey to attack Kurdish rebels. Moreover, in March 2020, Turkey launched an offensive with thousands of troops across the border to stop a Syrian offensive to retake Idlib.
While these developments were taking place, another reble group, Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which is a coalition of northern Syria-based Sunnis, emerged in a very strong and organized manner. It had evolved from Jabhat al-Nusrah (Nusrah Front), which is purportedly considered al-Qa'ida's former branch in Syria. In an interview to CNN, the HTS’ leader. Abu Muhammad Jolani, stated that their sole objective was to to overthrow authoritarian President Bashar al-Assad. The U.S. and Turkiye announced their support for HTS, which started moving towards Damascus from the north, the area that was already held by SNA and Turkish forces. In early December 2024, HTS moved with a lightening speed, like German blitzkrieg, and captured all major cities of Allepo, Iblib, Hamah, and Homs within one week starting December 3, 2024. By December 8, it had claimed control of Damascus. The same day, Bashar al-Asad fled to Russia, paving way for transfer power to the rebels.
The most important and, to many, most surprising element of this onslaught was ‘no resistance at all’ by Syrian military forces who were loyal to Bashar al-Asad. They had been obeying his orders to commit heinous crimes against their own fellow citizens. The leader of HTS, Abu Muhammad Jolani addressed the Syrians at the famous Ummayad Mosques in Damascus and announced that they will not any take revenge or persecute any minority group. Earlier, Prime Minister of Syria, who had not fled the country announced to cooperate with HTS in smooth transition of power.
It looks that Syrian have learned a great lesson from violent ousting of Saddam Hussein and Qaddafi in Iraq and Libya and extremely devastating repercussion of the same in both countries. On December 10, it was announced that a caretaker prime minister had been appointed for three months to oversee Syria’s transition to a new government. Though, the contours of such transition are not clear.
Taking advantage of such great chaos and power vaccum, Israel has siezed more territory beyond so called Golan Heights buffer zone up. Israeli forces have occupied area up to strategically important Mount Harmon. They also completely destroyed Syrian air-defence and air-force by carrying out more than 480 air strikes strikes, that included 350 manned aircraft sorties, targeting airfields, anti-aircraft batteries, missiles, drones, fighter jets, tanks and weapon production sites in Damascus, Homs, Tartus, Latakia and Palmyraas.
There are many lessons to be learned. However, few important ones are: no tyrant can stay in power for long, especially after losing support of the people; a government that is build and sustained on artificial support from outside has a short life; a state can only rely on its integral and intrinsic strength, borrowed help will fade away sooner or later; outside World has its own interests and will only support a regime as long as it seems viable; and injustice and persecution has a limit and human desire and struggle for freedom can not be subdued indefinitely.
Weather the regime change will bring much desired stability and economic revival to Syria is yet to be seen. Of course, it depends on host of factors. The situation is very fragile and uncertain. Only future developments will indicate the direction towards which Syria will move on. There are strong apprehension that Syria, once again, may not face unending civil war. Most the Muslim Arab sates in Middle East were created artificially by the United Kingdom and France, after the fall of Ottoman Empire (Khilafat). The Gulf states (Sheikdoms) were carved out, later on, primarily to control and ensure cheap and sustained supply of oil and gas to the West / the U.S. Syria, which is located at very important crossroad, has great attraction for many regional and global players. Besides geopolitics, it has a significant importance for many global geo-economic initiatives, including oil and gas pipelines from Middle East to Europe that would pass through Syria. Therefor, above mentioned apprehension are not mere assumptions, nor or unfounded. Leaving aside all such considerations, Syrian people, genuinely, deserve, peace, stability and economic development.
This article was published by Daily Minute Mirror, Lahore, Pakistan, in an abridged form, on December 16, 2024
The writer is a retired Army officer and former High Commissioner of Pakistan. His areas of interest are Foreign Policy, Global Security and Conflict Studies. He is affiliated as a Visiting Professor with Tsinghua University, Hebei Normal University, Southwest University of Political Science and Law, and Kashi University in China. He has also served at the Department of Peacekeeping Operations at United Nations Secretariat.
