Mideast: Syria Rising
On December 3, just two weeks ago, I pitched an article to my editor about Syrian rebels capturing several villages surrounding Aleppo. It seemed interesting, and perhaps it was the beginning of a new stage of the Syrian Civil War, which had continued for over a decade. Less than a week later, on December 8th, those same rebels marched into Damascus as Bashar al-Assad and his family fled the country.
So what changed? Since the Syrian uprising began in 2011, different militant factions have waged a guerilla war against Assad’s regime and, until this year, had achieved nothing but a fractured nation and a global refugee crisis.
The short answer as to what changed? Bashar al-Assad’s biggest, most powerful allies were distracted, and the rebels struck at the right time. The longer answer lies in who these rebels are and who they claim to be.
Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) is the rebel group at the head of the charge. In English, their name means Organization for the Liberation of the Levant. In 2024, they remain designated as a terrorist organization by the US and others and are considered to be localized solely to Syria. They originally were Jabhat al-Nusra, which was a Sunni Islamist organization committed to bringing down Assad and creating an Islamic governance in Syria. When Abu Bakar al-Baghdadi of the Iraqi ISIS faction tried to merge Jabhat al-Nusra under the Iraqi ISIS umbrella, the leaders rejected the move and swore allegiance to Al-Qaeda. Jabhat al-Nusra, under the leadership of Abu Mohamed al-Jolani, severed all ties with Al-Qaeda in 2017 and built a coalition of jihadist opposition militias in Syria. It is this coalition, HTS, now led by al-Jolani, who toppled Assad and now rule in Syria.
To many outside observers, it is unclear to what degree this was a religious crusade to create a conservative theocracy and to what degree it was a people’s revolution to liberate Syria from a brutal and corrupt regime. This confusion is warranted.
HTS practices the religious doctrine of Salafism, a modern conservative reform movement in Islam. The word Salaf is Arabic for predecessors or ancestors. It often refers to the first three generations of Muslims: Mohammad and his companions, their followers, and their followers’ followers. Salafi scholars warned against reinterpretations of the Quran and Hadith and encouraged people to mimic the lives of the earliest Muslims as much as possible.
However, many activists and supporters of the movement also made the connection between Islam’s modern flaws and Western influence. Salafists saw the governments of the contemporary Islamic world as corrupt, heretical, and hindering Islam’s expansion. Some Salafists became revolutionaries or Salafi Jihadists. They launched rebellions, attacks, and guerilla conflicts against governments across the Islamic world starting in the 80s. HTS is part of this tradition.
So, is HTS wrong in thinking that Assad’s Syrian government was corrupt, evil, influenced by foreign actors, and areligious? No. Assad and his cronies were all these things. However, HTS is frequently branded by supporters online as a liberatory people’s revolution, and they are not simply that. They espouse a radically conservative and fundamentalist religious doctrine, and many of its leaders believe in implementing Shari’a law. Jabhat al-Nusra and HTS have been accused of attacks against Kurdish and Druze civilians in Syria; the United States Government wants Jolani and has a 10,000,000 dollar bounty on his head.
Despite Jolani’s background and reputation, people have been skeptical and cautiously optimistic since the conquering of Syria. Bashar al-Assad’s regime was incredibly violent. His government imprisoned, murdered, and disappeared hundreds of thousands of people. For the relatives of these victims, Assad’s fall is justice and vindication.
To those outside Syria, the geopolitical chess match currently underway is the most interesting. Syrian forces supported by Turkey defeated Iranian and Russian interests. Analysts predict resounding impacts on the Russo-Ukrainian war, the Israel-Hamas/Iran war, and broader regional stability. Most of it is, of course, punditry and guesswork.
Syria stands at the bottom of a tall mountain now. While “liberation” is the word of the month for Syrians, there is a long way to go from successful violent rebellion to a free society. Some have hope because Jolani appears more moderate than his Al Qaeda past would indicate. Some have hope because anything would be better than Assad. Some have hope because, for the first time, it is safe for refugees to call their families in Syria without fear of retribution. Some have hope because they crave a religious government authority, which the Jihad’s success may lead to.
Yes, many Syrians' dreams and desires are contradictory, but that is the crux of liberation; the potential to achieve multiple contradictory objectives is the promise of a free society. The rest of the world, having forsaken Syria to its ruthless dictator for decades, can, at the very least, hope for a better future in Syria.
The number of uncertainties is impossibly high. Anyone espousing a confident, crystal-clear prediction for how the next several months and years will shake out is either deluded or attempting to delude others. However, as of December 8th, there are tens of thousands fewer innocent people imprisoned in inhumane conditions in Syria than there were over the last ten years. No wonder people are celebrating.
