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On Sunday morning, the world woke up to news it perhaps had stopped thinking was possible. The murderous regime of Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, is gone and the Syrian civil war may be coming to an end after 13 years of suffering.
In just a few days, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) – an armed Islamist group based in Idlib in the north of Syria – swept south, overrunning Aleppo and Homs and then taking the capital Damascus. Assad, meanwhile, is reported to have fled with his family to Moscow.
The most optimistic observers view this moment as a chance for peace. Assad has finally been toppled, his key allies Russia and Iran are engaged elsewhere and a fragile calm is emerging between Syria’s various armed factions. Others caution that the resulting vacuum may lead to a prolonging of chaotic violence of the kind that has plagued Libya since that country’s dictator, Muammar Gaddafi, was overthrown and killed in 2011.
What happens next will depend as much on the powers outside Syria as those in it. I was in Syria in 2013, interviewing fighters and commanders from several of the groups that merged to form HTS, including the Syrian al-Qaeda affiliate. As I learned by speaking with them, armed groups such as HTS tend to listen when the international community tries to engage with them.
HTS was formed in 2017 as a union between a number of Islamist armed groups in northwestern Syria, including the Syrian affiliate of al-Qaeda, known as Jabhat Fatah al-Sham. In previous years, HTS had been pushed into a corner in the region of Idlib. But it held on stubbornly while many other armed groups faltered under the assault of a regime bolstered by Russian warplanes and Hezbollah fighters.
Syria is at a junction and has many potential paths ahead. Some people point to HTS’s Islamist roots. For these people, the nightmare scenario that the world has been trying to prevent since 2011 has happened: a radical Islamist group has risen to power in Syria.
Others argue that the group has separated from its more radical origins. Jabhat Fateh al-Sham divorced al-Qaeda in 2016, as it no longer wanted to be tainted by its negative global image, and merged with other groups to form HTS.
And HTS has recently sought to push a more moderate image, even encouraging religious tolerance. If its claims are to be believed, then it may aim to build a peaceful and stable Syria.
Key to determining the future of Syria will be the actions of other countries who seek to engage HTS and its affiliates. My research suggests that, at times, they will implement changes as a result of such dialogue. Groups that have in the past violated the laws of war may respond to international pressure and bring about changes in their conduct.
They will also at times respond positively to engagement by taking part in negotiations and conflict resolution. But when ostracised, isolated or ignored, these groups may do the exact opposite.
While in Syria, I spoke to a number of the different insurgent factions and a common thread among them was how they felt ignored by the international community. A general from the Free Syrian Army (at the time a US-backed coalition of rebel groups), complained about the difficulties of following international humanitarian law without international support to do so.
Fighters from Islamist groups complained about the hypocrisy of international organisations. They felt ignored when they tried to engage with states and organisations, forcing them to ally with more hardline groups instead of moderates. A commander from the Islamic State even asked me to send positive messages about them to my friends and family, hoping to encourage more international connections.
It would be a mistake to wholeheartedly believe armed groups in their stated claims of a desire for peaceful cooperation. But by the same token, ignoring them entirely is unlikely to end the fighting.
Is peace possible?
Explaining how we got to this point may be easier than predicting what happens next. Assad’s regime has long been propped up by its allies. So, with Russia engaged in an war of attrition in Ukraine, and both Hezbollah and Iran reeling from their conflict with Israel, HTS saw an opportunity and took it.
Although many are celebrating the failure of Iranian and Russian interventions in Syria, it is unlikely that either power’s influence in Syria is over. Recent events could even push the two closer together in partnerships that may include interventions elsewhere, or exchanges of weapons technologies.
Neither country will simply surrender their objectives in Syria. Russia, for instance, has strategic air and naval bases there that are vital for the Kremlin to project power into the Middle East, the Mediterranean and Africa. Russia will not abandon these easily.
Turkey, a long supporter of HTS, seems to be in a strong position to influence events. This may include pressing its advantage in its continued assault against the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in Syria’s northeast.
Although the SDF are nominal American allies, it is unlikely they have forgotten Donald Trump’s sudden abandonment of them in 2019. When the US president announced a withdrawal US military forces from Syria, it created a power vacuum that Turkey used as a reason to launch a military operation against the Syrian Kurds. The future of Kurdish autonomy may therefore be in doubt, though the battle-hardened SDF will probably not go down without a fight.
It is yet unclear how the Trump administration will engage with Syria under HTS control. But, while it’s unlikely we will see an increase in American involvement on the ground, it is difficult to imagine Trump becoming allies with HTS, an armed group with historic Islamist links.
Meanwhile, Israel has seized temporary control of a demilitarised buffer zone in Syrian-controlled areas of the Golan Heights. Some are fearful that this may lead to a rise in conflict there. The Israeli military has warned Syrians living in five villages close to the occupied areas to “stay home”. And some schools have shifted to online classes in anticipation of unrest.
These events in Syria have massive implications for the country and the region, and at the centre of it is HTS. It remains unclear if the group will be able to hold power in Syria, and if they do, what sort of regime they will seek to build.
The reaction of regional and global powers will be pivotal in this moment, in which engagement with HTS is of vital importance if the opportunity for peace is to be seized.
William Plowright does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
