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Syria Proposes Initiative to Confront Turkish, Iranian ‘Infiltration’, Return to Arab Fold

People wearing face masks walk in Damascus, Syria. (EPA)
People wearing face masks walk in Damascus, Syria. (EPA)
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Syria Proposes Initiative to Confront Turkish, Iranian ‘Infiltration’, Return to Arab Fold

People wearing face masks walk in Damascus, Syria. (EPA)
People wearing face masks walk in Damascus, Syria. (EPA)

An upcoming meeting between Egyptian President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi, Jordan’s King Abdullah II and Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi in Baghdad will probably reveal the outcome of Russia’s recent diplomatic push to restore Syria’s membership in the Arab League.

It will also reveal the results of Syria’s “Arab depth” proposal, which it submitted to Baghdad, that outlined the steps needed for returning Damascus to the Arab fold and confronting Iran and Turkey’s infiltration of its territories.

Russia had dispatched its foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, to the region. He held talks with Egyptian officials in Cairo on Monday and had carried out a tour of the Gulf region a month ago. Russian President Vladimir Putin’s envoy to Syria, Alexander Lavrentiev, had also met with Syria’s President Bashar Assad two days ago and made unannounced visits to Arab countries.

Russia’s position
Moscow has urged Arab countries to restore Syria’s membership in the Arab League and to draft an Arab position that would be declared at the League’s next summit, which is set for Algeria. Lavrov had discussed this issue during his visit to Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar last month.

Moscow believes that the Syrian presidential elections will serve as a turning point in the course of the country’s ten-year conflict. It has also seen “progress” in the political process as demonstrated in the meetings of the Constitutional Committee in Geneva and frontlines that have remained largely unchanged since March 2020.

Meeting behind closed doors, Russian officials have said that “weakening Iran in Syria demands that Arabs restore their political and economic presence in Damascus.” They have also stressed the need to avert the collapse of the Syrian state due to American and European sanctions that are “suffocating the Syrian people”.

The Russians have therefore, urged Arab countries to offer financial aid to the Syrian government. Moscow has also sought to free some 1 billion dollars belonging to the Syrian government and that have been frozen in Arab banks. The funds will be used in financing the delivery of wheat and oil derivatives to Syria. Moscow has also vowed to offer a 500-million-dollar loan to Damascus as part of measures to avoid the collapse of the Syrian pound.

Russia and Arab countries are aware of the “limits of what they can offer” to Damascus given the legal restrictions imposed by Washington’s Caesar Act and European-American conditions on Syria’s reconstruction.

Arab position
The Arabs are divided over restoring Syria’s membership to the Arab League and normalizing relations with it. Some countries are committed to the need to implement the Geneva declaration and United Nations Security Council 2254 and ensure the withdraw of sectarian and foreign militias from Syria. The first steps in this regard should be taken by Damascus.

Some Arab countries have already reopened their embassies in Damascus, but without appointing ambassadors in what is seen as a test of Syria’s position. Others have reappointed ambassadors, such as Mauritania. Oman has maintained its diplomatic ties with Damascus and their foreign ministers have exchanged visits over the years.

Throughout this situation, one issue is clear: Arab countries are growing increasingly concerned with Turkey’s “infiltration” of northern Syria and Iran’s entrenchment in the country amid the “complete Arab absence from the scene”.

Arabs believe that Syria’s return to the Arab League demands a “collective position” from the chief Arab countries, as well as initiatives on Damascus’ end. The host, Algeria, is hoping for such an achievement to be reached on its territories. On the technical side, Damascus needs to submit a formal request to the League for its membership to be restored.

On the political side, Arab countries are waiting on Damascus to “carry out a series of political steps to implement resolution 2254 and approach the UN-sponsored Constitutional Committee meetings with tangible positivity.” Moreover, it should provide the necessary conditions for the safe return of refugees to their homes.

On the geo-political side, Arab countries expect “tangible steps” from Damascus in easing Iran’s influence in its territories and pulling out sectarian militias. They expect Moscow to take measures that prevent Turkey’s incursions in northern Syria and exert efforts to push the political process forward. Moscow is also expected to respect prior understandings about curbing Iran’s influence.

‘Arab depth’ initiative
Given the above, prominent Syrian figures proposed the “Arab depth” initiative to Arab countries, including Egypt, Jordan and Iraq to bolster their contribution in “finding the best solution that should lead to achieving internal Syrian stability and boost the Arab role.” The figures believe that several Arab countries share Damascus’ keenness in restoring stability in Syria and its fear over the expansion of religious extremism and terrorism in the region. They are also concerned with Turkey and Iran’s growing influence in Syria amid the absence of an effective Arab role.

Should the “Arab depth” initiative truly get off the ground, then it will act as a parallel platform to the Astana process that includes Russia, Turkey and Iran and the new platform that was recently launched by Russia, Turkey and Qatar.

The initiative calls for the release of detainees, encourages the return of refugees with Arab support, urges the establishment of an independent judiciary and hopes for the formation of a new Syrian platform with the Arab League’s sponsorship. It also urges dialogue with the Americans and Russians to ensure the success of the initiative.

Damascus’ position
Damascus believes it can break through the Arab “wall” after finding the door firmly shut against it by the Americans and Europeans. It has received some of the ideas of the initiative during its foreign minister’s recent visit to Muscat, Assad’s meeting with Lavrentiev and security contacts between Syrian and Arab officials.

Damascus has expressed reservations over the speed and “depth” of the conditions it is expected to meet and the “incentives” it is set to receive. On the technical side, two years ago Damascus refused to submit a request to the Arab League to end its suspension, saying at the time: “The Arabs should request to return to Syria, which is a founding member of the organization.”

Politically, Damascus is so far prioritizing its presidential elections, set for mid-May, with Assad expected to claim victory. Some officials have hinted that “political reforms could take place after the polls” and that they would positively deal with the Constitutional Committee. Damascus is also prioritizing its fight against western sanctions and its efforts to improve living conditions for the Syrians by receiving oil shipments from Iran and food from Russia. It is also striking deals with the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) to receive oil derivatives and grain from northeastern Syria.

Tactically, Damascus is still playing both sides, between Moscow and Tehran, whereby it turns to one whenever it comes under pressure from the other. This strategy is so far working as demonstrated in Lavrov’s recent remarks that “the more Russia pressures Damascus, the more it turns to Iran.”

Geo-politically, Damascus believes that the further Turkey, Iran and Russia expand their influence in Syria and the region, Arab countries will eventually find themselves forced to cooperate with it. The “initiatives” and “incentives” will then flow from Arab capitals, not Damascus.

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25 Years of Unanswered Questions in Iraq

A Saddam Hussein mural is seen in Baghdad in 1991. (Getty Images)
A Saddam Hussein mural is seen in Baghdad in 1991. (Getty Images)
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25 Years of Unanswered Questions in Iraq

A Saddam Hussein mural is seen in Baghdad in 1991. (Getty Images)
A Saddam Hussein mural is seen in Baghdad in 1991. (Getty Images)

People in Iraq often wonder dejectedly: What if Saddam Hussein were alive and ruling the country today? Many will reply with fantastical answers, but Saddam’s era would have responded: Iraq is isolated, either by siege or by a war that he launched or was being waged against him.

Many people cast doubt on whether actual change has been achieved in Iraq since the US invasion in 2003. The invasion ousted the Baath version of Iraq and Saddam was executed in December 2006, leaving questions to pile up over the years with no one having any answers.

After a quarter century, Iraq is accumulating questions. It casts them aside and forges ahead without addressing them. At best, it reviews itself and returns to that moment in April 2003 when the US launched its invasion. Or it asks new questions about the 2005 civil war, the armed alternatives that emerged in 2007, how ISIS swept through the country in 2014, or the wave of protests that erupted in 2019. It also asks new questions about Iran’s influence in the country that has persisted for decades.

The questions are many and none of the Iraqis have answered them.

A US marine wraps the American flag around the head of a Saddam Hussein statue in Baghdad. (Reuters file)

Saddam and the alternative

The September 11, 2001, attacks shook the United States and the entire world. They struck fear in Baghdad. Saddam had that year claimed that he had written a book, “The Fortified Castle”, about an Iraqi soldier who is captured by Iran. He manages to escape and return to Iraq to “fortify the castle”.

The terrifying Saddam and the terrified Iraqis have long spun tales about escaping to and from Iraq. It is a journey between the question and the non-answers. That year, when Baghdad was accused of being complicit in the 9/11 attacks, Saddam’s son Uday was “elected” member of the Baath party’s leadership council. The move sparked debate about possible change in Iraq. Bashar al-Assad had a year earlier inherited the presidency of Syria and its Baath party from his father Hafez.

The US invaded Iraq two years later and a new Iraq was born. Twenty-five years later, the country is still not fully grown up. Twenty-one years ago, on April 9, 2003, a US marine wrapped the head of a Saddam statue in Baghdad with an American flag. The Iraqis asked: why didn’t you leave us this iconic image, but instead of an American flag, used an Iraqi one?

Baghdad’s question and Washington’s answer

As the Iraqis observe the developments unfold in Syris with the ouster of Bashar from power, they can’t help but ask how this rapid “change” could have been possible without US tanks and weapons. Why are the Syrians insisting on celebrating “freedom” every day? They are also astonished at the Syrians who scramble to greet Abu Mohammed al-Golani, who has not yet managed to put this image behind him and fully assume his original identity of Ahmed al-Sharaa. The Iraqis wonder how the Syrians are managing this transition so far without a bloodbath.

They ask these questions because the Iraqis view and judge the world based on their own memories. They keep asking questions and await answers from others instead of themselves.

The Iraqis recall how in August 2003, after four months of US occupation, that the Jordanian embassy and United Nations offices were attacked, leaving several staff dead, including head of the UN mission Sergio de Mello. The Americans arrested Ali Hassan al-Majid, or “chemical Ali”, Saddam’s cousin, and 125 people were killed in a bombing in al-Najaf, including Shiite cleric Mohammed Baqer al-Hakim.

During that bloody month, the Iraqis asked questions about security, forgetting about Saddam’s alternative, democracy and the promised western model. Later, the facts would answer that the question of security was a means to escape questions about transitional justice.

Sergio de Mello (r) and Paul Bremmer (second right) attend the inaugural meeting of the Iraqi Governing Council in Baghdad on July 13, 2003. (Getty Images)

The question of civil war

Paul Bremer, the American ruler of Iraq, once escorted four opposition figures to Saddam’s prison cell. They flooded him with questions. Adnan al-Pachachi, a veteran diplomat, asked: “Why did you invade Kuwait?” Adel Abdul Mahdi, a former prime minister, asked: “Why did you kill the Kurds in the Anfal massacre?” Mowaffak al-Rubaie, a former national security adviser, asked: “Why did you kill your Baath comrades?” Ahmed al-Halabi simply insulted the former president. Saddam recoiled and then just smiled.

Saddam’s opponents left the prison cell with answers that should have helped them in running the transitional justice administration, but they failed.

The following year, Washington appointed Ayad Allawi to head the interim Iraqi Governing Council (IGC) that had limited jurisdiction so that it could be free to wage two fierce battles: one in Najaf against the “Mahdi Army”, headed by Moqtada al-Sadr, and the other against armed groups comprised of “resistance fighters” and “extremists” in Fallujah.

The opposition in the IGC got to work that was already prepared by the Americans. They outlined the distribution of Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds in the country, with historic questions about the majority and minority, and the “oppressed” now assuming rule after the ouster of the “oppressors”.

On the ground, the Ghazaliya neighborhood in western Baghdad with its Shiite and Sunni residents was in store for a bloodbath. On a winter night in 2005, an entire family was massacred and an enfant strangled to death. Soon after, lines drawing the Shiite and Sunni sections of the neighborhood emerged. The popular market became the tense border between the two halves. Two new rival “enemies” traded attacks, claiming several lives.

In Baghdad’s Green Zone, the IGC drew up a draft of the transitional rule. In January 2005, 8 million Iraqis voted for the establishment of a National Assembly.

Meanwhile, different “armies” kept on emerging in Baghdad. The media was filled with the death tolls of bloody relentless sectarian attacks. Checkpoints manned by masked gunmen popped up across the capital.

Those days seemed to answer the question of “who was the alternative to Saddam.” No one needed a concrete answer because the developments spoke for themselves.

Nouri al-Maliki came to power as prime minister in 2006. He famously declared: “I am the state of law” - in both the figurative and literal sense. Iraqis believed he had answers about the “state” and “law”, dismissing the very pointed “I” in his “manifesto”.

Nouri al-Maliki. (Getty Images)

The Maliki question

The American admired Maliki. Then Vice President Dick Cheney had repeatedly declared that he was committed to the establishment of a stable Iraq. Before that however, he had dispatched James Steele - who was once complicit in running dirty wars in El Salvador in the mid-1980s - to Baghdad to confront the “Sunni rebellion”. Steele set up the Shiite “death squads”. Steele was the man in the shadows behind Ahmed Kazim, then interior minister undersecretary, and behind him stood the new warlords.

In 2006, the political process was shaken by the bombing of the Al-Askari Shrine in Samarra. Questions were asked about the “need” to draw up new maps. Shiite high authority Ali al-Sistani said in February 2007 that the Sunnis were not involved in the attack. In July 2013, Maliki denied an American accusation that Tehran was behind it.

In those days, Maliki’s ego was growing ever bigger, and Steele’s death squads were rapidly growing greater in numbers.

The Iran and ISIS questions

Maliki tried to save himself as one city after another fell into the hands of ISIS. On June 9, 2014, as ISIS was waging battles in Mosul, Maliki met with senior Sunni tribal elders based on advice he had not heeded earlier and which could have averted the current disaster.

It was said that he made reluctant pledges to them and a third of Iraq later fell in ISIS’ hands. Sistani later issued a fatwa for “jihad” against the group, which later turned out not be aimed at saving the premier.

Maliki left the scene and Qassem Soleimani, commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps’ (IRGC) Quds Force, took over. Successive prime ministers would know from then on what it is like to be shackled by Tehran’s pressure as IRGC officials made regular visits to their offices.

Soleimani reaped what Steele sowed. By 2017, armed factions were the dominant force in Iraq. Running in their orbit were other factions that took turns in “rebelling” against the government or agreeing with its choices.

Today, and after 14 years, Iran has consolidated what can be described as the “resistance playground” in Iraq that is teeming with armed factions and massive budgets.

Protesters in Baghdad’s Tahrir Square in October 2019. (AFP)

The October question

The Iraqis were unable to answer the ISIS question and the armed factions claimed “victory” against the group. Many ignored Sistani’s “answer” about whether the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) was there to protect Iraq or just its Shiites.

Exhausted Iraqis asked: “What next?”

Next came Adel Abdul Mahdi’s government in October 2018. It was weighed down by unanswered questions and a year later, thousands of youths took to the streets to protest the state of affairs in Iraq, specifically the dominance of armed groups.

They were met with live bullets. Many were abducted and others were silenced. Abdul Mehdi acquitted the killers, saying instead that a “fifth column” had carried out the bloody crackdown on protesters.

After he left office, some Iraqi politicians were brave enough to tell the truth, dismissing former PM’s acquittal and pinning blame on the factions.

Sistani called for PMF members to quit their partisan affiliations. His demand was left unheeded. Mustafa al-Qadhimi became prime minister in May 2020. He left office months later, also failing in resolving the issue of the PMF and armed factions.

By 2022, everyone had left the scene, but Iran remained, claiming the Iraqi crown for itself, controlling everything from its finances to its weapons.

Question about post-Assad Syria

On December 8, Syria’s Bashar fled the country. Everyone in Iraq is asking what happens next. The whole system in Iraq is at a loss: Do we wait for how Tehran will deal with Ahmed al-Sharaa, or do we ask Abu Mohammed al-Golani about his memories in Iraq?

The Iraqi people’s memories are what’s ruling the country, more so than the constitution, political parties and civil society because they are burdened with questions they don’t want to answer.

And yet they ask: What if we weren’t part of the “Axis of Resistance”? Iraq’s history would reply that it has long been part of axes, or either awaiting a war or taking part in them.