Author: M Barbu

Ahmad Hussein al-Shara, aka Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, would like you to think he is a changed man. These days, al-Jolani, a 41-year-old one-time al-Qaeda and Islamic State operative with a $10 million bounty on his head, no longer spews jihadist fire and brimstone. Instead, he preaches pluralism, religious tolerance, diversity and forgiveness as his Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) rebels take control of Damascus, the Syrian capital.

The collapse of the 54-year rule of the Assad family in Syria constitutes a significant setback to Iran’s decades-long strategy to forge an “Axis of Resistance” to confront Israel and deter U.S. military action against Iranian territory and signals a seismic shift in the Middle East’s political landscape.

U.S., regional, and global officials seek to stabilize Syria and work to ensure that a successor government will not facilitate the continued operations in Syria of radical jihadist organizations such as the Islamic State.

Latest Developments

• Iran’s Route through Syria Severed: Hezbollah chief Naim Qassem said in a public address that Hezbollah’s critical supply line – running from Iran through Iraq and Syria into Lebanon – no longer exists following the overthrow of former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad by Islamist rebels on December 8. Qassem’s admission marks the first time that the Iranian proxy and U.S.-designated terrorist organization has commented publicly on the ramifications of Assad’s fall from power.
• Syria Helped Connect Iran to Hezbollah: For years, the Islamic Republic has directly shipped weapons across Iraq and Syria into Lebanon to facilitate Hezbollah’s attacks on Israel. Hezbollah’s Unit 4400 has historically been tasked with establishing these smuggling routes through Syria, which the IDF have targeted with airstrikes in recent months.
• Hezbollah Seeks to Establish Ties with Syrian Rebel Groups: Though Hezbollah’s Qassem conceded that his organization lost “its military supply line through Syria,” he emphasized Hezbollah’s goals of reestablishing these routes by coordinating with Islamist groups now in positions of power in Syria like Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, which spearheaded the ten-day offensive that ousted Assad. Qassem said that their weapons supply routes from Iran through Syria “might come back normally with the new regime,” but added that Hezbollah “can always look for other ways.”

Syria’s new transitional government said it was prioritising state-building and stability over any response to recent Israeli attacks.

Syria’s new transitional government is prioritising stabilising the country in the wake of the collapse of the Assad regime over responding to Israel’s ongoing offensive on Syrian military targets, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham’s (HTS) political spokesperson said in a televised interview on Wednesday.

A confluence of interests explains its actions, but these same actions also have some unintended consequences.

Israel carried out one of the largest attack operations in its history after launching nearly 500 strikes in post-Assad Syria, which has just been taken over by a group of “rebels” led by the terrorist-designated and Turkish-backed Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), formerly known as Al Qaeda in Syria. The goal is to create a “sterile defense zone”, to which end the IDF broached the Golan Heights buffer zone and advanced along the Syrian-Lebanese border, ending up just kilometers away from Damascus.

Bashar al Assad’s regime fell in the early morning of December 8, withering away in the face of a mere 11-day onslaught by a coalition of opposition armed groups. Israel found itself caught off-guard by the unfolding events in Syria. As matters developed, Israel cast a wary eye towards its northern neighbor. Assad’s downfall removed one of the most implacable and lethal of Israel’s Arab enemies. As importantly, it appeared to sever a central link in Iran’s anti-Israel “Resistance Axis” alliance—Tehran’s primary conduit of arms, material, and funds to its most powerful extension, Hezbollah.

Senior Iranian officials and the Iranian media expressed acceptance of the collapse of the
Assad regime in Syria and concern about future developments in the country and Israel’s
exploitation of the situation. The Iranian Supreme Leader noted that it was a “joint American-
Zionist plan.” However, they stressed that the fall of the Syrian regime would not have a
significant negative impact on the “resistance front,” including Hezbollah. The pro-Iranian
militias claimed that the plot was intended to undermine the support of the “axis of resistance”
for the Gaza Strip.

Abou Mohammed al-Joulani, qui de fait détient aujourd’hui le pouvoir à Damas, a une histoire éloquente : il commence sa militance djihadiste dans les rangs d’Al-Qaïda comme collaborateur de Abou Bakr al-Baghdadi, le «calife» qui en 2013 fonde l’ISIS, l’«État Islamique de l’Irak et de la Syrie». En 2011, pendant la phase préparatoire, al-Baghdadi l’envoie en Syrie avec des fonds importants pour créer le Front al-Nosra, faction formellement autonome mais en réalité appartenant à l’État islamique.

La volonté d’obtenir la défaite de la Russie dans le conflit ukrainien a incité les États-Unis, l’OTAN et l’Occident collectif à déployer les outils de la terreur à l’échelle mondiale, ce qui a conduit à la chute de Bachar el-Assad en Syrie le 8 décembre 2024, à la suite d’un conflit décennal et multidimensionnel.

Depuis leurs salons feutrés, les dirigeants occidentaux contemplent avec une certaine distance les ruines de la Syrie. Un spectacle qui, semble-t-il, les amuse autant qu’il les intrigue. Car, après tout, n’est-ce pas là le résultat logique de leurs interventions bienveillantes ?

Le premier partage de la Syrie s’est accompli. Son principal bénéficiaire s’est avéré être le président turc Recep Tayyip Erdogan, pour qui c’est un pas de plus vers la restauration du grand projet ottoman.

Cependant, la partition de la Syrie signifie beaucoup plus. Elle montre que le monde fondé sur le principe de l’inviolabilité des frontières est révolu, que les grandes puissances utilisent à nouveau la force et que tous les principes sur lesquels les démocraties occidentales tentaient de construire l’ordre mondial ces 30 dernières années ont subi un échec retentissant.