When Aleppo, Syria’s second largest city fell on Friday, November 29, 2024 , I thought it was a big blow, but that the Syrian Armed Forces would quickly recover and fight to retake it. However, in the following days, as the Syrian military melted away in the face of advancing Islamic terrorist rebels of al-Qaeda, Islamic State, ISIS and al-Nustra, now called the Hayat Tahir al-Sham, HTS, I was worried.
The Syrian government announced that its troop withdrawals were tactical and strategic moves. But it reminded me how the Taliban in Afghanistan raced through towns and cities within a few days before arriving at the gates of Kabul on August 15, 2021. They then entered the city without a fight.
My fears were confirmed on Sunday morning December 8 when a friend called to inform me that the rebels had entered Damascus. We discussed for about an hour as I tried to convince him that the fall of President Bashir al-Assad’s government is a tragedy of monumental proportions as it was the glue that held the country together. So, it will be a miracle if the country does not disintegrate.
First, it was the liberal Assad government, despite its frailties that had kept the vicious Islamic terrorists from power. So Syria would now be run under a backward regime that would make it a virtual crime for Syrians to be Alawite Muslims, minority Christians, marginal nationalities or liberal-minded.
The HTS leader, Ahmed al-Sharaa alias Abu Mohammed al-julani, had at various times been the right hand man of ISIS leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, headed al-Qaeda in Syria and founded the terrorist al-Nusra Front which later changed its name to Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, JFS.
Only myopic Western leaders think robing Syrian Islamic terrorists in cassock would turn them into born-again liberals or democrats.
Secondly, it was the Assad administration that kept expansionist Israel from rolling down the Golan Heights it seized in 1967, to occupy more Syrian territory. Now, within three days of Assad’s fall, Israel has rolled out its thanks, seizing more Syrian lands, claiming it wants to build a buffer between the Golan Heights it is occupying and the new regime in Damascus.
Thirdly, the fall of Assad would give Turkey which already occupies 8,835 square kilometres of Syria, the opportunity to further expand, using its surrogate Syrian National Army.
Fourthly, Assad’s absence may make the Syrian Democratic Forces, SDF, and its Kurdish Peoples’ Protection Units, YPG, fighting alongside Christian minorities, breakaway and establish a state of their own. Although currently, the SDF and the new regime in Damascus are not at loggerheads, the likely advance of the Turkish military and militia may force them into a war of survival.
The fall of Assad also presents an uncertainty for the US and its troops in Northern Syria who are holding over 40,000 ISIS combatants and their allies in various prisons. These prisoners and the jihadists now controlling Damascus, belonged to the same group and share the same jihadist ideology.
Yet another major factor in the unfolding tragedy is that the defeated Syrian armed forces, except for those who may defect to the new forces, have not been decimated. They are virtually intact. Some of their heavy arms have already been delivered to their allies in Iraq.
Also, the Alawites, a liberal Muslim movement which produced Hafez al-Assad, the father, and Bashar al-Assad the son as rulers of the country in the last half century, may build their own regional militia force that may be backed by Iran, Iraq and Russia.
Apart from the Americans and the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, NATO, with military interests in Syria, there are the Gulf States, including Jordan, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia which had funded the establishment of ISIS primarily as a force to destabilise Syria and overthrow the Assad government. After ISIS became a Frankenstein monster and a beast to be put down, these regional powers continued to maintain links with its off shoots like the HTS that now holds power in Damascus.
Syria under Assad had its problems like all other countries, but the crises that led to its civil war was a contrived one. It was one of the countries the West and US pencilled down for regime change under various guises. The others included Iraq under Sadam Hussien, Afghanistan with Mullah Muhammad Omar as leader, Libya under Mouammar Ghadafi, Sudan with President Omar al-Bashir and, Iran. All those leaders are gone, remaining the leadership in Iran.
I have tried to understand the world and why we have ended up almost in a cul-de-sac. The overthrow of Assad gave me an added perspective. A world led by Western elites and their US first cousins, cannot but be a confused one because their philosophy is not about development, but acquisition and control.
This is not about their attempts to conquer the rest of humanity, slavery, colonialism and leading humanity into two World Wars, with a drive towards a nuclear-powered Third World War. It is more about being partially blinded by a myopia that sees weaponising religion thrice over, and expecting a different outcome.
The unfolding tragedy in Syria has its origins in the December 24, 1977 to February 15, 1989 conflict in Afghanistan. It was part of the Cold War battles. Pro-Soviet Union governments ran Afghanistan, and the US and its allies concluded that the best way to remove them and impose a Pro-capitalist government, was by mobilising Muslim youths across the world to carry out a jihad against the Afghan government which they labelled atheists. These youths became known as Mujahedeen and they succeeded in taking out the pro-Soviet regime, but could not agree on a new government.
When the Mujahedeen fighters returned to their various countries, their mainly conservative governments were afraid as they were battle-tested fighters who were outside the regular armies. When they moved against the returnees, the youths fled. Many re-assembled under a new internationalist organisation called al-Qaeda. It was led by US favourite, Osama Bin Laden. The al-Qaeda which was given refuge in Afghanistan, was later accused of masterminding the 911 attacks in US. For this, the US and its allies, invaded Afghanistan for two decades. When it was decided to invade Syria, the US and its Gulf allies, created ISIS and al-Nustra Front from al-Qaeda. ISIS like a mad dog turned against its owners and created a short-lived Islamic Caliphate spanning Iraq and parts of Syria.
So, having failed to learn from those experiences, the West, US and their allies are hailing the HTS Islamist jihadists.
The world is likely to wake up tomorrow to the reality that ousting Assad for the Islamic fundamentalists, was a grave error.
- Owei Lakemfa is a seasoned Nigerian journalist, author, and human rights activist
