On Friday 30, it became
clear that the war in Syria is not a civil war. It is now a global proxy war, initiated
by Saudi Arabia and Qatar to eliminate Arab governments that do not reliably
support the Saudi (or Arab League) position. When the international community was
threatened by the spread of violence outside the Syrian border, the U.S. and
other European countries intervened to force their regional allies to scale
back their belligerence. Russia also intervened in support of its traditional
allies in the region. These interventions transformed what was at first a
regional proxy war into a global proxy war. That escalation occurred because of
several historical and geopolitical factors.
Russia, with a
long-standing strategic alliance with Syria that goes as far back as the USSR, supported
the Syrian government and found itself on the same side as Iran. Iran has had an
alliance with Syria since the Iraq-Iran war during which the Gulf States
supported Saddam Hussein, who initiated an eight-year old war that killed
nearly one million people. The U.S.’s primary regional ally is Saudi Arabia.
France and the UK, two countries with billions of dollars in trade and arms
deals with Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates sided with Saudi
Arabia as well. Turkey, governed by the AKP since 2002, took the side of the
Muslim Brotherhood, with whom they share an ideological and sectarian affinity
and whose armed militia was crushed in Hama in 1982 by Bashar al-Assad’s father.
Jordan, whose massacre of Palestinians in 1970 caused Syria to send an armored
division into Jordan, sided with Assad’s opponents. These are just few of the
historical and geopolitical reasons behind the strange anti- and pro-Assad
alliances. These are self-interested actors, brought together for a single
purpose: to overthrow the Assad regime. This was not about defending the rights
of the Syrian people or punishing a belligerent authoritarian with blood on his
hands—all Arab regimes have blood on their hands. None of these countries on either
side really cared about the Syrian people, which is why most of them have
failed to take in any Syrian refugees. Even Turkey, which initially opened the
door to the families of the rebel fighters, is now pushing them into the sea
and driving them into Europe.
For four years, these
regional and international actors watched as armed groups, both Syrian and
foreign, moved into towns and cities inviting retaliation by the armed forces
of the Syrian government. Within three years, nearly 70% of Syria’s infrastructure
was destroyed. 200,000 Syrians were killed, and nearly ten million people were
displaced. All this did not move any sponsors of the armed factions to act. They
insisted instead that they had a moral obligation to continue to arm and
finance the armed groups until Assad was removed.
Then, during the summer
of 2015—after the Turkish Islamist party lost its majority in the June 2015
elections, ISIL launched its first suicide attack inside Turkey, and millions
of Syrian refugees trekked through Turkey and Greece to Europe—the world began
to pay attention. It was Russia’s assertive show of power that forced some key
anti-Assad actors to reconsider their positions and take the gravity of the
Syrian situation seriously. With Russian forces on the ground, in the air, and on
the seas, Syria’s proxy war became a global war. That fact became evident in
the October 30th Vienna Meeting, where neither the Syrian government
nor the Syrian opposition groups were present. Instead, 17 countries, including
Iran—participating in such talks for the first time—as well as the UN and the
European Union, sat down to draw a declaration of principles for ending a war
that should not have begun in the first place.
Four months ago, no one
familiar with the key players was optimistic that these countries would
suddenly agree on a practical solution to this deadly conflict. But anyone well-informed
of the motives behind the primary actors in this conflict knows that the
stalemate has been caused by the untenable position of Saudi Arabia and Qatar.
They have been demanding, and insisted just days before the start of the Vienna
Talks, that Assad be removed through a political settlement or by force. Their
position, once again, shows the Saudi rulers’ disdain for participatory
governance and peoples’ right to self-determination.
Saudi Arabia has a long
history of cooking up such deals, none of which have worked. Saudi Arabia
engineered the Ta’if accord, which mandated power sharing in Lebanon. As of today,
Lebanon has been without a president for 523 days, its parliament has given
itself extension after extension instead of holding new elections, and its
government is paralyzed to the point that it cannot even haul the trash out of its
capital city Beirut.
Saudi Arabia engineered
a political settlement in Yemen after the Arab Spring uprising there. The deal
required then-president Ali Abdullah Saleh to hand over power to his vice
president, Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi. Hadi was supposed to preside over a two-year
transition period, during which Yemenis would vote on a new constitution and
elect a new government. Hadi failed to accomplish those goals, preferring
instead to stay in power indefinitely. When he was pressured by the Houthis and
their allies to hold elections, he resigned, fled to Saudi Arabia, withdrew his
resignation, and supported a brutal Saudi-led war on his impoverished country
with the aim of reinstating him as the “legitimate” president. In that war,
Saudi Arabia has thus far failed to achieve its stated goals, but has managed to
hand over the city of Aden and other southern territories to al-Qaeda and ISIL.
In Bahrain, when 75% of
the population rose up against the corrupt rulers, Saudi Arabia sent its armed
forces to crush the protest movement and bolster the regime there. When the
Tunisian people rose up against their authoritarian president, Ben Ali, Saudi
Arabia offered him sanctuary and froze its investment in that emerging
democracy. When Tunisia’s elected government wanted Ben Ali extradited on
murder and corruption charges, Saudi Arabia ignored the request and continued
to offer him protection, undermining the sole emerging democracy in the Arab
world.
In a sense, the rulers
of Saudi Arabia have been consistent. They prefer a political order imposed
top-down, and have never supported a genuine democratic movement or a democratic
process for the transfer of political power. Instead, they have preferred to
make deals that exclude the people. That is what they want for Syria as well: a
political solution imposed on the Syrian people without regard for democracy or
self-determination. Saudi Arabia does not promote solutions that are democratic
and transparent, and will never willingly agree to a process that would leave
the decision about Assad’s fate in the hands of the Syrian people. Instead, they
must be forced to agree to it.
There are signs that
the Vienna meeting might be setting the stage for that to happen:
First, the U.S. is distancing
itself from the Saudi position. After the meeting, the State Department
released a photo of the participants in the Vienna Talks, showing Saudi Arabia
sitting at the end of the table farthest from where Secretary Kerry was sitting.
Importantly, it showed Secretary Kerry at head of the table, with the Russian
Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on his left and UN Special Envoy to Syria Staffan
de Mistura on his right. The U.S. is finally playing the role of facilitator,
not party to the conflict. That is a good sign, and a hopeful one for the
Syrian people.
The nine-point Joint Statement,
agreed to by all participants and issued as a final declaration of the results
of the talks, contains several points that give reason for optimism. The Joint
Statement stresses the need to preserve “Syria’s unity, independence,
territorial integrity, and its secular character.” The participants also acknowledged
the rights of “all Syrians, regardless of ethnicity or religious denomination”
to be protected. Importantly, the participants asked the UN “to convene
representatives of the Government of Syria and the Syrian opposition for a
political process leading to credible, inclusive, non-sectarian governance,
followed by a new constitution and elections.” The participants recognized that
such a “political process [must be] be Syrian led and Syrian owned, and [that] the
Syrian people will decide the future of Syria.” Responding to some of the
participants who wanted to bypass the Syrian people, claiming that Assad might
rig such elections, the participants declared that “these elections must be
administered under U.N. supervision to the satisfaction of the governance and
to the highest international standards of transparency and accountability, free
and fair, with all Syrians, including the diaspora, eligible to participate.”
The fact that the participants
agreed on these principles is a huge success. The principles recognize the right
of the Syrian people to decide on the nature of their constitutional rights and
next generation of leaders, and reflect an ability to prioritize the fight
against terrorism and identify the violent groups that must be opposed. The
Joint Statement is explicit in identifying the groups that must be fought and
excluded from deciding the future of Syria: (1) those who want to redraw
national borders (ISIL), (2) those who want to establish a Sunni-dominated
religious state (ISIL, al-Nusra, Ahrar al-Sham, Jaish al-Islam, The Syrian
Islamic Front, and any other group aspiring to impose their own version of Sharia),
(3) any group that promotes a sectarian agenda.
The Joint Statement also
explicitly resolves the dispute over the fate of the current Syrian president
by stating unequivocally that the Syrian people are to choose their next president,
not Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Russia, the U.S., or the UN. The world community can
only help by ensuring that the Syrian people are able to exercise their rights
and carry out their duties under safe, free, and transparent conditions.
With these principles, it
is clear that Saudi Arabia was rebuked for insisting on the removal of the president
of another sovereign country, particularly before they act to stop funding and
arming terrorist and sectarian fighters in that country. The Syrian people—the
dead, those living under siege, and those displaced—have paid for this proxy war
in blood and tears. They are the only people with the right to decide these
matters, not outside forces who sought to use them to settle a geopolitical score.
It is hopeful that the U.S. is finally embracing a principled solution over the
self-interested positions of allies like Saudi Arabia, who continue to be a
burden on U.S. foreign policy.
Related documents: Geneva-1 Final communiqué of the Action Group for Syria; and the basis for Geneva-2 meeting
Related documents: Geneva-1 Final communiqué of the Action Group for Syria; and the basis for Geneva-2 meeting
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* Prof. SOUAIAIA teaches at the University of Iowa. His
most recent book, Anatomy of Dissent in Islamic Societies, provides a historical and theoretical
treatment of rebellious movements and ideas since the rise of Islam. Opinions
are the author’s, speaking on matters of public interest; not speaking for the
university or any other organization with which he is affiliated.
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