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December 6, 2024 - 7:00am
Once a symbol of Bashar Al-Assad’s power, the Syrian city of Hama has now fallen to rebel forces. That these are led primarily by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a coalition with roots in jihadist movements, makes Hama’s fall not the cause for unadulterated joy it might otherwise have been. The success follows quickly on from the rebels’ capture of Aleppo, and they are, perhaps unsurprisingly, using it as proof that total victory in Syria is now inevitable.
It also, however, raises serious questions about the future of Syria and the region at large.
Hama is important. Situated between Damascus and Aleppo, it is a vital artery linking the north and south of the country. Its capture disrupts government supply lines and further isolates the already embattled Assad regime. Beyond its geography, Hama also carries a symbolic weight. In 1982, the city was the site of one of the Assad regime’s most infamous massacres, when Bashar al-Assad’s father, Hafez, crushed an Islamist uprising, killing tens of thousands in the process. For many, the fall of Hama to rebel forces feels like justice — the wheel turns, even if it takes decades to complete a single revolution.
Images from the ground are accordingly triumphant: social media bursts with scenes of celebration among rebel factions, of prisoners being freed from Hama’s central detention facilities, and of triumphant fighters parading through the streets.
The rapid advances of opposition forces have exposed the vulnerabilities of Assad’s regime, particularly as its allies grow increasingly distracted by other conflicts. Russia, which has effectively propped up Assad for years, has redirected much of its attention and resources to the war in Ukraine, while Hezbollah, another key Assad ally, has been royally beaten up by the Israelis. The result is that the Syrian government forces — never particularly impressive — are now consistently unable to mount an effective defence against coordinated rebel offensives.
The implications of Hama’s fall are serious. Already, the rebels appear to be turning their attention to Homs, another strategically significant city that lies just to the south. Succeed in taking that, and they could well sever Damascus from the coastal regions, cutting the Assad regime off from its remaining strongholds outside the capital. This would probably be a near-fatal blow to a government that, despite years of war, had appeared to be slowly consolidating its power.
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SubscribeThe West’s main aim in this conflict should be to minimise the migration of people to mainland Europe and the UK from Syria. It is a horrible war run by horrible people on all sides. Hopefully some behind the scene arrangements between Russia and the US can keep the conflict simmering within the borders of Syria. Or better still, if nothing to be done is better than something, send in the UN to meander about from fort to fort.
Syria was a stable multi-ethnic and multi-religious country, a rarity in the Middle East, until the Gulf States and CIA stirred up and financed a false “Arab Spring” Uprising because Assad would not bow to their demands on how he should run his country. Since Turkey invaded the north, killing thousands and commandeering wheat and water supplies with not a peep of protest from the West Syria has been under ridiculous international sanctions, initiated by the US, making day to day life very difficult for the population. If only the West would leave other countries alone when it is obvious from all evidence over recent decades that interference has made each country worse than before.
We should take willing Syrian and Lebanese Christians in a one for one swap with islamists living in Europe. Middle Eastern Christians integrate really well. See Australia for proof
The Middle East is where the first civilisations arose; the first settlements that could be called cities, the first traders, the place-names to which our most ancient texts refer.
Now, it’s just a nest a vipers, a human desert; a place where the worst traits of humanity play out in a sandpit.
Actually we have no idea where the first civilisations arose. There are way too many unanswered questions about human prehistory.
And to call the Middle East a ‘human desert’ or ‘nest of vipers’ ignores the role played by the American Empire and other outside actors are playing in that region. It also puts Western countries on a false moral high ground. It makes us forget that we are all of us capable of those atrocities: create those same conditions in Lancashire and you too could be sodomising your neighbour with a knife, just like Abdullah and Mohammed over in Homs.
Every civilization has its moment in the sun.
Which would make it the first place where people made war on each other!
HTS and Israel may form an alliance, after all they have common enemies: Assad, Iran and Hezbollah. It may not be a formal alliance, but behind the scenes support.
Imagine if HTS takes over Damascus. Bashar Al-Assad will need to flee or end up like Saddam. Then if HTS Syria wants to make heads spin, it could ask to be part of the Abraham Accords. Wild.
Not so far-fetched as it might seem. All these Sunni insurgents are backed by the Saudis – who appear to have decided that Israel is less of a problem than Iran and its allies. For the moment.
Saudi are very happy to see a weakened Iran
Hezbollah was one of Assad’s few effective fighting forces in Syria. His army is poor. Hezbollah got dragged into Hamas’ insurgency against Israel. Israel has crushed Hezbollah. And now, without Hezbollah support, Assad’s army is collapsing.
If your enemy’s enemy is your friend, then Israel is very friendly with HTS. HTS is sponsored by Saudi. Saudi opposes Iranian hegemony. Iran is practically at war with Israel via its proxies Hamas and Hezbollah. And Hezbollah and Syria are allied with Iran.
In the big picture, what’s happening in Syria now makes total sense for Israel and Saudi.
You forget the Turks. They want to reinstall the Ottoman Empire, have openly said so many times. Even with Iran gone as a threat (let’s hope), new threats appear on the horizon for Israel.
H_zbollah was one of Ass_d’s few effective fighting forces in Syria. His army is poor. H_zbollah got dragged into H_mas’ insurgency against Isr_el. Isr_el has crushed H_zbollah. And now, without H_zbollah support, Ass_d’s army is collapsing.
If your enemy’s enemy is your friend, then Isr_el is very friendly with HTS. HTS is sponsored by S__di. S__di opposes Ir_ni_n hegemony. Ir_n is practically at war with Isr_el via its proxies H_mas and H_zbollah. And H_zbollah and Syria are allied with Ir_n.
In the big picture, what’s happening in Syria now makes total sense for Isr_el and S__di.
They already have, Israel and the US are acting as their Air force
Chaos in Syria, refugees for Europe
Thanks a lot Israel
HTS are still a proscribed terrorist organisation so if Syrians flee their land when the thugs take over we will of course let them all into the UK. Whatever you may think of Assad there are no good Islamic Terrorist Groups, whatever they may call themselves they all have the same aim, and it is not good.
I don’t really understand your downvotes. There’s already been something of a Sunni-Israeli rapprochement, in the form of the Abraham Accords.
I learned to not pay attention to down votes on this site, alot of people here are so emotional about Israel, that an alliance with anything Islam is inconceivable, and Israel can do no wrong.
The Middle East today resembles the western Balkans of the 1990s: there are no good guys. If we continue with our usual boy-scout approach to politics in the region, we will come to grief.
Where do our interests lie? I suggest we want to see an end to Iran’s meddlesome allies in the region. So either Assad cuts loose from Tehran, or he goes down fighting.
The price for our support for the Iranian regime’s survival should be the end of their atomic bomb ambitions for once and for all.
There may be no good guys, but some guys are badder than others.
The Christian population of Syria, around 10% of the people, have historically supported Assad. We can expect yet another Christian depopulation if the jihadists gain power. And yet again, crickets from the mainstream media on this issue.
Most Christians have already left as refugees or migrants, it’s estimated they are now less than 3% of the population, the rest should leave imo, they have no future there, just misery. Syria is divided into factions , Kurds, Shia and sunni. It could be chaos for a long time yet.
All the problems my Syrian expat colleague was escaping in the 2000s have now breezily walked into Europe via its open borders and are now playing out in its migrant communities in Germany and Sweden. The problem with offering refuge to everyone is you stop being a refuge for anyone.
Nope, that makes you like my own USA, which has been many things over its history, but never a ‘refuge’ by any plausible definition of the word, not for people anyway. I suppose you could call about half of it a wildlife refuge if you go back a century or so and about 85-90% if you go back two centuries. You’d be surprised how much of it still does qualify as a wildlife refuge even when not designated as such by the government. As an American, let me humbly apologize for exporting irrational optimism towards immigration and multiculturalism into places where it proved unhelpful. I apologize in advance for the high crime, the ghettos, the racial animus, the dysfunctional politics, that has always characterized the US and that we’ve now inflicted on so many other nations.
Meant to say Alawites, not Shi’ites, and Assad is an Alawite, a minority which has ruled over the Sunni majority for decades,
but supported by Iran.
The Alawites are a Shiite sect.
Syria was not chaos until the US and Gulf States decided Assad wasn’t compliant enough to their wishes on how Syria should be run.
A Kurdish state in the region would probably be a boon for overall stability given that the Kurds are by far the least insane and the easiest faction for western governments to deal with constructively. The American government has quietly relied on the Kurds to keep the peace in northern Iraq and aided them financially and militarily for a long time because they’re the group who can be trusted to keep the peace without doing what Assad or the Islamists do, that is massacre people left and right. Unfortunately, you’ll never here any call for a Kurdish state out of Washington or any other western capital because the Turks are determined not to ever give their own Kurd majority regions any excuse to demand independence or separation from Turkey, and thanks to Turkey’s strategic location at the mouth of the Black Sea and the leverage that position provides over Russian naval power, western governments will continue to ignore one of the most obvious partial solutions to violence in the Middle East.
They support him because he offers them some protection. No Christian is safe around islamists. The surviving Christians of Syria are the remnant of a once thriving population of Christians that predates the arrival of islam by several hundred years.
Coptic Christians in Egypt tend to support al Sisi for similar reasons – he protects them from the Muslim Brotherhood of former President Morsi.
Well, did Sisi not just release from prison 800 members of the Muslim Brotherhood?
If true, is your argument that Sisi is no longer protecting Copts from the Muslim Brotherhood and that Copts should no longer support him?
Of course. The only place in the Middle East where Christian are protected is, drum roll, Israel! No one seems to talk about this.
Western powers aren’t some bystanders reluctant to engage with Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS). There is no dilemma. From the very beginning the West has actively and consistently supported the Islamists.
The uprising against Assad was led by the Free Syrian Army. It was formed of a command structure of disgruntled former Assad officers who had fled to Turkey and fighters in Syria drawn largely from al-Nusra (Islamist), Islamic Front (Islamist), Mujahideen Army (Islamist), Sham Legion (Islamist), Al-Qashash Battalion (Islamist), Al-Tawhid Brigade (Islamist), Ajnad al-Sham Islamic Union (Islamist)… you get the picture.
In fact, Assad represented the only credible non-Islamist government for Syria. So in a binary choice, the West chose to support Islamists against non-Islamists. Between then and now the USA and UK and NATO member Turkey have provided military and logistic support to the Islamist rebel groups, including the Syrian branch of al-Qaeda known as al-Nusra.
And what became of al-Nusra? Its leader was a Salafist from Saudi Arabia named Abu Mohammad al-Julani. And guess where he ended up? He now leads… Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS). HTS is simply a rebranded Syrian al-Qaeda.
Western governments’ dilemma about Islamists overrunning Syria is a pretence. From Afghanistan to Saudi to Libya to Iraq and now Syria, the West actively supports Islamists and Islamism.
Your last sentence is made manifest every single day in this country. To say that I am extremely concerned for the future of my children and any grandchildren that might come is an understatement.
None of this is by accident but planned and enabled. Why? What was so terrible about our culture that is had to be brought to its knees?
I’ve posted this quote before but it is relevant for it reveals the roots of the long held desire to see this come to pass. (written by Gramsci in 1915): “Socialism is precisely the religion that must overwhelm Christianity. … In the new order, Socialism will triumph by first capturing the culture via infiltration of schools, universities, churches, and the media by transforming the consciousness of society.”
This is exactly what has taken place. Currently we have the so-called woke and marxists hand in glove with islam but how do you think it will be for the woke left once islamism rules the roost?
Two comments made. Two comments deleted.
Entirely factual comments based on already printed information in the BBC News archive about HTS, its leader, his previous organisations, and Western backing.
What rules cause such comments (or readers?) to be sanctioned? It isn’t off topic. It isn’t indecency. It isn’t inaccuracy. It isn’t libel. So why?
It’s difficult for us to comment, given that we can’t read what your posts said.
Sure, Assad is a vile dictator but at least he gave stability to his country. It’s Western meddling that started this civil war (and Iraq, Libya etc) which has destabilise the region, impoverished its citizens and damaged, by immigration, all of Europe. The Syrians must stay and sort out their country.
I don’t doubt that there are plenty of things not to like about the rebel factions, but the end of Assad should displease nobody. I hope he meets his end in the same way that Gaddafi did.
You and Cackling Hillary Clinton both!
“We came, we saw, he died” *cackle cackle*
I want Assad, Putin and Ian to lose and I want the Turkish backed terrorists to lose. Oh and ISIL. Most of all.
Let’s hope the Kurds are well protected. Our most reliable ally.
The Assad regime was clothed only by a minority: over 90% of Syrians knew them to be the only realistic bulwark against Islamic fundamentalim; and, like Afghanistan, it will the women who will suffer most; but doubtless we will play tame poodle yet again to the US and the Saudis.