EA on International Media: Is There Hope for the “New Syria”?

UPDATES: “New Syria” Calls for Removal of International Sanctions

UPDATE 1352 GMT:

Turkey’s Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan has met the head of Syria’s General Command, Ahmed al-Sharaa, in Damascus.

No details were given of the discussion.

Fidan threatened on Saturday that Turkey will do “whatever it takes” against the Kurdish autonomous area in northeast Syria if the new Syrian Government does not pursue acceptable action.

He accompanied the threat with praise of “excellent cooperation” with the Islamist faction Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham, supported by Turkey for years in northwest Syria, in the battle against the Islamic State and Al Qa’eda in the past.

Turkish Defense Minister Yasar Guler said:

We believe that the new leadership in Syria and the Syrian National Army, which is an important part of its army, along with the Syrian people, will free all territories occupied by terrorist organisations.

We will also take every necessary measure with the same determination until all terrorist elements beyond our borders are cleared.

Al-Sharaa also met Lebanese Druze politician Walid Jumblatt, a long=time critic of the Assad regime’s actions in Lebanon, including the assassination of his father.

Al-Sharaa pledged, “Syria was a source of concern and disturbance, and its interference in Lebanese affairs was negative. Syria will no longer be a case of negative interference in Lebanon.”

Jumblatt said, “We salute the Syrian people for their great victories and we salute you for your battle that you waged to get rid of oppression and tyranny that lasted over 50 years.”

He expressed hope that Lebanese-Syrian relations “will return to normal”.

The scene in the Syrian Druze city of Suwayda on Saturday:

UPDATE 1148 GMT:

Iran’s Supreme Leader has distanced himself from developments in Syria, following the loss of Tehran’s ally Bashar al-Assad.

At a ceremony in Tehran, Ayatollah Khamenei insisted, “The Islamic Republic of Iran doesn’t have proxy forces. If we decide to take action one day, we don’t need proxy forces.”

Without naming a specific group within Syria, Khamenei declared:

UPDATE 1125 GMT:

Syria’s General Command has named Murhaf Abu Qasra as Defense Minister Asaad Hassan al-Shibani as Foreign Minister.

Both men are close associates of the leader of the Islamist faction Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham, Ahmed al-Sharaa.

Al-Shibani, who holds a Ph.D. in political science, is the long-time HTS head of external relations.

UPDATE 1119 GMT:

Qatar is the latest country to reopen its embassy in Damascus.

Doha closed the embassy in July 2011, following attacks on the compound by supporters of the Assad regime.

Turkey, Egypt, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Jordan, Bahrain, Oman, and Italy have also restored their diplomatic missions.

UPDATE 0905 GMT:

The New York Times adds to the accounts of the Assad regime’s final days:

Bashar al-Assad left his country so secretively that some of his aides remained in the palace hours after he had left, waiting for a speech that never came, the insider said. After midnight, word came that the president was gone, and they fled in a panic, leaving the palace gates wide open for the rebels who would storm in a few hours later….

“For your own personal safety, you sacrificed all your people?” said the palace insider, who barely escaped before the rebels arrived.

Hiding from Syria’s new masters far from Damascus, he was still struggling to come to grips with Mr. al-Assad’s sudden flight.

“It is a betrayal that I cannot believe.”

UPDATE, DEC 22:

Bike riders in Damascus this morning:

UPDATE 1341 GMT:

Syria’s ruling General Command has named Asaad Hassan al-Shibani as Foreign Minister.

An administration official said the appointment “comes in response to the aspirations of the Syrian people to establish international relations that bring peace and stability”.

UPDATE 1228 GMT:

Iran’s Foreign Ministry says a local employee of the Iranian Embassy in Damascus was shot and killed in his vehicle in the city last week.

Spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei said Davood Bitaraf was slain by “terrorists”. He declared that the Syrian transitional government is responsible for “identifying, prosecuting, and punishing the perpetrators of this crime”.

“The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is seriously pursuing the matter through appropriate channels and various diplomatic and international avenues,” he said.

UPDATE 0824 GMT:

Having propped up Bashar al-Assad from the start of Syria’s uprising in March 2011, Iran’s regime has blamed the former leader for his sudden downfall.

Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said in a televised interview:

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UPDATE 0714 GMT:

Israel’s military has confirmed the shooting of a protester during a demonstration on Friday against the Israeli occupation of southwest Syria.

The man was injured in the leg during the rally in western Daraa Province (see December 20, 1301 GMT).

“During a protest against IDF’s activities in the area of Maariya in southern Syria, IDF called on protesters to distance themselves from the troops,” the military said. “After the troops identified a threat, they operated in accordance with standard operating procedures against the threat.”

Resident Ali al-Khalaf, 52, said:

When the Israelis entered [Maariya]…they sowed fear and horror among the people, the children, the women. So much so that some people fled to other nearby villages. They [Israeli troops] entered the villages of Maariya, Aabdyn and Jamlah.

UPDATE, DEC 21:

The US has lifted its $10 million bounty on Ahmed al-Sharaa, the leader of the Islamist faction Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham.

American diplomat Barbara Leaf, leading a delegation in Damascus, told al-Sharaa — formerly known as Abu Mohammad al-Joulani — in a meeting on Friday.

The bounty was issued on al-Joulani as the leader of a “terrorist organization”. HTS was linked with Al Qa’eda until it broke away in 2016.

Leaf explained:

It was a policy decision…aligned with the fact that we are beginning a discussion with HTS.

So if I’m sitting with the HTS leader and having a lengthy detailed discussion about the interests of the US, interests of Syria, maybe interests of the region, it’s suffice to say a little incoherent then to have a bounty on the guy’s head.

Leaf, the State Department’s senior diplomat for the Middle East, said al-Sharaa had given assurances that the Islamic State and other terrorist groups would not be allowed to operate in Syrian territory.

The diplomat also spoke about efforts to prevent battles between Turkish-backed fighters and the US-supported, Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces in northern Syria.

Ankara considers the SDF and Kurdish authorities to be part of the Turkish Kurdish insurgency PKK.

Leaf said:

We are working energetically in discussions with Turkish authorities, also with the SDF.

We think the best way ahead is for a ceasefire around Kobani [a Kurdish-run city on the Turkish border] and that we work to find what I would call a managed transition in terms of SDF’s role in that part of the country.

So I think we’re working above all to de-escalate things there, to not distract from the really critical counter-ISIS fight and the critical role that the SDF has in managing foreign terrorist fighter detention facilities, while Damascus and the SDF hopefully begin a dialogue themselves.

UPDATE 1422 GMT:

Omar al-Aswad and Daniel Hilton of Middle East Eye speak with Assad regime troops about the 11-day rebel offensive that liberated Syria.

Amr, a 27-year-old conscript in the Syrian army, was stationed on the front line just north of Hama.

As he took cover, Amr quaked. The rebel offensive had taken everyone by surprise, and he was no warrior.

“My commanding officer told me to start shooting,” he recalled. “He said if you don’t start shooting the enemy, you will be considered a traitor and punished.”

So Amr began shooting – not at anyone or anything, just sporadic gunfire into nothingness to avoid punishment.

“We kept being told: ‘Don’t retreat, backup is on on the way,’” Amr said. “But everyone knew that was a lie. There was no backup.”

Over time, Amr and the rest of the troops defending Hama were pushed southwards to Salamiyah. That’s when everyone seemed to give up hope.

All around him, Amr’s fellow soldiers and officers were stripping off their uniforms and laying down their weapons.

He decided to do the same and made his way to Damascus, exhausted, half-naked and in shock.

UPDATE 1323 GMT:

Journalist Wladimir Van Wilgenburg reports on the killing of two colleagues in Kurdish territory in northern Syria.

The Dicle Firat Journalists’ Association said of the slaying of “two valuable journalists”, “We condemn this attack on our colleagues and demand accountability.”

The Turkish Journalists Union also condemned the attack.

In his last tweet on Thursday morning, Dastan report that — contrary to claims of a ceasefire between Turkish-backed fighters and the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces — Turkey and its affiliated groups were preparing a major attack on Kobani and otehr areas of Syrian Kurdistan.

On Friday, Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan indicated Turksih attacks on Syrian Kurdish territory will continue.

After attending a Cairo summit, Erdoğan told reporters that the Islamic State, the Turkish Kurdish insurgency PKK, and “their affiliates – which threaten the survival of Syria – must be eradicated”

He included the Syrian Kurdish militia YPG, “The heads of terrorist organisations such as IS and PKK-YPG…will be crushed in the shortest time possible.”

UPDATE 1301 GMT:

Claimed footage, from Daraa 24 Media, of protesters injured in western Daraa Province in southern Syria by the Israel Defense Forces.

Israeli troops reportedly fired on the demonstration demanding the withdrawal of Israel from the country.

Residents claim Israeli forces have prevented local farmers from reaching their fields, setting up a position in an abandoned Assad regime army base in the village of Maariyah.

UPDATE 1244 GMT:

A Syrian military analyst notes:

UPDATE 0908 GMT:

Senior US diplomats are in Damascus for discussions with the new Syrian authorities, including representatives of the Islamist faction Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham.

The delegation is led by Barbara Leaf, the top State Department official for the Middle East, and Daniel Rubinstein, a veteran of posts in Arab countries who is in charge of engagement on Syria. Roger Carstens, the US envoy on hostages, will be seeking information on missing Americans such as journalist Austin Tice, abducted in August 2012.

The US officials will speak with Syrians about “their vision for the future of their country and how the United States can help support them”, a State Department spokesperson said.

HTS, which broke from Al Qa’eda in 2016, is still on the State Department’s list of “terrorist organizations”.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a podcast on Wednesday that it is too early to assess the sincerity of HTS leader Ahmed al-Sharaa and that any sanctions relief will depend on actions.

There are no guarantees at all. We’ve seen too many times one dictator can be replaced by another.

So this is fraught, but we know almost certainly that absent our engagement, absent our leadership, that’s the way it will go.

We have a chance, and the Syrian people have a chance, if concerned countries, including the United States, work to move this in a good direction.

ORIGINAL ENTRY, DEC 20: Eleven days after the fall of the Assad regime, hundreds of demonstrators gathered in Syria’s capital Damascus on Thursday to call for democracy and women’s rights.

The crowd in Ummayad Square chanted “No to religious rule”, “God is for religion and the homeland is for all”, “We want a democracy, not a religious state”, and “The Syrian people are one”. They held signs saying, “Secular”, or portraying the scales of justice hanging equally with the words “Men” and “Women” below. One young man carried a handwritten sign, “No free nation without free women”, and another held up “Equality between women and men is a legitimate Islamic and international right”.

Ayham Hamsho, 48, a maker of prosthetic limbs, said:

We are here in peaceful action to safeguard the gains of the revolution that has let us stand here today in complete freedom.

For more than 50 years, we have been under tyrannical rule that has blocked party and political activity in the country….

Today we are trying to organise our affairs…[for] a secular, civil, democratic state”

A few armed fighters of the Islamist faction Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham, some of them masked, walked around the demonstration. One said, “The great Syrian revolution was victorious through armed force.” The protesters responded with the chant, “Down with military rule.”

Actress Raghda Khateb, standing among friends, said the demonstration is part of “preventive” action to block any attempts to establish strict conservative rule.

“Syrian women have been a constant partner on the streets, in protecting protesters, in tending to the wounded, and in prisons and detention centres,” she explained. “The people who took to the streets against the murderous regime are ready to come out again and to rule.”

The marchers pushed back against the statement earlier this week by Obaida Arnaout, spokesman for the new political administration, that “female representation in ministries or parliament…is premature” because of “biological” and other considerations.

Majida Mudarres, 50, a retired civil servant, said, “Women have a big role in political life….We will be observing any position against women and will not accept it. The time in which we were silent is over.”

Fatima Hashem, 29, a television screenwriter, said Syrian women “must not be just partners but must lead the work of building a new Syria”.

Researcher Widad Kreidi added, “While men were fighting, women were keeping up the economy, feeding their children and taking care of their families. Nobody has the right to come to Damascus and attack women in any way.”

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