The long-expected decision this week
from the Arab League to readmit Syria after a decade was
bitter, even for some of those involved.
اضافة اعلان
The devastation of the past 10 years is
still raw, the human suffering still apparent.
The muted response from the region’s
capitals, western politicians, and Syrian opposition, testify to a feeling that
the region has changed so much that what was once unthinkable is now
inevitable.
The Middle East is undergoing profound
political shifts, although the import of each of them is not immediately
obvious.
The readmission by the Arab League
comes shortly after a Chinese-mediated diplomatic agreement between Saudi Arabia and Iran, a
potential ceasefire
in the Yemen war, and the first visit to Damascus since
the Syrian war began of Iran’s president.
Years of war with no solution in sight
and the severe strain of Syrian refugees especially on Lebanon, Jordan, and
Turkey eventually forced a recognition that a new direction was needed.
Jordan initiative
It was Jordan that first broke the cordon
sanitaire around Assad, so it is no surprise that they were the ones who came
up with the Jordan Initiative.
Attempting to address the vast issues of refugees, militias, and smuggling requires a state that is willing to act normal. After a decade of war, Syria is a very different state to the one the uprising started in.
Back in 2021, King Abdullah took
a phone call from Assad,
ending the isolation and beginning a gradual process of, if not reconciliation,
then at least recognition.
The return of Syria would be “gradual”
said Ahmed Aboul Gheit, the Arab League’s secretary-general and would depend on
each individual Arab country.
The process, he admitted, was only at
the beginning.
Syria may never be a normal state again
But the beginning of what. The Arab
League may have opened the door to normalization, but Syria has changed so
much, it may never be a normal state again.
The question of how far Syria has
fallen outside the orbit of the Middle East has been asked before.
In the mid-2000s, the relationship
between Damascus and the wider region had hit a low point.
The rumbling occupation of Iraq, the
stalemate war between Hezbollah and Israel of 2006, and a continuing crisis in
Lebanon all meant that, when 2008’s Arab League summit came along and was held
in Damascus, barely half the Arab leaders showed up.
Yet, within a year a rapprochement
was underway. Then, as now, the politics outside of Syria eventually created
the conditions for its return.
2008 was different, and not merely
because of the scale of the crimes committed by the Assad regime in the past 10
years.
Syria in the late 2000s had been changed
by the Iraq war and other crises, but it hadn’t been fundamentally changed as a
state. Today, Syria has been.
It’s all part of the forceful messaging that Jordan is determined to make Damascus understand: Normalization comes with a price.
At the root of the push for rehabilitation with Assad is
Captagon, an amphetamine-style drug produced in Syria and exported across the
Middle East.
Since the Syrian regime began mass
producing the drug a couple of years into the civil war, the pills have flooded
parts of the Middle East.
Tens of millions of pills have found
their way to the cities of the Gulf and into Europe. By one estimate 80 percent
of all the Captagon produced in the world is made in Syria, generating billions
in revenue.
Captagon production and distribution
has changed the way the Syrian regime operates, giving power, money, and
latitude to act to a variety of groups beyond the control of the state.
Jordan’s long border with Syria has become the focus of these groups, leading
to gun battles with Jordanian soldiers.
The question Jordan and the wider Arab
world will want answered is, can Syria now rein in these criminal gangs, in
return for a return to the Arab fold?
Will they even want to, if the money
from Captagon smuggling is not replaced by something else?
As a demonstration of how seriously
Jordan is taking drug smuggling, the day after the Arab League voted to readmit
Syria, Amman conducted rare airstrikes over
Syrian territory, killing one of the largest suspected drug dealers.
It’s all part of the forceful messaging that
Jordan is determined to make Damascus understand: Normalization comes with a
price.
What price will they demand for Syria’s
return
And this is where, having made the
bitter decision to readmit Damascus, the Arab leaders will need to expend their
political energies: What price will they demand for Syria’s return, and is it a
price Assad can or will pay?
The Arab League may have opened the door to normalization, but Syria has changed so much, it may never be a normal state again.
For Jordan, the three pillars are drugs, refugees, and roaming
militias.
The latter, which overlap between
drug smugglers and pro-Iranian militias, are also a concern for other
countries.
That’s where the potential sticking
points emerge.
Because, just as Captagon smuggling offers
funds for the regime that will need to be made up elsewhere, so the militias
offer political benefits that will need to be made up. The appearance of Iran’s
president last week was a clear message that Iran will not simply fade away
from Syria.
The current state of Syria remains the biggest political
obstacle to any normalization.
Simply put, Syria has morphed from an
authoritarian state into something rather different. The regime is beholden to
Tehran, hemmed in by Hezbollah, and must answer to Russia.
Its smuggling empire is so vast it has
been dubbed a narco-state. Under these
circumstances, the very idea of normalization with the regime may be a fiction:
the regime itself may be incapable of acting “normal.”
Attempting to address the vast issues
of refugees, militias, and smuggling requires a state that is willing to act
normal. After a decade of war, Syria is a very different state to the one the
uprising started in.
Any attempt at normalization may
founder on the rocks of that reality. Syria has simply changed too much.
Faisal Al Yafai is currently writing a
book on the Middle East and is a frequent commentator on
international TV news networks. He has worked for news outlets such as The
Guardian and the BBC, and reported on
the Middle East, Eastern Europe, Asia and Africa.
Twitter: @FaisalAlYafai
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