Research & Commentary Results

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan finds himself in a tough spot with Russia as tensions in Syria have escalated dramatically. In a rare direct military confrontation between Turkish and Syrian regime forces, 14 Turkish soldiers and over 100 regime troops were killed in two separate clashes in Idlib over the past 10 days.

Since the beginning of the Syrian civil war in 2011, many analysts have examined the role played by a handful of key outside actors, such as Russia, Iran, Turkey, and the member states of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). Yet China has received comparatively little attention in most discussions about the Syrian crisis. A deeper look at Sino-Syrian relations and Beijing’s policies vis-à-vis Syria is long overdue as this bilateral relationship is set to become increasingly important to both China’s ambitious foreign policy as well as the Syrian government’s vision for reconstruction and redevelopment.

Relentless airstrikes and shelling have killed over 5,000 and displaced more than half a million people.

Faced with the threat of further sanctions, a volatile situation in neighboring Lebanon, and a brutally tough winter, the only thing currently rising from the embers of war-torn Syria is the value of the dollar against the struggling Syrian pound. This marks the beginning of a dangerous new phase in the Syrian conflict as the government, fresh from its eight-year-long war for survival, tries to fend off an economic collapse from within. 

With its clash with Syrian forces on Feb. 3, Turkey is being forced to realize that it has very limited leverage over its foreign policy priorities.

If Turkish efforts to stop the regime’s advance on Saraqeb fail, the humanitarian crisis will escalate uncontrollably.

The escalating tensions between Turkey and Russia over Idlib did not come as a surprise to many outside the Turkish capital.

While proclamations of ISIS’s defeat were certainly premature, international policy and attention on countering terrorism in Syria has since declined — as if to suggest that the job is done. In fact, as 2020 sets in, the world seems to be getting counter-terrorism all wrong in Syria, in three interlinked ways.

By any objective standard, the Lebanese protest movement has failed. This is not necessarily an indictment against it. Rather, it’s a reality one cannot and should not ignore. The responsible thing to do now is to try to understand why it has fallen flat, despite more than 100 days of demonstrations in various regions of the country including the capital, Beirut. 

First, a word of solace. In the annals of history, the Lebanese are in good company as most uprisings and revolutions failed to attain their goals. And even when they did, success either didn’t last long or was completely reversed due to counterrevolutions and other spoilers, both foreign and domestic.

The U.S. assassination of Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani came as a seismic shock to the Middle East, not least to the embattled political system in Damascus that has reaped the benefits of Iran’s military involvement across the region. While his death will be a severe blow, it will not necessarily translate into a decline in Iran’s influence or military presence in Syria. Soleimani’s army of militias and supporters will outlast him, possibly by decades. 

Although Moscow continues to reap the benefits of its Syrian campaign, it is increasingly faced with diminishing returns. Despite its greater geopolitical involvement in the country, the Kremlin has so far failed to extract major economic dividends and may soon face increased competition from Tehran. With Syria’s future clouded in uncertainty and the unresolved issue of the Idlib region hanging like the sword of Damocles over any potential political settlement, Russia is now trying to bring the Libyan conflict into the equation as well.

On Dec. 2, a series of public statements from Emirati and Syrian officials brought widespread attention to the UAE’s rapprochement with Syria. In a video circulated by Russian state media outlet RT, the UAE’s charge d’affaires in Syria, Abdul-Hakim Naimi, praised the “wise leadership” of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and hailed the Syria-UAE relationship as “solid, distinct, and strong.” Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad responded enthusiastically to Naimi’s comments by praising the UAE for standing by the Syrian government in its war against terrorism.

MEI experts Robert S. Ford, Fatima Abo Alasrar, and Emad Badi join host Alistair Taylor to survey what lies ahead for the Middle East in 2020, with particular attention to Iran, Syria, Yemen, Libya, Iraq and Algeria.

It is unclear how many civilians were killed in February and March 2019, when the U.S.-led coalition and the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) pounded ISIS’s last enclave around the town of Baghouz. Presumably, the numbers reached into the thousands. Those who escaped found themselves in the desert, hundreds of kilometers away from lifesaving aid. The reasons for the failure of the humanitarian response were mainly political.

It is increasingly the case that the Russian-Turkish decisions on Idlib or Syria need to be understood as part of a broader Russian-Turkish partnership.