Jihadi Rebel Surge Disrupts White House Plans for Syria

The Syrian civil war has cost half a million lives while forcing millions to seek refuge abroad, yet the Biden administration has continually sought to ease American pressure on the regime in Damascus mainly responsible for the carnage. What animates this policy is the hope that a softer line on the regime of Bashar al-Assad can pry Damascus away from Tehran despite their four decades of close cooperation.

However, after a lightning rebel offensive scattered the government forces holding Aleppo on November 30, Assad will now be more dependent than ever on his patrons in Tehran and Moscow. This undercuts Washington’s latest plan to lift sanctions on Assad in exchange for parting ways with Iran, an initiative it planned to pursue in tandem with the United Arab Emirates, the leading advocate of Arab normalization with Damascus. Instead, in its final weeks in office, the Biden administration will have to adapt to instability that could empower Sunni jihadists, spark new atrocities, or lead to the use of chemical weapons.

U.S.-Designated Terror Group Leads Rebel Offensive but Promises Tolerance

Washington added Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) to its official list of foreign terrorist organizations in 2018, identifying it as the successor to al-Qaeda’s branch in Syria. HTS is led by Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, a longtime al-Qaeda operative who now claims to reject that group’s extremism. HTS specifically pledged to respect the Syrian Kurdish community, although Kurdish media reported several violent incidents. HTS also suggested its gains “pave the way for the return of more than 100,000 displaced persons to their homes and their lands,” rekindling hopes that many who fled Aleppo could finally come back.

Jolani and HTS continue to believe that society should conform to religious dictates and that democracy is forbidden. “You can live by the law of Islam, or you can live by the law of sin,” Jolani said.

Assad Could Use Chemical Weapons — Or Lose Them to the Rebels

During his first term, President-elect Donald Trump launched two rounds of airstrikes against Syria as punishment for its use of chemical weapons. In 2021, at the behest of the United States and numerous allies, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) suspended Syria for its ongoing refusal to dismantle its chemical weapons program. Should the Assad regime continue to lose ground rapidly, its arsenal could fall into rebel hands. If that seemed likely to happen, the United States might consider employing airstrikes to destroy the weapons before their seizure. An alternative risk is that Assad will order chemical attacks as he did on several occasions between 2013 and 2018, challenging the West to either enforce its prohibition or acknowledge that it has become hollow.

Congress Faces Key Decision on Syria

In 2019, Trump signed into law the Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act, named for the Syrian military photographer with the pseudonym “Caesar” who fled the country in 2013 with 55,000 digital images showing the corpses of men, women, and children held and tortured by the regime. The law passed with overwhelming bipartisan support and prescribed the toughest sanctions to date on the Assad regime. Yet in the absence of congressional action, the Caesar Act will expire later this month. There is bipartisan support for its renewal, yet few days remain on the legislative calendar.

The new administration should recognize that the crisis in Syria is inseparable from the problems that Iran’s clerical regime has created across the region. Thus, maximum pressure on the Assad regime should form an integral part of the new administration’s maximum pressure policy toward Iran. Yet the enemy of an enemy may not be a friend, so the Trump administration should likewise pursue Jolani and HTS as they would any other terrorist outfit, unless and until they show that their repudiation of extremism is not just a public relations gambit.

David Adesnik is vice president of research at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), where Ahmad Sharawi is a research analyst. For more analysis from David and Ahmad, subscribe HERE. Follow them on X @adesnik and @ahmada_sharawi. Follow FDD on X @FDD. FDD is a Washington, DC-based, nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.