{"id":283968,"date":"2025-01-06T12:00:13","date_gmt":"2025-01-06T12:00:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=283968"},"modified":"2024-12-31T06:28:29","modified_gmt":"2024-12-31T06:28:29","slug":"us-helps-syrias-ruling-al-qaeda-offshoot-while-punishing-its-people","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2025\/01\/us-helps-syrias-ruling-al-qaeda-offshoot-while-punishing-its-people\/","title":{"rendered":"US Helps Syria\u2019s Ruling Al Qaeda Offshoot while Punishing Its People"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Abu Mohammed al-Jolani aka Ahmed al-Shara
(Photo by Ali Haj Suleiman\/Getty Images)<\/p><\/div>\n

The US ignores its own terrorist designation of Syria’s ruling Al Qaeda veterans, all while maintaining sanctions that devastate ordinary civilians. <\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

30 Dec 2024 <\/em>– In his memoir of his time as a senior aide to President Obama, Ben Rhodes recalled one of the administration\u2019s top quandaries in Syria.<\/p>\n

Back in late 2012, the CIA was waging a multi-billion dollar covert war to help insurgents topple then-Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. By that point, Al Qaeda had established a powerful franchise in Syria known as Jabhat al-Nusra, which international actors were promptly designating as a terrorist organization.<\/p>\n

Yet for a US government seeking regime change in Damascus, adding al-Nusra to the State Department terror list posed a problem. On the ground, Rhodes acknowledged, al-Nusra \u201cwas probably the strongest fighting force\u201d against the Syrian government. Moreover, rather than coming into conflict with one another, it was \u201calso clear that the more moderate opposition\u201d favored by the US was in fact \u201cfighting side by side with al-Nusra.\u201d Therefore, Rhodes recalled arguing to his colleagues, designating al-Nusra as a terrorist organization \u201cwould alienate the same people we want to help.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rhodes and his compatriots ended up losing that debate. Yet while the State Department designated al-Nusra in December 2012, it turns out that the US still found a way to help. By placing Nusra on the terrorist list, the New York Times<\/a> explained that month, the Obama administration hoped \u201cto remove one of the biggest obstacles to increasing Western support for the rebellion: the fear that money and arms could flow to a jihadi group that could further destabilize Syria and harm Western interests.\u201d<\/p>\n

In other words, designating al-Nusra as a terrorist group was a toothless move that helped the Obama administration continue arming the insurgency that the Nusra militants dominated. The notion that US sanctions would force an Al Qaeda-dominated rebellion to abandon its leading fighting force was a fantasy \u2013 if not a deliberate ruse — that ensured that US weapons would continue to flow.<\/p>\n

And that they did: three months after Nusra\u2019s terrorist designation, the Associated Press reported<\/a> that the US and its proxy war allies had \u201cdramatically stepped up weapons supplies to Syrian rebels\u201d to help them \u201cseize Damascus.\u201d Despite the Obama administration’s public opposition to Nusra, \u201cthere is little clear evidence from the front lines that all the new, powerful weapons are going to groups which have been carefully vetted by the U.S.\u201d Instead, insurgents \u201cincluding Jabhat al-Nusra\u201d had been seen \u201cwith such weapons.\u201d Once U.S. weapons arrived in Syria, the Obama administration quietly acknowledged that it had no way of controlling who would use them. \u201cWe needed plausible deniability in case the arms got into the hands of al-Nusra,\u201d a former senior administration official explained in 2013<\/a>.<\/p>\n

With US arms in hand, al-Nusra and its allies captured the Syrian province of Idlib in May 2015. It was from Idlib that al-Nusra \u2013 now under the name of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) \u2013 launched the recent offensive that removed Assad.<\/p>\n

And now that HTS, an Al Qaeda offshoot, has finally seized Damascus in December 2024, the Obama administration veterans who now serve under President Biden are facing a dilemma similar to what Ben Rhodes described during that same month in 2012.<\/p>\n

On the one hand, the US helped the insurgency that toppled Assad<\/a> \u2013 not only via the CIA dirty war, but also the crippling sanctions that crushed Syria\u2019s economy and the concurrent military occupation that deprived Syria of its oil and wheat. Yet on the other — because of the decision that the Obama team took in December 2012 over Rhodes\u2019 objections — the new Syrian government is a designated terrorist organization. The HTS ruler, Abu Mohammed al-Jolani \u2013 now using his given name, Ahmed al-Shara \u2013 even has a $10 million US bounty on his head<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In Washington, the decision has been made to give Syria\u2019s ruling Al Qaeda spinoff another helping hand.<\/p>\n

After meeting with al-Jolani\/al-Shara in Damascus on Dec. 20th, senior State Department official Barbara Leaf announced that the US will suspend the $10 million reward for his capture. In Leaf\u2019s telling, Al-Shara \u201ccame across as pragmatic\u201d and offered \u201cmoderate statements\u201d on issues including the rights of women and minorities.<\/p>\n

The US government\u2019s willingness to engage with al-Shara, a former leader of Al Qaeda \u2013 and before that, a former deputy leader of ISIS \u2013 underscores that its definition of \u201cterrorism\u201d is entirely dependent on political calculations. The operative standard boils down to whether or not the designated \u201cterrorist\u201d is \u201con our side<\/a>\u201d, as Jake Sullivan described al-Qaeda in Syria in a now infamous February 2012 email.<\/p>\n

Similar criteria applies to the US definition of \u201cmoderate.\u201d After receiving the Biden administration\u2019s endorsement, al-Shara\u2019s government has offered a vision for Syria that hardly reflects the democratic aspirations of the secular, reformist protesters who took to the streets against Assad in early 2011.<\/p>\n

After initially suggesting that there would be quick elections, al-Shara now says that this could take up to four years. For a war-torn country like Syria, some interim period of restructuring before a vote is understandable. But the government that al-Shara is putting in place for this open-ended transition does not resemble Syria\u2019s rich cultural mosaic, and instead HTS\u2019 own brand of sectarianism.<\/p>\n

Al-Shara has tapped Anas Hassan Khattab, a former Al-Qaeda commander and Nusra co-founder, as Syria\u2019s new intelligence chief. Back in 2014, the United Nations designated Khattab as a \u201cterrorist\u201d for his critical role in Nusra\u2019s financing and operations. Meanwhile, the only woman appointed to serve in the \u201ctransition\u201d government to date has declared that the new system will be based on Sharia law. She also insisted<\/a> that there will no space for both \u201csecularism\u201d and \u201cthose who don’t agree with my thinking.\u201d<\/p>\n

The most ominous development is a wave of sectarian violence. Although largely downplayed in Western media, there are widespread reports, documented with video evidence, of militant attacks on Alawite, Christians, and other minorities. Although HTS fighters have reportedly tried to stop such attacks in some areas, this is an inevitable consequence of a sectarian insurgency taking power in a decimated, divided country. As the New York Times notes<\/a>, HTS\u2019s own ranks \u201cinclude thousands of radicalized foreign fighters\u201d, complemented by many more in other militias. In a show of gratitude for their critical role in toppling Assad, al-Shara has said that these foreign militants will likely be granted Syrian citizenship<\/a>.<\/p>\n

As the US offers Syria\u2019s new rulers an olive branch, it has done the opposite with the Syrian people. Last week, President Biden authorized a five-year extension of the Caesar Act, a set of draconian sanctions that have deliberately prevented Syria\u2019s reconstruction and crushed its economy. Congress had included the sanctions<\/a> in its must-pass annual defense bill right before Assad\u2019s ouster. His surprise overthrow has put the US government and allied Syrian opposition lobbyists in the awkward position of acknowledging that their sanctions devastate Syrian civilians.<\/p>\n

Republican Rep. Joe Wilson, a longtime proponent of the sanctions on Syria, has now asked<\/a> the Biden administration to issue a waiver that would \u201csuspend sanctions statutes and executive orders connected to reconstruction, economic development, foreign investment, and other critical economic activities.\u201d These waivers, Wilson wrote, \u201ccould build good will for the United States in Syria… by facilitating economic and financial access for ordinary Syrians.\u201d<\/p>\n

This is a sharp U-turn for Wilson, who not only co-sponsored the Caesar Act sanctions but even declared that he was \u201cdeeply saddened\u201d when Biden issued a temporary waiver on them after the devastating earthquake of February 2023<\/a>. In now wanting to \u201cbuild good will\u201d by lifting sanctions, Wilson is acknowledging that they indeed hurt \u201cordinary Syrians.\u201d<\/p>\n

As the New York Times observes<\/a>, \u201cthere is widespread agreement that the single most important step in rebuilding Syria\u2019s economy can be taken only by the United States: Lift the punishing layers of sanctions that have effectively cut off Syria from international commerce and investment.\u201d As to why the US had the right to subject ordinary Syrians to these punishing sanctions in the first place, that is because there was a unilateral agreement in Washington behind making them suffer if it could help topple their government.<\/p>\n

Now that regime change has been achieved, the US is also being more candid about another critical component of its immiseration of ordinary Syrians. After long claiming that it had only 900 troops inside Syria, the Pentagon has now admitted that the number is in fact more than 100% higher. \u201cI learned today in fact there are approximately 2,000 US troops in Syria,\u201d Maj. Gen. Patrick Ryder, a Pentagon spokesperson, told reporters last week.<\/p>\n

As top US officials from President Trump on down have acknowledged<\/a>, the aim of that troop presence is not to fight ISIS, but to loot Syria\u2019s oil and wheat to complement the sanctions in collapsing the Syrian state. With Syria risking a descent into further chaos, the current message from the White House is that the \u201ctransitional\u201d regime that grew out of Al Qaeda, and not the Syrian people, remains the only suitable recipient of Washington\u2019s help.<\/p>\n

___________________________________________<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Aaron Mat\u00e9 is a journalist with<\/em> The Grayzone, where he hosts<\/em> \u201cPushback.\u201d He is also a contributor to<\/em> Real Clear Investigations and the temporary co-host of<\/em> \u201cUseful Idiots.\u201d In 2019, Mat\u00e9 won the\u00a0Izzy Award for outstanding achievement in independent media for Russiagate coverage in<\/em> The Nation.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 aaronmate.net<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

30 Dec 2024 – The new Syrian government is a designated terrorist organization. The HTS ruler, Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, aka Ahmed al-Shara, has a $10 million US bounty on his head. The US ignores its own terrorist designation and maintains sanctions that devastate ordinary Syrian civilians.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":283969,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[3407,393,767,1190,923,413,265,2686,492],"class_list":["post-283968","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-anglo-america","tag-abu-mohammed-al-jolani","tag-coup","tag-middle-east","tag-regime-change","tag-sanctions","tag-syria","tag-terrorism","tag-war-of-terror","tag-war-on-terror"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283968","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=283968"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283968\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":283974,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283968\/revisions\/283974"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/283969"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=283968"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=283968"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=283968"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}