HTS must unite partners to curb infighting

Syria is not Idlib. Syria’s new rulers, dominated by Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), have yet to learn that Syria is far more commanding, complex and complicated than Idlib, one of the smaller provinces. Idlib had a population of 2.9 million, of whom 1.9 million were internally displaced persons (IDPs), out of a total Syrian population of 24.7 million. As Idlib’s residents are largely Sunni and conservative, HTS did not have to moderate its fundamentalist culture and impositions to win a measure of public acceptance. HTS dealt harshly with detractors and dissidents and marginalised communities which did not accept its diktat.

HTS could count on allied Turkish military muscle and political and economic resources to prop up the National Salvation Government which administered Idlib as an authoritarian, technocratic, Islamic state. It provided education, police, and services and collected taxes. Idlib had 24-hour electricity because Turkey connected Idlib to its power grid and replaced the weak Syrian currency with the Turkish lira. Without Turkey HTS would never have been able to topple the Assad government.

Although the leading faction, HTS has to assert command and control over all others. To achieve this end, HTS must unite its militia partners to prevent infighting and the fracturing of the country into fiefdoms ruled by squabbling warlords. Last week, HTS’s commander Ahmed al-Sharaa (formerly Abu Mohammed al-Jolani) announced that faction heads had agreed they would disband and merge under the new Defence Ministry. While he did not name them, he said there was “no faction that did not agree.” However, he left out Turkey’s Syrian National Army (SNA) and the US-protected Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

The SNA and the Turkish army hold the northwest Afrin district plus the border towns of al-Bab, Azaz, Manbij, Jarabulus, Rajo, Tal Abyad and Ras al-Ayn. These areas have been designated as a “safe Zone” by Ankara.

The SDF controls and administers territory in the northeast which amounts to 25 per cent of Syria. The dominant Kurds call it “Rojava.” This strategic region is a rich agricultural area containing three dams and Syria’s oil wells The SNA and SDF create a dilemma for the HTS. The SNA is allied to Turkey while the SDF is backed by the US which the HTS sees as its key to securing international recognition. The SNA and SDF are sworn enemies and have frequently clashed in the border zone.

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan seeks to defeat and disband the SDF, which he regards as an offshoot of the insurgent Turkish Kurdish Workers Party and put an end to Syrian Kurdish autonomy. So far, he has been thwarted in this ambition by the US which has deployed at least 2,000 troops in the Kurdish area. However, during his first term as president Donald Trump threatened to withdraw US troops and could act on this threat after he re-enters the White House on January 20th. He admires the Turkish leader.

Erdogan stated on December 25th, “The separatist murderers [Kurds] will either bid farewell to their weapons, or they will be buried in Syrian lands along with their weapons. We will eradicate the terrorist organisation that is trying to weave a wall of blood between us and our Kurdish siblings.”

He vehemently opposes and is willing to use force to prevent the emergence of a recognised Kurdish autonomous region in Syria like that in northern Iraq as this is precisely what the Turkish Kurds have been fighting for over four decades.

While in the north and the northeast enmity between Turkey and Syria’s Kurds constitutes the greatest risk of renewed warfare in Syria, the lack of civil order is undermining HTS assurances to minority groups and secularists. HTS has only around 25,000 fighters deployed in Syria’s main cities where the civilian authorities are also undermanned. Syrians dwelling in towns, villages, and the countryside remain vulnerable to lawless gangs and criminals.

Following incidents of intimidation against Christians, the December 23rd torching of a Christmas tree by masked men in the Christian-majority town of Suqaylabiyah, near the city of Hama, sparked public protests in Damascus and across the country. Defiant Christians responded by planting a cross on the place where the tree stood.

The arsonists were reported to be foreigners which HTS leader Sharaa said would be punished. So far, they have not been apprehended.

On the 25th, 14 members of Syria’s HTS-Interior Ministry forces were killed when trying to arrest an ex-regime army officer. They were attacked by supporters of former President Bashar al-Assad in the coastal province of Tartus where there is a substantial Alawite community. Alawites — the small sect to which the Assads belong — have been beaten, kidnapped, and killed since HTS took power, an Alawite shrine has been desecrated, and the mausoleum of late President Hafez al-Assad in his natal Latakia village has been set on fire.

These incidents have been magnified by being widely posted on social media which is well developed in Syria due to Bashar al-Assad. He headed the Syrian Computer Society before he became president.

Meanwhile in the south, although Sharaa has tried to avoid confrontation with Israel, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu ordered troops to seize the UN-monitored Golan buffer zone and the summit of Jebal Shaikh (Mount Hermon) that commands the approach to Damascus. Israel has also carried out heavy airstrikes on Syrian army bases and arsenal, leaving Syria unable to defend itself against its aggressive neighbours, Erdogan and Netanyahu. They have conflicting politico-military objectives in Syria and will do their utmost to realise their goals — at Syria’s expense.

Erdogan and Netanyahu seek to shore up their flagging rule in challenging times. Erdogan wants the 2.9 million Syrian refugees living in Turkey to go home as they are unpopular with Turks, and he is blamed for welcoming them. Netanyahu is opening a new front with Syria to distract Israelis from the never-ending war on Gaza. Due to his refusal to agree to a ceasefire and end the Gaza war, 100 Israeli captives share the fate of Palestinians who are bombed day and night and deprived of water, food, and medicine and driven from one unsafe place to another.