A Final Burial for the Arab Spring: Arab League Readmits Syria under al-Assad, as Tensions with Iran Subside

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The foreign ministers of the Arab League states, meeting in Cairo on Sunday, approved the end of Syria’s suspension from membership in that body. Syria was suspended in November 2011 as the Syrian Arab Army was deployed to massacre civilian protesters.

The decision was a recognition that the Baath government of Bashar al-Assad had won the civil war, albeit with help from Iran, Hezbollah, Iraqi Shiite militias, and the Russian Aerospace Forces. Although al-Assad has a great deal of blood on his hands, so do many Arab League member governments, so squeamishness about a poor human rights situation was never the issue here.

The London-based Al-`Arab reports that the move was led by Saudi Arabia and garnered support from Egypt, Iraq and Jordan. Although this newspaper says that the decision was made possible by a softening of the US position against Syria, I don’t see any evidence of it. Rather, I would say this initiative was undertaken in defiance of Washington.

This newspaper is right to underline, however, that this development is one result of the March 10 agreement in Beijing by Saudi Arabia and Iran to restore diplomatic relations and turn down the level of tension between the two. Iran’s backing for al-Assad and Riyadh’s for the Salafi “Army of Islam” had helped polarize the region. Now, Saudi Arabia is seeking its own, new, relationship with Damascus and no longer insists that it break with Iran. It is no accident that pro-Iran Iraq was one of the brokers of this deal.

Al-Assad’s fragile victory has left the country a basket case, a situation exacerbated by Turkish military intervention both against Syria’s Kurds and in favor of its remaining fundamentalist forces (in Idlib Province).

The foreign ministers who readmitted Syria spoke specifically of wanting to forestall any threats to Syria’s national sovereignty.

They also spoke of an Arab League role in resolving the Syrian crisis, which has left the country split into three zones: The majority of the country, ruled by al-Assad; the Kurdish northeast, which is currently autonomous; and Idlib Province, where rebels of a fundamentalist cast have gathered as refugees (among hundreds of thousands of displaced noncombatants who perhaps are not so ideological despite having taken a stand against al-Assad).

The United States protested the move and rejected it. Washington has imposed strict Caesar Act sanctions on Syria, which critics maintain are interfering with rebuilding the country and harming ordinary people more than they do the government.

The decision will be formally ratified at the full Arab League summit in Riyadh at the end of May, which a Syrian delegation is expected to attend.

Algeria had stood by al-Assad all through the Civil War. Among states that broke off relations, the move to rehabilitate al-Assad was begun by the United Arab Emirates, led by Mohammad Bin Zayed, who restored diplomatic relations and opened an embassy in Damascus in 2018. Tunisia, under dictator Qais Saied, recently followed suit. Saudi Arabia is said to be on the verge of restoring diplomatic ties with Syria, as well.

Sunday’s decision had been opposed by Qatar, Kuwait and Morocco. They, however, were too few to block the League’s decision. Morocco has no love for the Syrian rebels, who gradually turned to forms of Muslim fundamentalism, some close to al-Qaeda but most rooted in the Muslim Brotherhood. Morocco does, however, entertain deep suspicions of Syria’s ally, Iran, and as a conservative Muslim monarchy does not think well of Baathist socialism. Kuwait and Qatar both supported the 2011 youth revolt and went on supporting the rebels once the revolution turned into a Civil War. Both countries are concerned about the fate of the four million people bottled up in Idlib Province, who had supported the overthrow of the government. Qatar says it will decline to restore diplomatic relations with Damascus until some key issues are resolved. This is likely a reference to the fate of the Qatar-backed groups in Idlib.

At the time of Damascus’ suspension, the Arab Spring governments were influential. Egypt, Tunisia and Libya all had interim governments after youth street protests had overthrown their dictators, and Yemen’s Ali Abdullah Saleh was just three months from stepping down in favor of a national referendum on his vice president becoming president. These new governments sided with Syria’s protesters. There was an odd conjunction of these Arab Spring transitional states and some of the Gulf monarchies, which deeply disliked al-Assad’s strong alliance with Iran and his government’s intolerance of Sunni fundamentalism. Thus, Saudi Arabia wanted al-Assad gone as much as Tunisia or Egypt did.

Now, the Arab Spring is a dim memory. Dictatorships have returned in the countries that saw youth revolts. Al-Assad and his corrupt, genocidal government is not going away. Henry Kissinger said that diplomacy is a game that is played with the pieces on the board. Now it transpires that the Arab League states, too, are Realists.