The fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria is good news for the Arab nations and for all freedom seekers around the globe. Since the 2011 outbreak of the Arab Spring in Syria, Da’am Party has unequivocally supported the popular struggle to overthrow Assad’s brutal regime. During that time, the party organized protests in front of the Russian embassy in Tel Aviv and during the visit of the Russian Prime Minister to Israel, demanding an end to the Syrian genocide.

In 2014, Da’am Party initiated the “Committee for Solidarity with the Syrian People,” which included over 50 Jewish and Arab figures. The committee held speaking panels and raised funds for Syrian refugee children, which were transferred to them through Save the Children.

The timing of Assad’s regime fall is no coincidence. After more than 13 years of oppression, which led to the displacement of 13 million Syrian citizens, the killing of half a million people, and the imprisonment and torture of hundreds of thousands, regime opponents managed to overthrow it almost without a fight. The final disintegration of the Syrian regime can be attributed to Hamas’s terrorist attack on October 7, 2023, which was orchestrated and supported by Iran—the patron of both Hamas and Assad’s regime.

The Da’am Party strongly condemned the barbaric attack of Hamas, which aligned itself with the Iranian axis and sought to extinguish the state of Israel, and expressed support for Israel’s right to defend itself. Our stance against Iran and its proxies reflects our commitment to the freedom of Arab nations, above all the Palestinian people, who have long suffered from displacement and suffering. We argue that the struggle for progress, democracy, and human rights in the region requires Israel to end its political intransigence, but such progress will not be possible without the defeat of the Iranian axis, which seeks to establish an aggressive and extremist theocratic rule in the region that views Israel as its target for destruction.

Over recent decades, under the pretext of “liberating Jerusalem,” Iranian aggression has gained momentum. Iran has nurtured and armed its proxies —Hezbollah, the Houthis, and Hamas—who have wreaked havoc and destroyed the lives of millions in Yemen, Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq. Iran also created a “ring of fire” around Israel and positioned itself as a regional power. Its objectives, however were entirely detached from the needs of the peoples who became hostages of the Iranian regime.

The collapse of Assad’s regime began with the confrontation between Iran and Israel on October 7, 2023. The decisive event in this process, which paved the way for the Syrian revolutionaries, was undoubtedly the assassination of Hezbollah’s Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah a year later, on September 27, 2024. Israel’s decision to eliminate Nasrallah, who played a prominent role in Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, sent a clear signal to the Lebanese and Syrians that the organizations tied to the Iranian axis, including Iran itself, are not invincible.

The joy expressed in videos from liberated areas of Syria following Israel’s killing of Nasrallah was striking. The Syrian people knew Hezbollah fighters and their revered leader Nasrallah as perpetrators of some of the most heinous crimes against the residents of Syrian towns and cities such as Qusayr, Madaya, Zabadani, and many others. Hezbollah’s acts of oppression included murder, rape, systematic starvation, and torture. The celebrations in Syria over Nasrallah’s death reflected the Syrian people’s view of Hezbollah and Iran as their enemies and their approval of Israel’s fight against them.

In Lebanon, a broad front emerged in opposition to the “Support for Gaza War” launched unilaterally by Hezbollah on October 8, 2023, without any deliberation in parliament. The Lebanese people clearly understood that this war would bring devastation to Lebanon, hollow out the country’s institutions, and turn Lebanon into an Iranian proxy state serving as a base for endless future wars against Israel.

The success of the rebels in toppling the regime in Damascus can be attributed to several factors, including the weakening of Hezbollah and its defeat in the war against Israel; the failure of Hamas; the blows suffered by Iran; and Russia’s entanglement in its aggressive war against Ukraine. The U.S. and Western Europe maintained relations with Russia even after 2015. The tacit acceptance of Russia’s murderous airstrikes on Aleppo (the second city of importance in Syria) in 2015, aimed at saving Assad’s regime, was later interpreted by Putin as a green light to invade Ukraine, with little expectation of serious Western opposition.

However, a decade of Russian-Iranian occupation in Syria failed to stabilize Assad’s regime. The destruction of the economy, reliance on a Narco-economy, and rampant government corruption left extreme oppression as the regime’s sole guarantee for survival. Syria, like Lebanon, became a failed state, unable to protect its citizens or provide for their most fundamental needs.

Life for Syrians, including those from groups that once supported the regime, turned into a nightmare. In 2011, when the Syrian uprising began as part of the democratic Arab Spring, the regime portrayed itself as the sole bulwark against jihadist forces threatening secular life, garnering support from minorities and residents of major cities. This time, however, during the ten days leading up to the regime’s collapse, it became evident that this support base had completely eroded. As the rebel forces advanced toward Aleppo, Hama, Homs, and Damascus, they were greeted with cheers and celebrations by the local residents. Fifty-four years of the Assad dynasty rule in Syria had united the Syrian people against it.

The fall of the Syrian regime is a historic event that shakes the foundations of all authoritarian Arab regimes in the Middle East. These regimes had welcomed Assad back into their fold over the past year, normalizing relations with him. The United Arab Emirates, with the support of the U.S. administration, played a leading role in this normalization effort. For all of them, Bashar al-Assad’s downfall signifies that the Arab Spring has not yet had its final say.

For the Da’am Party, the revolutionary wave of the Arab Spring in 2011–2012 reflected a profound historical shift, embodying the Arab peoples’ aspirations for democracy. We rejected the views that claimed it was a mere fleeting event serving the interests of extremist Islamist forces. We interpreted the uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Syria, and later in Lebanon and Iraq, as a new era in which the peoples of the region seek their place in the modern 21st-century world. After years of tyranny, they want to share in the achievements of progress and the social, economic, political, and cultural openness that other world nations enjoy. The fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime marks a critical milestone in the collapse of the entire Iranian axis. It will have a particularly significant impact on Hezbollah, which will no longer be able to operate as an armed militia alongside the Lebanese state.

The regime’s fall also delivers a severe blow to Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and to Iran’s broader project, which has leveraged hostility toward Israel and calls for its destruction as an effective tool for gaining popular support. This defeat will have direct consequences on the Iranian political arena. The damage to the prestige and status of the Revolutionary Guards, Iran’s militant force, will inevitably strengthen the civil reformist movement.

If the Iranian regime wishes to survive following Syria’s collapse, it must abandon the idea of exporting the Shiite revolution and dominating Arab states under the pretext of “liberating Jerusalem.” Instead, it must redirect its efforts toward rebuilding the Iranian state, society, and economy.

As for Russia, that was “invited” to Syria by Assad, it has lost all its assets in Syria, from the Khmeimim airbase to the Tartus naval base. This situation will have far-reaching consequences for Russia’s prestige as a military power and for its actions in Ukraine.

Although Israel’s actions over the past 14 months did not reflect a coherent plan, they played a decisive role in the fall of Assad’s regime. Israel was caught off guard when Hamas launched “Operation Al-Aqsa Flood” on October 7, 2023. Despite the bitter failure it experienced that day, Israel demonstrated its resilience to itself and to the world. This stands in stark contrast to Nasrallah’s claims that Israel’s power is illusory and comparable to a “spider web.” Backed by overwhelming support from its citizens, its economic, social, military, and technological capabilities, in addition to generous U.S. military and economic support, Israel managed to reverse the equation. Fighting on multiple fronts, Israel proved that the Iranian axis is the weaker force.

As the Syrian people embark on the long and arduous journey of internal reconstruction, it is vital for Israel to cease all interference in their affairs, allowing them to rebuild their political, social, and economic lives according to their own will.

This war, however, came at an unbearable cost, especially for the Palestinian people, who paid a devastating price: tens of thousands killed and injured, many of them women and children, widespread hunger, and the internal multi-time displacement of over two million Gaza residents. Also, the West Bank faced a severe crisis, exemplified by the closure of checkpoints, leaving 200,000 workers without a livelihood. The Lebanese people suffered immensely, with countless homes destroyed, civilians displaced, and many lives lost. It is important to remember that this tectonic upheaval was triggered by Hamas’ reckless and murderous actions, including mass killings, rapes, and the abduction of civilians—among them elderly people, women, and children—who remain hostages to this day. None of them ever saw a representative of the red cross.

All of this could have been avoided if Israel had acted differently. The Iranian axis could have been dismantled earlier had Israel chosen to support the democratic forces in Syria against the regime. When the Syrian people rose up in 2011, Israel chose to watch from the side-lines, preferring to maintain the status quo with the “familiar enemy,” Bashar al-Assad. Israel allowed the massive intervention of Russia, Iran, and Hezbollah in support of Assad. The result was the bolstering of Iranian power in Syria and the arming of Hezbollah, which grew into a formidable force and joined Hamas in the attacks of October 8, 2023.

However, the original sin of Israel, which led to the devastating war of October 2023, lies in its decades-long refusal to reach a just political solution to the Palestinian issue. Israel systematically undermined the establishment of an independent Palestinian state and sought to deepen internal Palestinian divisions by providing economic support to Hamas. Due to the blindness of its political and military establishment, Israel adopted an approach that viewed Hamas as a strong but deterred force—a sort of guarantee for maintaining the status quo, particularly in the absence of any significant global pressure for a political resolution. For years, Israel turned a blind eye as Hamas built its military strength, using the generous aid it received to boost its missile industry and construct a network of tunnels designed for future attacks.

The fall of the Syrian regime directly serves Israel’s security interests, as it cuts off Iran’s military supply routes to Hezbollah through Syria. Iran’s “ring of fire” around Israel has collapsed. At the same time, Israel watches the dramatic developments in Syria with suspicion and concern. The Israeli political and security leadership—spanning both the coalition and opposition—views these events through a purely military lens. Their actions focus on damage control, anticipating the potential emergence of rogue elements seeking to act against Israel during Syria’s transition period.

From the Syrian people’s perspective, Iran and Russia are their primary enemies—not Israel. The Syrian rebels understand their victory is partly owed to Israel’s military superiority in its campaign against Iran. Today, Syria, Lebanon, Yemen, and Iraq are fragile, fragmented states. Rebuilding these nations after the systematic destruction caused by Iranian occupation will take a long time.

As the Syrian people embark on the long and arduous journey of internal reconstruction, it is vital for Israel to cease all interference in their affairs, allowing them to rebuild their political, social, and economic lives according to their own will. The same principle applies to Lebanon’s rehabilitation. Neither Syria nor Lebanon currently poses a threat to Israel. All they seek is to heal the deep wounds inflicted by the Iranian regime and its allies—Assad’s regime and Hezbollah.

Within Israel, there is much to hold Prime Minister Netanyahu accountable for. The Lebanese journalist Fares Khashan was correct when he tweeted on Sunday, December 8, that “Bashar al-Assad is a far greater criminal than Netanyahu. Assad committed crimes against his own people, while Netanyahu acted against an external enemy that threatened to annihilate Israel.”

While Assad’s regime was worse, this does not absolve Netanyahu of being the most incompetent prime minister in Israel’s history. He supported and bolstered Hamas, systematically obstructing any political resolution with the Palestinians. His refusal to pursue a political solution gave Iran an opening to present itself as “the protector” of the Palestinian people. Netanyahu deepened the occupation and perpetuated an apartheid regime that denies 5 million Palestinians basic human and civil rights.

He failed to protect Israeli citizens from the horrific massacres perpetrated by Hamas on October 7, leaving defenceless Israelis vulnerable to unimaginable violence. Netanyahu also ushered openly racist parties into his government, focusing his efforts on undermining Israel’s democratic system and attempting a judicial coup to shield himself from the criminal charges he faces. Now that fighting has diminished, and a new phase in his trial begun, he is giving a new green light for the judicial coup to advance.  In recent years, Netanyahu has adopted a mantra akin to Assad’s: “It’s me or the state burns down.”

In the aftermath of the devastating war, all peoples of the region—particularly the Palestinian people—must reassess their approach to the conflict. Support for armed struggle, the “resistance axis,” and violence has led the region and the Palestinian people to ruin and disaster. A new path must be forged, one that prioritizes diplomacy, coexistence, and rebuilding trust.

Without a doubt, respecting individual freedoms and adopting democracy as a fundamental framework for societal development is a guarantee for the security of all nations. The Palestinians must change their misguided approach of boycotting everything Israeli, including the democratic forces within Israel, under the pretext of opposing “normalization.” Instead of this futile policy that leads to a dead end, a creative leadership is needed to present a plan for building Palestinian society in partnership with progressive elements in Israel.

This equation also requires an Israeli component. Liberal and democratic forces in Israel must reassess their positions and put an end to the notion that the conflict with the Palestinians can be “managed” and its resolution postponed to a distant future. Leaving the occupation and apartheid regime in the territories intact—even while taking steps to “reduce the conflict”—creates fertile ground for the growth of racist and fascist forces and fuels the flames of judicial overhaul and the dismantling of democracy. The result is the establishment of an anti-liberal, religious, messianic regime, with the Nation-State Law of 2018 serving as its wake-up call, leading to the judicial coup of Minister of Justice Yariv Levin in 2023.

The pro-democracy protest movement, which demonstrated for months against the far-right government, proved that there are resilient and influential democratic forces in Israel with widespread public support who are aware of the dangers. This movement must break free from conservative thinking and adopt radical solutions based on partnerships of peace and democracy with the peoples of the region. Peace and mutual recognition with the Palestinians are central components that will secure the future of all nations, as well as the stability and rebuilding of Israeli society itself.

The post Position Statement of the Da’am Party
Fall of the Assad Regime: The End of the Iranian-Russian Axis first appeared on Da'am Party: One state - Green Economy.

Note: This piece was written days before the Russian invasion of Ukraine. It is more relevant than ever.

When Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid was asked about his position on Ukraine, he was quick to explain the complexity of the situation in which Israel finds itself. Not only are there large Jewish communities in Russia and Ukraine, he said, but of all Western countries, Israel alone is bordered by Russia! Yes, no more and no less. Since 2015 Russia has been present on the northeast border of Israel (more exactly, on what Israel considers its border). At the request of Syria’s Bashar Assad, in the midst of his bloody civil war with democratic forces, Russia took over in Syria with the full consent of Israel and the willing blindness of the West. After that Putin became Israel’s strategic ally, together with Donald Trump, and the two allowed Israel to do as it pleased in Syria, Iran and the Occupied Territories.  Hence the hems and haws of Israel concerning Ukraine.

Putin did not simply take over Syria, he committed genocide and other crimes against humanity there. He transformed entire cities into ruins, causing a humanitarian catastrophe that continues to this day. In December 2016, Human Rights Watch published a report entitled War Crimes in the month of the bombing of Aleppo, in which 440 civilians were killed, including 90 children. All of this came after President Obama drew a red line for the Syrian regime against the use of chemical weapons. This line did not prevent Assad from using such weapons against his citizens, and Obama then made do with a proposal by Putin to remove chemical weapons from Syria in coordination with Israel. This paved the way for Putin’s takeover of Syria, including the Latakia Port and the Khmeimim Air Base. From then until today, the understandings between the Israeli government and Putin are clear: Russia will not deprive Israel of freedom of action in the air above Syria, and in return Israel will not interfere with Russia’s actions anywhere else, which today means Ukraine.

As the crisis in Ukraine worsens, Israel is exposed in all its shame. Bibi Netanyahu, we recall, had warm relations with Putin and Trump, both of whom helped in his election campaigns. Putin gave Israel the bodies of its soldiers who had been buried in Syria, while Trump gave Bibi an embassy in Jerusalem and recognition of Israeli sovereignty on the Golan Heights. Putin helped Trump in the 2016 election campaign, and Bibi bluntly intervened in Congress against Obama and the nuclear deal with Iran. This alliance was undoubtedly ideal for Bibi while it lasted. With the rise of Joe Biden, however, the celebration ended, but Israel’s “government of change” refuses to acknowledge the new reality.

According to Israel, the danger to world peace is Iran and not Russia. Israel’s position is that compared to Iran, whose fundamentalist regime seeks regional dominance, Ukraine is an intra-regional problem. Asked about his position on Ukraine, Finance Minister Avigdor Lieberman said he was not at all interested. What interests him, he said, is what is happening in Vienna, where a new nuclear agreement between the West and Iran is afoot. For the U.S. and the West, however, Iran is a regional issue with marginal impact on world peace, whereas Putin, via Ukraine, wants to change the world-order, bringing Europe back to the days before the fall of the USSR. Russia, they point out, is not alone in having territorial claims. So do Serbia, Romania, Turkey, Greece, and Poland (vis-à-vis the Czech Republic). A Russian occupation of Ukraine will take us back to the 19^th century border conflicts.

It is no secret that Putin is using Russia’s army to gain points in the face of his domestic failures. Russia is a backward country that has nothing to offer its people. The USSR disbanded because of the nature of the totalitarian communist regime, whose corruption pervaded all spheres of life. Putin’s Russia renounced socialism and the nationalized economy, but it remained centralized and totalitarian: the oligarchy replaced the communist bureaucracy and took over the country’s resources. It is a failed state not because of the US or NATO, but because of Putin. The oligarchs he nurtured plundered the country’s treasures. They smuggled their wealth to the West, settling in London, Europe and North America with the kind help of Britain, Germany and even the United States. Despite its richness in minerals, Russia’s GDP remains at $10,000 per capita, compared to $60,000 in the United States and $40,000 in Israel. An occupied Ukraine, which is even poorer, will not cure the ills of Russian society, but only aggravate the suffering of Russians and Ukrainians alike.

Putin’s ideology and course of action are very much in line with Israel’s ideology and course of action. Israel also views military power as its chief means of achieving political goals. Its military force imposes the status quo in the West Bank and Gaza, deters Iran and motivates the alliance with the Gulf states. In this respect, the American reluctance to go to war, its hasty withdrawal from Afghanistan and the diversion of attention to the economic confrontation with China are all perceived in Israel as signs of weakness. The prevailing Israeli perception is that the world is a jungle, military power is the guarantee for the existence of the state, and it must not look too closely at friendly dictatorial regimes and the atrocities they inflict. On the contrary, best give them full backing— and sell them Pegasus spyware.

Israel is now torn between loyalty to Putin, its ideological ally, and America, its strategic ally. Biden is a liberal who opposes Trump and everything he represents. He tries to revive the welfare state, seeks to impose taxes on the internet giants, supports the rights of minorities (especially blacks), conducts a conscious climate policy, opposes totalitarian regimes, boycotts Saudi Arabia’s Mohammad bin Salman (responsible for the murder of journalist  Jamal Khashoggi), abhors the Chinese regime, opposes the theory of racial superiority, and fights xenophobia. All of these qualities are incompatible with Zionist nationalist ideology, with Israel’s citizenship law and nation-state law, and with the apartheid it practices toward Arabs. Thus, Israel’s strategic ally is an ideological adversary, while tactical allies such as Russia, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the Emirates, Morocco, Egypt and Sudan give Israel the leeway to do what it pleases in the Middle East.

The position of the Da’am Workers Party toward Putin did not have to wait for his aggression against Ukraine. It was already determined by the genocide he committed in Syria. Those who did not stop him in Syria now receive him at the gates of Ukraine. Putin is not only the enemy of America and the democratic West, he is the enemy of all those young people in Syria, Russia, Belarus, Ukraine and the rest of the world who aspire to live free in the 21st century. The West’s struggle against Putin brings hope back to the hearts of millions of Syrians, Egyptians, and Iraqis who have taken to the streets to overthrow dictatorial regimes under the slogan “Bread, freedom and social justice!” Putin’s defeat will be the victory of all who demand these things. Da’am stands squarely on the side of Ukrainians who refuse to accept a life shorn of human rights like the life imposed by Putin on Russia.

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Last November, New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman visited Saudi Arabia, sat in a spacious armchair in the palace of Saudi Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman, aka MBS, and went on to write a piece in The New York Times under the bombastic headline: “The Saudi Arab Spring, at last.” In fact, it was nothing more than an embarrassing, obsequious op-ed. It glorified the Saudi prince who described the economic reforms he was introducing into the kingdom as an “Arab Spring.” In practice, the archaic Saudi kingdom has been and remains the Number One Enemy of the Arab Spring. There is no connection between MBS’s reforms and real democratic change in the kingdom.

Recently, Friedman was invited by the Israel Defense Forces to act as the mouthpiece of the Israeli propaganda machine, warning of a war between Israel and Iran on Syrian soil. A very senior military officer (perhaps the Chief of Staff) openly admitted to Friedman that Israel had targeted a military base in Syria, an assault in which the head of the Revolutionary Guards drone unit, with the rank of colonel, was killed.

In other words, from Israel’s most senior officer to America’s most senior correspondent, Israel – without explicitly saying so – declared war on Iran. The Iranians had no choice but to “take off their kid gloves” and state via the Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson that “the Zionist entity will receive an appropriate response.” It appears that the bad years in Israeli-Iranian relations are over and the worse are about to begin. What appears to be the end of the Syrian civil war is becoming, before our eyes, the beginning of a new war for the future of Syria, with Iran and Israel as major competitors.

Since the outbreak of the popular uprising against Assad, Iran mobilized in his favor and has done in Syria as it does at home. Israel, on the other hand, played the game of “neutrality”; its official position calls for “no interference in the Syrian civil war.” The meaning of this “balanced” position can be understood as follows: The genocide carried out by the Syrian regime is not Israel’s business. The longer the war lasts and the greater the destruction, the better for Israel.

This cynical game reached its peak in 2013, when US Secretary of State John Kerry and his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov, struck a deal on dismantling chemical weapons in Syria, following a large-scale chemical attack in the Ghouta suburbs. The assault, which claimed more than 1400 lives, crossed President Obama’s “red line,” and the US administration vowed to respond militarily. But Obama shilly-shallied. Putin jumped at the opportunity, and instead of an air strike against Assad’s regime, Obama agreed to a dubious accord to disarm Syria of its chemical weapons.

Assad took advantage of the non-attack and continued to massacre civilians by more conventional means. The Netanyahu government celebrated the removal of the chemical threat to the citizens of Israel, where the era of gas masks ended. The chemical deal was accompanied by the flight of millions of Syrians from their homes because of murderous, indiscriminate bombings, and the Syrian refugee crisis changed the political map in Europe. But Israel’s worldview was and remains very narrow: The deal is good for the Jews even though it is bad for both the Syrians and those countries to which millions of them have fled.

Israel was not the only land to celebrate the miserable deal which freed Obama from having to attack and saved Assad. Iran also celebrated. The accord to dismantle chemical weapons in Syria turned into a prototype for dismantling the Iranian nuclear program, an accord that Israel strongly opposed and was unable to block. Iran became an ally of the United States and a legitimate player in the war against ISIS. Iran also partnered with Assad and the Russians in the war against the Syrian opposition. For seven years, Iran sank huge sums into reviving the Syrian economy; Hezbollah turned into a major player in the civil war, losing 1700 fighters; and Iran bankrolled Shiite militias in Iraq to the tune of 20,000 fighters. Throughout that period, Israel took delight in seeing Hezbollah hemorrhage in Syria and become too bogged down to engage Israel. Its air force thwarted the transfer of “game-changing” weapons from Iran to Hezbollah – with the silent acquiescence of the Russians.

Not only did Iran gain a foothold in Syria but the Russians, invited in by Assad, became the real landlords there. They carried out horrific aerial attacks on Syrian cities, the foremost being Aleppo, and saved Assad’s regime from certain defeat. Here, too, Israel looked on from the sidelines and did not utter a word about atrocities occurring just kilometers from its northern border. Netanyahu decided that the best strategy was to maintain a secure hotline with Putin.

The agreement with Putin is simple: Israel will not act to topple Assad and will not object to the Russian takeover of Syria. In exchange, it seeks freedom to act against attempts to transfer arms from Iran to Hezbollah. Putin, for his part, wants Israel to accept the Russian presence in Syria, but this presence also requires close cooperation with Iran. A Russian presence requires Iran’s consent because Russia does not have many boots on the ground; without Iran, Assad’s regime will again be in danger of collapse.

Israel has no interest in seeing Assad toppled. In this respect it is in lockstep not only with Russia, but with the Americans. After the unconvincing air strike in response to Assad’s recent chemical attack in Douma, the Americans declared that they had no intention of replacing Assad. In fact, Assad has gained immunity from all factions operating in Syria and continues to survive as Syria bleeds. So we have reached a situation in which no one wants to overthrow Assad; every player needs him to serve its own interests. Israel wants to go back to the status quo ante consisting of the long-term cease-fire it has enjoyed since the 1973 war. Iran has completely opposite plans: Seeking to become a regional power, it is creating an Iranian corridor through Iraq and Syria to the Lebanese coast. Israel must accept the fact that Assad’s Syria exists in theory alone and that the country is divided between Iran, Turkey, the United States and Russia.

Israel’s attempts to pry the Iranians from Syria are leading to a head-on collision with them and indirectly with the Russians. The Israeli message to the Russians is straightforward: If you want to keep Assad in power in order to gain legitimacy for your airbase in Khmeimim and a naval base in Tartous, get rid of the Iranians. The choice is either Assad or Iran, Israel will not allow any arrangement at the expense of its strategic interest.

However, despite warm relations between Netanyahu and Trump, and the latter’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, Trump’s announcement that he intends to withdraw from Syria “very soon” leaves Israel, on its 70th birthday, flying solo. It seems that Teheran is not interested in an open war with Israel, given stiff domestic opposition to its Syrian adventure. Putin also is afraid of opening a front against Israel, while Netanyahu is reluctant to involve the IDF and the home front in a war that could prove to be costly and destructive. It might be impossible to square the circle: each side is entrenched in its position, and all of them together are being pushed to the edge against their will.

The Syrian Spring broke out with the hope of regime change and the establishment of a modern democratic state. Assad gassed civilians; Iran enlisted Hezbollah; Putin built military bases to expand his empire; Obama refused to support the democratic Syrian opposition; Saudi Arabia and Qatar armed extreme Sunni militias; Israel watched and relished; all of them wiped out any hope for a democratic future in Syria. The only way to stop further bloodshed, and a war between Israel and Iran, is the withdrawal of all foreign forces. If there is any hope for a democratic future in Syria, Assad must go. Currently this option is not on the agenda. Trump, Erdogan, Putin, Khamenei, and Netanyahu do not believe in democracy. Syria has become a reflection of the world at the beginning of the 21st century.

* Translated from the Hebrew by Robert Goldman

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Still bodies of babies, women and children, murdered by the chlorine gas – these are the recent victory pictures that Bashar Assad wants us to remember. Assad triumphed the Syrian people, he triumphed Syria and the human spirit. Five years ago, the butcher from Damascus has slaughtered more than one thousand Syrian civilians in Eastern Ghouta and crossed the red line posed by President Obama. However, he was saved from a military blow thanks to his accomplice, President Putin, which reached an agreement with Obama to disarm the Syrian regime from chemical weapon. Obama already completed his two presidential terms and the British Cameron resigned from his post, but Assad, Khamenei and Putin are here to stay, together with the poisonous gas which kill the poor who did not manage to find a haven.

These are the hands of Assad that kill and poison the Syrian people, but the responsibility lies upon the Turkish-Iranian-Russian Trinity whose leaders met a couple of days ago in Ankara to divide the booty. They agreed to divide Syria and leave Assad in power despite his responsibility for the destruction of the state and to the flee of millions of Syrians, hereby providing him the political legitimacy to annihilate the people of Douma.

Some people wonder why Assad used the gas against helpless men and women while Douma is besieged and ISIS started negotiating on leaving the town and giving it to the Russians. The answer is quite simple: Assad wanted to enforce himself on his allies. Whereas Russian wanted to skip Assad in the negotiations, whereas the Trinity wanted to ignore him in discussing the solution, his reply was immediate: Douma would have to surrender to Assad and the most practical way to accomplish this task would be using the chlorine gas.

The other half of the answer to this question is simple too. Since using a chemical weaponry against the people of Eastern Ghouta five years ago, Assad found out that there are no more red lines. The Russian cover on the one hand, and the unwillingness of the US and its allies to act decisively to stop the atrocities on the other hand, enabled him to do whatever he pleased, without paying the price for his crimes. Thus, Assad, Putin and Erdogan, along any despicable rule across the globe, knew that all means are legitimate to retain their rule: murder, destruction, exiling people and the use of chemical weapon were proved to be efficient, hereby becoming the winning cards who have saved the evil regime.

What is going in Syria serves as a pretext at the hands of Israel’s government following the fact that the international community condemned Israel for killing Palestinian demonstrators across the border between Israel and Gaza. Israel’s Defense Minister, Avigdor Lieberman, accuses the world of hypocrisy as the latter accuses Israel but refrains from accusing Russia and the Syrian regime. Moreover, Lieberman draws a comparison between the “humanitarian” approach of the Israeli occupation and the cruelty of the Arab regimes, boasting in Israel’s democracy vis-à-vis the tyrannies in the neighboring countries.

The truth is that Lieberman, like his right-wing government, is indifferent to the atrocities in Syria, although he has influence over determining the fate of Syria and its regime through his tight coordination with the Russians. Israel’s refusal to join the US and the EU in condemning Russia for its use in gas against the Russian spy on British soil, is not less hypocritic than the way other countries are conducting. Assad’s cruelty against the Syrians doesn’t justify the cruelty of Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian people as well as the fact that for fifty years Israel is busy in violating the political and civil rights of the Palestinians.

The Daam party condemns the Syrian regime and its allies and call upon the people of conscience, along with the friends of the Palestinian people, who support its rights and freedom, to endorse the Syrian people and its noble revolution against the evil regime of Assad. Whoever refuses to resist the despot, whoever justifies regime’s war crimes in the name of the struggle against Zionism and imperialism, loses the moral, political and legal basis to condemn Israel which is oppressing the Palestinian people. The fate of the Palestinians is bound with the fate of the Arab people, first and foremost the Syrian people. As long as the Arab people will be subordinated to tyrannical regimes – in Egypt, Syria, Jordan or Iraq – the Palestinian people will continue to be occupied. The collapse of Israel’s occupation depends on the collapse of the despotic Arab regimes, first and foremost the Syrian one.

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“Men are accomplices to that which leaves them indifferent” (George Steiner)

Statement of opinion, Da’am Workers Party, February 26, 2018

The horrors of recent days in East Ghouta in Syria, evident in the corpses of men, women and children, have met with global indifference, including in the Arab states. The relentless bombing by the regime and its sponsors, the Iranians and the Russians, did not hesitate to target hospitals and residential neighborhoods. This crime against humanity is witnessed hourly on TV and social networks. The lack of response, the deafening silence, attests to the loss of a sense of right and wrong, the loss of a sense of humanity. What is happening today in the suburbs of Damascus can happen anywhere tomorrow.

The person responsible for this crime is Bashar al-Assad, who is backed by Iran and Russia. But the massacre would not have proved possible had it not been for the tacit compliance of countries competing to grab a piece of the Syrian pie: the United States, Turkey, Israel and the Gulf States. Among the latter, Saudi Arabia and Qatar support mercenary militias such as the Army of Islam and the A-Nusra Front. They are joined by the American-backed Kurdish forces and the Israeli-backed Sunni rebel militias in the Golan Heights.

Contrary to Assad’s claims, in 2011, Syria was not the target of an international conspiracy, but rather a civil war between a dictatorial regime and its subjects, who have taken to the streets demanding freedom. The weakness of both the regime and the opposition has pushed both sides to seek help from outside parties who have little interest in the fate of the Syrian people, and who act in their own narrow interests. With the outbreak of the revolution in 2011, the line between the regime and the opposition was clearly drawn. However, President Obama, who had called for Assad’s downfall, turned against the Syrian opposition in order not to undermine the chances of a nuclear agreement with Iran,with the result thatAssad’s regime was narrowly saved. From the beginning of the uprising, Russia and Iran have stood with him, while the opposition enjoyed support from the United States, Turkey and the Gulf states. Nevertheless, the Russian-American agreement to destroy Syria’s chemical weapons arsenal hit the opposition hard, paved the way for the emergence of ISIS (aka the Islamic State), and allowed Assad to slaughter his people using barrel bombs. Chemical weapons in the form of chlorine bombs have also been used.

The rise of ISIS and its takeover of Mosul in Iraq led to an important change in the Obama administration. It began to see ISIS as a strategic enemy. The US lost interest in the fate of the Syrian people under Assad. It ended its support for the Free Syrian army in favor of an alliance with the Kurds, who exploited Assad’s weakness, joining the Americans in the war against ISIS in exchange for their promise of an autonomous Kurdish region near the Turkish border. This in turn led to an immediate change in Turkey’s policy: from supporting resistance against the Assad regime, Turkey switched and began a war against Kurdish autonomy. Erdogan has succeeded in enlisting Russian support for this.

Russia backed the Turkish demand to transfer control of al-Bab, northeast of Aleppo, from the Kurdish- to the Turkish-supported rebel forces. In exchange, Turkey turned a blind eye to Russian involvement in Syria, contributing, for example, in the fall of Aleppo. The Gulf States, on the other hand, armed and financed Islamic militias thataim to liquidate the popular committees of the revolutionary movement in Syria; they took the liberated areas of Idlib and East Ghouta by force.

However, despite the defeat of ISIS and the re-conquest of Mosul by Shiite militias with Iranian support, and, notwithstanding the capture of Raqqa by the Kurds with American support, the war and the massacres continue unabated, this time under the watchful eyes of all parties involved in the Syrian arena.

The current massacre in East Ghouta is a consequence of the failure of the Russian-backed peace talks in Sochi at the end of January, where Putin tried to impose a political solution leaving Assad in power. Israel, for its part, is concerned about Iranian entrenchment in Syria, viewing this as a threat to Israeli control of the Golan Heights, and as a threat to its security in general. This threat to Israelcomes on top of that posed by Hezbollah in southern Lebanon.

Those who pay the price of the conflict between the US and Russia, and between the regional forces of Israel, Iran, Turkey and the Gulf states, are the defenseless citizens of East Ghouta. After seven years of war that killed 400,000, incarcerated 200,000, and displaced 10 million people, it is clear that Assadcannot be part of Syria’s future.

Leaders such as Trump, Putin, Khamenei, Erdogan, Netanyahu, Mohammed bin Salman (Saudi Arabia), Tamim al-Thani (Qatar) and Hassan Nasrallah are indifferent to human rights. Syria is not the only victim of this situation. Libya, Yemen, Egypt, Iran, Turkey and Palestine are all suffocating under the yoke of oppression.

After the Syrian people, the first to pay the price for scorn of international law and for contempt of rights are the Palestinians. Trump’s decision to move the American Embassy to Jerusalem and to inaugurate it as part of Israel’s70th anniversary expresses not only its bias towards Israel, but its contempt for human rights and national freedom. Just as Putin can bomb and destroy Syria without opposition, Trump can force the Palestinians to make do with autonomy instead of an independent state.

When the Security Council stands helpless at the massacre of defenseless civilians in East Ghouta, how can we expect it to intervene in favor of the Palestinians, who have been living under occupation for 50 years? On the other hand, the silence of the Palestinian Authority and Hamas in light of events in Syria undermines their moral basis, for example when they threaten to put Israel on trial for war crimes at the International Criminal Court in The Hague.They do not condemn Assad for the greatest war crimeof the century.

Israel’s policy of “non-intervention in the Syrian civil war,” in the name of its own security, is a failure. Not only because of its immorality, but also because the barbaric Russian and Iranian intervention that saved the Assad regime has turned Syria into a forward base for Iran and Russia. Israel sees Iran positioning itself near the border,an act that heightens the danger of war. The indifference of the Israeli public to what is happening in Syria only proves how successful 50 years of occupation have been. The occupation has closed the hearts of Israelis. They have grown accustomed to the scenes of destruction by their air force in Gaza, and the almost daily killing of Palestinian civilians who oppose military control.

The Da’am Workers Party, which supports the rights of the Palestinian people, also stands with the Syrian people who raised the revolutionary banner “Freedom and Democracy.” We call upon foreign forces – the United States, Russia, Iran, Turkey, Israel, Qatar and Saudi Arabia – to withdraw from Syria and let the Syrians decide their future without foreign interference, not only for the benefit of Syria, but in the interests of all its neighbors.The alternative is a prolonged war that has already reached beyond Syria’s borders and threatens to engulf the region. It has the potential of bringing the US and Russia intoa direct confrontationthat could explode into an unthinkable war, after which, to quote Albert Einstein, the next will be fought with rocks.

* Translated from the Hebrew by Robert Goldman

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“The government is dragging us into war,” cautioned Maj. Gen. (res.) Amiram Levin in Yediot Aharonot (October 22), warning that “any person with eyes in his head must mobilize to end this government’s term before we reach a disaster.” It seems that Levin is asking Israelis to give more than they can. Netanyahu is popular, and apparently those who have “eyes in their heads” are a minority. Further, it is doubtful whether Levin’s eyes were always open. If they were, he might have awakened much earlier when there was still time to prevent the calamity. The Syrian crisis was not born last week.

To be precise, the process leading to war began on September 14, 2013, the day that John Kerry and his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov signed an agreement to dismantle the chemical weapons in Syria. This agreement saved Assad from an American strike that could have led to his overthrow and would have hindered the spread of Iranian influence in Syria. Obama had stated that the use of chemical weapons would cross a “red line.” Assad deliberately crossed it with a chemical attack in Ghouta on the outskirts of Damascus, where the death toll exceeded 1,300 civilians. But Obama backtracked, Assad survived, and only four years later Netanyahu was forced to declare “We will not allow Iran to establish itself on our northern border.” Netanyahu, like others in Israel, had failed to foresee what would await Israel, and with it, the entire world.

Following the chemical agreement between Kerry and Lavrov, the defense establishment stopped distributing gas masks, and Israel breathed a sigh of relief. The deal looked very good to Israel, but it was very bad for the Syrian people. But who cared? Everyone was satisfied: Obama sidestepped a potentially unpopular military intervention in Syria, Russia saved its ally, and Israel benefited twofold: the strategic threat of chemical weapons was eliminated, and the civil war could be expected to continue indefinitely. A war in which Syria and the Arab world are smashed to smithereens is viewed by Netanyahu as a strategic plus. The government’s official position was: “We will not interfere in the Syrian civil war.” After all, why intervene when the Syrians are doing such a good job? Worse still, in December 2016, apparently under Russian pressure, Netanyahu even instructed Israel’s UN delegation to abstain from a vote to investigate crimes against humanity committed in Syria.

However, the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons Agreement that saved Assad triggered two events that played into Iranian hands. The deal between the United States and Russia did avert an American attack on Syria at the last minute, but it also put an end to expectations that the West would deliver Syrian citizens from a terrible massacre. It allowed the Assad regime to slaughter its own people by barrel-bombing helpless civilians. Desperation caused the Syrian democratic opposition to retreat, which helped ISIS. Millions of Syrian refugees fled to Europe, and in response to right-wing and xenophobic pressure there, the British prime minister resigned following his defeat in the Brexit vote. A few months later, Clinton lost to Trump.

The agreement banning Syria’s chemical weapons had two further ramifications: it gave Russia total guardianship over Syria and it paved the way for the nuclear deal with Iran. Thus Netanyahu’s troubles began. He left no stone unturned to block the deal with Iran, including a pathos-filled speech before the US Congress, but he failed. Obama was resolved to pivot away from the Middle East, and for that reason, Netanyahu had no choice but to reach an understanding with the Russians. Then came Trump. Despite his harsh statements against Iran and the nuclear deal, he failed to take firm action, even cooperating with Iran in the war against ISIS in Mosul. Most recently, the US turned its back on the Kurds when the Iraqi army, along with militias funded by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, took control of Kirkuk in northern Iraq, expelling the Kurdish Peshmerga troops from the city.

Moreover, the Israeli government chose to remain silent when Putin decided to commit the entire weight of his army to save Assad’s regime in September 2015. The Russian Air Force completely demolished Aleppo, bombed hospitals, markets and schools in order to crush the anti-Assad rebels. While Russian planes did the job from the air, the Shiite militias and Hezbollah put boots on the ground and occupied the area, killing indiscriminately. For some time, Iran has been a partner of the United States in Iraq and, at the same time, a collaborator with Russia in Syria. The Americans have become accustomed to Russian war crimes in Syria.

When Russian warplanes crushed Aleppo, Netanyahu traveled to Moscow, not to dissuade Putin from committing crimes against humanity, but to arrive at an understanding with the new landlord in Syria. After their meeting, Netanyahu declared, “I have made clear our policy to thwart arms transfers in various ways, as well as Iran’s attempts to establish a second terror front against us. I stated clearly that we would take action against this.” He added, “There was no opposition to this. Whatever Russia’s intention in Syria, he [Russia] will not be part of Iran’s aggressive activity against us.”

Despite all the coordination, declarations, and “understandings” with Putin, Iran has solidified its position in Syria, as well as in Iraq, in accordance with agreements signed with the Russians and Turks in Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan, which I wrote about in an earlier article. Astana is a further step toward the empowerment of the so-called Russian-Iranian-Turkish axis in Syria, with the Damascus region going to Tehran. Iran has invested a great deal of money and soldiers in Syria, and like Russia, it wishes to enjoy the fruits of the victory.

Netanyahu was not invited to Astana, and his American friends had to be satisfied with the status of observer. So all that was left for Netanyahu was to plead with the Russians to consider Israeli interests and not allow a permanent Iranian presence in Syria. But this is unrealistic. Russia’s control of Syria depends on its partnership with Iran. Without Iranian-Shiite militias and Hezbollah, Russia has no hold on the ground. Assad’s army is in shambles, and without Iranian fighters, Assad has no control.

The recent meeting in Damascus between the Syrian and Iranian chiefs of staff was intended to make clear to Israel that the Iranian presence in Syria is not temporary, and that it will continue as long as Assad is in power. Thus what began with Israeli non-intervention in Syria, followed by close coordination with the Russians, has now turned into a policy of growing intervention in an attempt to influence Syria’s future. Those who ignored Assad’s crimes, seeking to benefit from genocide and civil war, are now paying the price of their short-sightedness and evil. And do not, by the way, blame Netanyahu alone. Silence in the face of genocide, and in the face of the biggest refugee tragedy since World War II, enjoyed a wall-to-wall consensus here. In the entire Israeli establishment, coalition and opposition alike, no one can claim to have clean hands.

• Translated from the Hebrew by Robert Goldman

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The fall of Aleppo is viewed in Israel as a great victory for Bashar Assad, and as the first step towards the resumption of his control over Syria. Idlib, still in rebel hands, is next in line. After Idlib is pounded to smithereens, Russian and Syrian aircraft and the Shiite militias will head south to restore order to the part of the Golan Heights that Bashar used to hold. Then the Redeemer will come to Zion. But if you take a closer look at how Aleppo fell, it is not clear that Assad is indeed on his way to regain control over Syria. On the contrary, at center stage in the unfolding picture are Putin, Khamenei, Nasrallah, Erdogan and Netanyahu, while Assad has been shunted to the background. The powers determining the future of Aleppo in particular, and of Syria in general, are the Russians and the Iranians. Assad legitimized their intervention along with that of various militias operating on their behalf.

It was not by accident that the cease-fire agreement, and the agreement on evacuating the tens of thousands trapped in Aleppo, was reached in the Turkish city of Ankara. The Turks brokered the deal between the Russian military representative and the besieged Syrian rebels. The fact that this agreement did not occur without Iran’s consent shows who the real players are in this horror film. Assad is out of the picture: Having lost his army and status, he is totally dependent on the Russians and the Iranians. They will emerge as the powerbrokers in Syria for years to come.

In the summer of 2015, the Assad regime was on the ropes. Without massive Russian intervention, Syria would have fallen to the opposition. When he understood that Obama was refusing to get seriously engaged in the fighting and did not want the rebels to win, Putin entered the vacuum with a murderous display of power. He wasn’t alone. Russia and Iran divided the work – Russian planes targeted the rebel-controlled city causing indiscriminate civilian deaths. Iranian and Hezbollah forces then moved in, purging, murdering, raping and looting.

One cannot make sense of the collapse of Aleppo without understanding Turkey’s role. As said, the surrender agreement was signed in Ankara, and not between Kerry and Lavrov in Geneva. Aleppo might not have fallen if not for Erdogan’s political flip-flop after the failed coup against him in July. Erdogan understood that Obama was acting behind his back when the US armed and supported the Kurdish militias under the pretext of fighting ISIS. He watched with alarm the creation of the Kurdish canton of Rojava along the Syrian border. Seeing this as a serious threat to Turkish national security, Erdogan—who till then had supported the Syrian rebels—made a U-turn. He humbled himself before Putin, mended their strained relations and renewed diplomatic ties with Netanyahu. His deal with Putin is clear: Russia agrees to a Turkish security zone inside Syrian territory at the expense of the Kurds, and Turkey refrains from opposing Russian intervention in Syria, especially in Aleppo.

Last August, Erdogan began his “Operation Protective Shield,” intending to capture the northern border area in Syria from ISIS and the Kurds, where he would then create the desired security zone. In parallel, the Russians and Iranians began preparations to conquer Aleppo. Turkey established a Syrian militia called the “Syrian Free Army,” made up of units once supported by the Americans, and changed its priorities. By withdrawing support for the rebels in Aleppo, Turkey was free at last to set up the much desired security zone against the Kurds.

With this turnabout, some of the Turkish-supported rebels left Aleppo and joined the new Turkish force. Their departure formed the first crack in the opposition front in Aleppo, a crack that allowed militias supporting Assad to take over neighborhoods previously in rebel hands. Renewal of relations between Erdogan and Putin was undoubtedly a serious blow to the Syrian rebels. They lost a main ally (Turkey) just as Iran and Russia stepped up their murderous offensive.

The fall of Aleppo leaves Syria in the hands of four major players, each with a direct interest: Turkey dominates the countryside north of Aleppo, a stone’s throw from the city; Russia sees itself as the acting ruler of Syria because of its air superiority (without which the Iranians alone could not have defeated the insurgents); Iran is still a player because Putin is not willing to dirty his hands on the ground. Putin needs the Iranian-backed Shi’ite militias as a policing force, and therefore he must take Iran’s interests into account. Facing all this is Israel, which maintains good relations with Putin and has recently revamped relations with Turkey. On the other hand, Israel sees Iran and Hezbollah as existential threats. Standing among these four players, each of which has huge military power, is Bashar al-Assad. He has no army, no economy, and a beaten-down population. After destroying his state, bombing his cities, murdering and exiling his own people, Assad celebrates victory!

To get the proper perspective as to what might take place in Syria, one can learn from the Iraqi example. At the end of 2011, in accordance with President Obama’s election commitment, the last American soldier left Iraq. Still ruled by the pro-Iranian Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, Iraq, like Syria today, fell easily into Iranian hands. Nonetheless, there was a fly in the ointment: two years later Mosul fell to ISIS, and Iraq has been crumbling ever since.

Assad’s regime is much weaker than the Iraqi regime. Syria is completely in ruins as a result of his Russian friend’s bombing, which has destroyed the very cities he is slated to control. About half of Syria’s residents have lost their homes and been forced to leave. Up to a half a million have been killed by the regime. Assad has lost all legitimacy not only in the eyes of his own people, but in the eyes of the world. Of course, he would like to restore his control, and Israel would like that to happen, but having destroyed his own country he has nowhere to go.

The impotence of the international community says it all. About Obama’s lack of leadership much will be written, and the beautiful friendship between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin raises concerns not only regarding peace in Syria, but for the entire world. What is happening in Aleppo, near the Euphrates River, and in Mosul on the banks of the Tigris, attests more than anything else to the region’s accelerating disintegration. The unwillingness of the international community to support revolutions demanding democracy, and their insistence on working with benighted regimes like Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, have led the entire region into a state of civil war of an ethnic/tribal nature. This is causing indescribable suffering for millions of people, and massive waves of migration will continue to alter the demographic and political map of Europe.

Within this painful process, dictatorial regimes crumble because they are unable to adapt themselves to the spirit of the times. The problem lies in the fact that democratic forces have lost ground in favor of Islamist extremists of all varieties. These extremists are supported by monarchist regimes and dictatorships such as Saudi Arabia and Qatar. Setting the tone are Hezbollah and Iraqi Shiite militias on one side, ISIS and Sunni militias on the other. Bashar al-Assad in Syria, and Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Al-Abadi, rely on radical Shiite militias to impose their rule. Facing them are Sunni extremists, propped up by sectarian hatred and supported by the Gulf States.

In the middle are millions of people, Shia and Sunni alike, who rose up to seek democracy and social justice. They see how their countries have been repeatedly raped by authoritarian regimes. The silence of the international community cannot be understood only as indifference, but as mistrust and hostility towards millions of young Arabs. These are people who seek an escape from backwardness and tyranny to democracy and freedom, people who want to integrate into the modern world. Trump and Putin, Netanyahu and Erdogan, the Saudi king and the rulers of Iran are united against these educated young people and against the marginalized poor. They leave us with the horrors of Aleppo, which will haunt us for many years to come.

Translated from the Hebrew by Robert Goldman

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As with his entry into Syria, Putin’s departure comes as a surprise and leaves us guessing about his intentions. Today, as in October 2015, the world looks with amazement at the all-powerful Vladimir Putin, the leader of Russia, who appears to be the only one who knows how to capitalize on American weakness and restore Russia’s international status. Indeed, there is a huge contrast between Putin, who sent planes to bomb Syrian cities, and Obama, who demurred about taking any action to implement his demands that Bashar al-Assad step aside. American passivity fueled Russian activism. So far, however, neither Putin nor Obama has taken steps to end the bloodshed and the terrible destruction in Syria.

Since no one knows what Putin’s goals were when he deployed the Russian air force to Syria, there is no one who can specify for certain his motives for withdrawal. It may be possible to attribute this to his political genius, but it might equally be true that the whole venture is a folly that has entangled Russia in a conflict whose outcome is unpredictable.

There is little doubt that Putin’s intervention was intended to save the Assad regime from collapse. In this he failed. Assad will not survive despite massive support from Russia, Iran, Hezbollah and the Iraqi Shiite militias. Even though the Syrian opposition is unable to defend itself from Russian and Syrian air power, and even though it has no counter to the supply of Russian weapons, and despite the West’s inaction, the Assad regime remains teetering on the verge of collapse, its military crumbling. Even after the terrible destruction inflicted on Syria – 350,000 deaths, millions of refugees, destroyed cities and starving citizens – the picture has not changed.

Despite its claim to be fighting the Islamic State (ISIS), Russia focused its attacks on areas controlled by the moderate Syrian opposition, which sees ISIS as an enemy. The results of Russian involvement in Syria are devastating: 2000 killed in aerial bombardments, the complete destruction of clinics, markets, schools and homes in areas controlled by the moderate Syrian opposition, and tens of thousands of refugees, who have fled the fighting and are trying to escape to the West. Many of the more recent refugees are now on the border with Turkey. Turkey refuses to let them enter its territory, so they are abandoned to harsh weather and appalling living conditions. The desert region in Syria is controlled by ISIS. It was never bombed, and life there goes on as usual. Thus, Russia is contributing to the growing humanitarian disaster in Syria without diminishing ISIS’s hold over territory.

Putin’s “achievements” are meager. He weakened the democratic opposition to Assad. He accomplished this with the help of Kurdish forces, who exploited Russian bombing to join forces with Assad and grab territory from the opposition. Putin did return some vital areas to Assad’s control. These include the supply routes between Turkey and the besieged city of Aleppo. However, here Putin was forced to stop. Neither Assad nor Putin are able to conquer Aleppo. All attempts to cut off the city from its Turkish hinterground may lead to direct intervention by Saudi Arabia and Turkey, which have repeatedly stated that this is a red line for them.

Putin’s main goal was to defeat the opposition, and replace it with an “opposition” loyal to the Assad regime. For a long time Moscow acted to create an alternative to the opposition democratic forces. These efforts were concentrated on the Kurdish Democratic Party (PYD). However, the Turkish veto thwarted the Russians. They were compelled, in effect, to declare a ceasefire before completing their mission. The new round of negotiations in Geneva between the opposition and the Syrian regime marks, for now, the end of the Russian military campaign. Assad, unlike the Russians, does not want a ceasefire, and has no interest in renewing negotiations. Hence, the statement of the Syrian Foreign Minister, Walid Muallem, that Assad’s future is not up for discussion. This position highlights the gap between the Syrian regime and its Russian benefactor.

The ceasefire was used by the democratic opposition in Syria to come out and protest against the regime. Non-violent mass demonstrations, which took place in the streets of the bombed-out cities, were reminiscent of protests at the beginning of the revolution. Despite the death and destruction that have been visited on the Syrian people in the past five years, they have not given up and refuse to return to the days of dictatorship. These demonstrations will not affect Putin. Like all dictators, he holds life and human rights in contempt. But they make it clear that aerial bombing will not decide the outcome of the war. There is no chance that Assad’s disintegrating regime will overcome civil resistance to his rule. Putin was sorely mistaken when he came to protect this bloody regime; a regime that had lost all legitimacy in the eyes of its people and in the eyes of the international community. His efforts to save a government accused of committing crimes against humanity reveals the fact that Putin lacks all moral boundaries.

Putin has no winning cards. His “tactical flexibility” of withdrawal cannot determine Syria’s future, and all attempts to save the Assad regime will only prolong the war and increase the flow of refugees to Europe. Russia itself is edging toward economic collapse. It does not have much to offer the Syrian economy except arms. Iran and Hezbollah will not contribute anything to help rebuild Syria. Russia may have a formidable air force, but it is no a position to financially help Syria and influence its future. Putin knows how to destroy, but he leaves reconstruction to others. Indeed, the Syrian people need an enormous influx of economic aid from the international community so that they can rebuild what Assad destroyed.

Russian withdrawal from Syria is symptomatic of Assad’s failed policy of relying on a military solution. It also shows that ISIS was never an enemy of the regime, but an enemy of the Syrian revolution and its democratic agenda. Despite all the words spilled about the danger of ISIS, the Russian and Syrian regimes never really engaged them militarily. To defeat ISIS, one must first remove the rationale that led to its proliferation, i.e. Assad. Today the Syrian regime is forced to negotiate with the opposition; it has agreed to a ceasefire, and eventually will be forced to give up the battle cry: “Assad or the country burns!”

Putin understands that Assad will not return to be the leader of Syria, so he clings to the idea of dividing the country along sectarian lines. This will enable him to continue to control the seaport and the airport near the Alawite-controlled coastal city of Latakia. That is why he helped the Kurds to establish their autonomous region in northern Syria. But the majority of the Syrian people oppose this idea because it leaves Syria in conflict, divided, and easy prey to repeated interference from Iran, Hezbollah, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey. Dividing the country will also strengthen ISIS and thwart plans for rebuilding. The only basis for the rehabilitation of Syria is the creation of a democratic regime.

The proposal of dividing Syria into enclaves is actually a replication of the Iraq and Lebanon model, which will only perpetuate internal conflicts, sectarian violence and instability. The attempt to impose this model on Syria will intensify extremism, increase the suffering of civilians and leave ISIS as a major player in the region. If the Syrian people will not unite around a democratic constitution that guarantees the rights of all citizens, regardless of religion or sect, the civil war in Syria will continue even after Assad falls.

• Translated from the Hebrew by Robert Goldman

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As the civil war enters its fifth year, it is becoming increasingly difficult to gain an understanding of the turn of events in Syria: Who is fighting whom and why? Who are the good guys and who are the bad? Before we try to untangle the knot, one thing is clear: Those responsible for the unimaginable killing and destruction are the Assad regime and its allies – Russia, Iran, and Hezbollah. Only Russia has the air power capable of destroying what still remains intact in Syria, as it did in Chechnya, and only Assad has a quantity of aircraft capable of spewing destruction on such a large scale. Neither ISIL (aka ISIS or DA’ESH) nor the rest of the opposition possess heavy weapons, aircraft, or ground-to-air missiles, leaving them defenseless against air strikes.

Geographically, Syria is split in two: The “populated” area in the West and the “desert” area in the East. Assad abandoned the latter at the very beginning of the war and it ended up in ISIL’s hands. From Daraa in the south, near the border with Jordan, to Aleppo in the north, near the border of Turkey, stretches a road running through the capital Damascus and the cities of Hama and Homs, which remain in the hands of the regime. The war is over the “populated” area, which includes Syria’s most important cities. Assad’s control over this area is precarious, and without massive Russian intervention, his regime would be on the verge of falling.

The great puzzle is not what has prevented the downfall of the Assad regime, but why the United States is silent in the face of unbridled Russian aggression. The realization that Assad has no future in Syria is now an international consensus uniting most leaders, including Putin and Obama. While Iran continues to ally itself to Assad and is prepared to fight to the last Syrian, most reasonable people understand that Assad has lost his legitimacy after displacing 10 million people, almost half Syria’s population. With hundreds of thousands becoming refugees overnight and dozens being killed every day, how can one explain the fact that US Secretary of State John Kerry hasn’t sardonically quipped – as he did when the Israelis shelled Shejaiya in the last Gaza war – “That was a hell of a pinpoint operation!”

Furthermore, why are the Russians and the Americans supporting the YPD Kurdish party? After all, the Kurdish aim is to exploit the Syrian civil war and establish an autonomous Kurdish province called “Rojava” bordering Turkey, like the Kurdish autonomous region in Iraq. And how to explain the fact that the same Kurds are fighting beside Assad against the Syrian Opposition Forces and are helping him besiege Aleppo? How does it serve American interests to transplant into Syria a failed sectarian Iraqi model (aiding the Shiites and abandoning the Sunnis)? And how can we talk about war against ISIL when, in fact, Syria is divided along sectarian lines and, as in Iraq, the large Sunni majority is left without hope? But the biggest question is this: In the aftermath of the nuclear agreement with Iran, what does the US want in the Middle East? Does it support a Shiite government in Iraq? Does it favor the removal of Assad and support the Kurdish YPD?

Indeed, diplomacy is the name of the game. John Kerry will keep meeting his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, and, between handshakes and smiles, convey a sense of agreement between the great powers. Recently the two held a conference under the dubious title, “Conference of Friends of the Syrian People,” which gathered all the bitter enemies of Syria who are massacring and starving the Syrian population every day. The nuclear deal with Iran and the chemical weapons agreement between Obama and Putin created, say American diplomats, “positive” momentum. So they sit and talk while the Iranians and the Russians terrorize the world.

The latest farce was the convening of the Third Geneva Convention, where Kerry forced the opposition to participate without having discussed the future of Assad. Indeed the desired conference was held and served as a prelude to the murderous Russian assault on Aleppo, which sought to overwhelm the opposition and obviate the need for further negotiations.

The Obama doctrine is simple, if somewhat unreasonable: The civil war in Syria must be resolved on the basis of a compromise between the regime and the opposition. It sounds logical enough, except that Assad does not recognize the opposition, and the opposition will never share power with a regime that has massacred and exiled the Syrian people.

It is clear that Iran continues to prop up the Assad regime, which gives it a power base in Syria and provides vital backing to her protégée, Hezbollah in Lebanon. It is clear that Russia is not ready to forgo its alliance with Syria in favor of the United States. It is also clear that Saudi Arabia and Turkey are determined not to let the Iranians, the Kurds or the Russians decide the fate of Syria. But what about Obama? Since his policy of diplomacy is not working, he makes do with passing out vague tips to the world backed up by zero action: Obama tells the Russians that it’s not worthwhile to continue waging war for economic reasons and warns them against becoming embroiled in the conflict; he warns Assad that even if he conquers Aleppo, most of the country will still remain outside his control; he cautions the Saudis not to get militarily involved in Syria and is preventing them from equipping the opposition with anti-aircraft weapons; he has forbidden the Turks from bombing the Kurdish region or establishing a no-fly zone; and he urges the Europeans to be compassionate and to absorb the millions of refugees knocking on their doors. However, after backing down from his own “red line” in the chemical weapons affair, what he is ready to do remains unclear.

The problem is that the Iranians, Russians, Saudis, and Turks are stubborn enough not to heed the learned advice of the American president. As long as the Russians, Assad, Iran, Hezbollah, and the Kurds tighten their siege on Aleppo, and as long as the Saudis and the Turks threaten to send in ground forces – the Turks to fight against the Kurds and the Saudis against the Iranians – what will the Americans do? And if they do something, how will the Russians react? The situation is complex. Turkey is a member of NATO, and any Russian attack on her will be considered an attack on NATO. Saudi Arabia, for its part, might expand and replicate its war (against Iran in Yemen) in Syria. Thus while Obama shilly-shallies – spewing advice, cooperating with Russia, and accepting mass slaughter – the Middle East slides toward an all-out war that may easily engulf the world.

Some unresolved questions remain, such as, who are the rebels? The rebels are a horde of local militias competing for Saudi and Qatari funding. Since the Americans refuse to support the revolutionaries, including the liberal and democratic opposition, the Saudis and Qatar use oil revenues to “buy” those local militias that share the fundamentalist Saudi ideology. The resulting strength of these fundamentalists gives the Americans a reason to turn their back on the rebels. American inactivity has led to the rise of ISIL, as well as to the Saudi and Qatari intervention in Syria. And now it cooperates with Russia, which fights the very rebels that America nominally supports. Putin is doing Obama’s dirty work.

It is easy to say that Syria has fallen to the bad guys and so the West cannot support any party in the conflict. However, in Syria there are bad guys and then there are very bad guys: The regime is the source of evil there, and its continued existence only increases the power of the extremists. Nonetheless, Syria also has much going for it. While the number of warring militias is not large and their impact is limited, there are still hundreds of thousands of young Syrian democrats who waged the revolution, and without them Syria has no future. They have not disappeared and they continue their activities, whether in Syria or in exile. They are determined to build a modern democratic state living in peace with its neighbors. The good guys are the majority. They work tirelessly to build a civil society. They see the totalitarian regimes in Saudi Arabia, in Qatar, and in Iran and know that there’s not much to learn from them. I met a Syrian refugee in Germany who said, “We chose democracy as in the West, and we expected the West to support us, but when they said, ‘You must decide between Assad or ISIL,’ we refused. We want democracy and we are willing to sacrifice our lives for it.”

• Translated from the Hebrew by Robert Goldman

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The revolutionary uprising in Syria that started in March 2011 as part of the Arab Spring, and the current struggle there, have had a huge impact on my political party, the Organization for Democratic Action (ODA-DAAM, henceforth DAAM). Because of Syria’s proximity to Israel and Palestine, developments there directly affect Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, as well as Palestinians with Israeli citizenship. Hamas is close to the Islamic Brotherhood in Syria and elsewhere, Fatah is close to Arab regimes such as Assad’s in Syria and Sisi’s in Egypt, while the Salafi and Jihadist movements influence Palestinians on both sides of the Green Line.

One’s position on the Syrian revolution is a litmus test for any one who is politically active. Therefore, it is a precondition for building a Jewish-Arab political party in Israel, such as DAAM, that we find Palestinian partners, inside and outside Israel, who support democracy in Syria. We are talking here about the tragedies of two peoples with a common cause: the Syrians and the Palestinians. Then there are the Israelis, who are generally indifferent to the fate of both Palestinians and Syrians. The Israelis do not see in Syria a revolution, they only see extremist Islam and religious struggles. Berlin seems to them much closer than Damascus.

Let us start from the present. Today (January 30, 2016), the delegation of the Syrian opposition decided to participate in the 3rd Geneva conference to discuss the fate of Syria. This is a tragedy. Oslo was also a tragedy, but it was supported by both the Palestinians and the Israelis. In fact, the decision to establish DAAM came from our understanding that Oslo was the surrender of the Palestinian revolution. The difference between the two tragedies is that the Syrians do not believe in the Geneva 3 negotiations. They are participating because they have lost control over the situation in Syria.

We are in a stalemate. The opposition cannot topple Assad, while Assad’s government cannot rule Syria. Neither the Syrian government nor the opposition can accept the other side as a partner, yet the Americans and the Russians have forced them to convene, which is absurd. No less absurd is the flow of hundreds of thousands of Syrians into Germany, because they have a country they love but cannot go back to.

The Syrian opposition sought help from everyone they could think of: from the Turks, the Saudis and mainly from the Americans. Yet last week when U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry came to Riyadh, he simply adopted the Russian point of view; threatening withdrawal of support, he ordered the Syrian opposition to go to the negotiations without preconditions, not even a halt to the bombings and the starvation. That is why the Syrians feel that Kerry betrayed them and that they are alone.

So much for the present situation. Now let us go back to the beginning. When the revolution started in 2011 it was a surprise. People tried to understand what had led to the uprising. Examining the past, one can trace similar developments that led to the Arab spring. The common denominator among these countries was that their regimes were trying to apply the same economic formula, abandoning the old state-regulated economies and moving into neoliberalism. This shift in policy served small elites, who became rich and corrupt, while most people were abandoned to poverty without functioning social services or social safety nets. This was true for countries like Tunisia, Egypt and Syria. It had nothing to do with ISIL, which did not exist then.

In Egypt, in 2008, the revolution began with a wave of strikes in the Mahala al-Kubra textile factories. The workers called for a general strike on April 6. They were supported by a group of students who formed the April 6 movement. Thus in Egypt the workers played a very fundamental role in the revolution; it was by no means the creation of the Facebook youth alone. The workers’ incessant strikes during the uprising helped bring Mubarak down. In Tunisia too, the strikes of the Gafsa phosphate miners, which started in 2008, played an important role in the revolution. Then came the Libyan uprising, in which the USA intervened militarily to bring down Kaddafi. On seeing this, Syrians believed that here was their opportunity to topple the Assad dynasty. They believed that peaceful demonstrations like those that had occurred in Egypt would bring Assad down. Unlike the Egyptian case, however, the regime began slaughtering the demonstrators. The belief that the West would intervene as it had in Libya turned out to be naive.

Mubarak, Kaddafi and Assad (the father) had much in common. All came from the military, ruled their countries for 40 years, and wanted to bequeath their states to their sons. Their countries and citizens meant no more to them than a springboard for becoming vastly rich, so they could pass the wealth and power to their sons. Corruption was rampant. For example, anyone who wanted to study in a university, get a diploma, or even get out of prison after the end of the sentence, had to pay large sums, reaching $30,000. In the embattled cities of Syria, today and yesterday, corruption even exploits the hunger under siege. Jaish al-Islam, a jihadist group, buys food from Assad’s army officers and sells it for a fortune to those of the starving people who can pay.

In 2008, when the wave of strikes started in Egypt, DAAM recognized that this was the start of a revolution. We wondered who the strikers were, because until then the only demonstrations in Egypt had focused on the Palestinian issue, never on Egyptian causes.

We applied the same logic to the Palestinian struggle. We have always believed that one cannot help the Palestinians if they do not first help themselves. They have no economy or social infrastructure, while Israel has both, in addition to a strong army. We have always said, “You have to develop your social infrastructure. (Hamas) rockets and missiles alone will not bring down the Occupation and will not lead to independence. If you have a culture, an economy, a cohesive society, and a strategy, you will not need the missiles. To say ‘God is Great’ does not help either.”

We saw this pattern in Lebanon too, where the Hezbollah, an ultra-nationalist Shiite movement, was ready to sacrifice Lebanese and Palestinian lives in Lebanon. DAAM called their bluff, claiming that Hezbollah was using the anti-Israeli tactic in order to take power in Lebanon, just as Hamas did in Gaza. Neither poses a real threat to the Israelis, nor has either of them won any war against Israel: they have just wanted to establish their own power. Is it a wonder, then, that today Hezbollah is killing Syrians, not Israelis?

During the uprisings of the Arab Spring it became clear that the Arab peoples saw through the lies of the anti-Israel slogans. How did this happen? Let’s analyze the case of Syria. At the turn of the century, after Hafez al-Assad died, Syria went through a deep economic change from a nationalized to a market economy. The Assad family took over the infrastructure and communications, while it left commerce to the big Sunni families. In June 2000, Hafez Assad died and his son Bashar returned from the UK with a western education. People hoped for more freedoms. At the beginning of his rule Bashar Assad allowed a degree of political openness in what was called the Damascus Spring. Within 3 months, however, it ended, and arrests of those who felt too free resumed. After the assassination of Lebanese PM Rafik Hariri in 2005, local protests and Western pressure forced Bashar Assad to retreat from Lebanon. This withdrawal affected Syria’s economy adversely, because Lebanon had been a source of bribes and smuggling for Syria’s rulers. It was a blow to Assad, who could not stop the Lebanese from throwing him out.

At the same time, opposition forces published the Declaration of Damascus. These forces included (1) the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, who accepted the democratic rules of modern states; and (2) a leftist party called the People’s Democratic Party, led by Riad Turk and independent figures well known for their opposition to the Assad regime. That was the beginning of a new independent opposition in Syria.

In the articles of Yassin Haj Saleh, written between 2006-2009 (in Syria on one foot, Arabic edition), he predicts not an uprising but an explosion, either a popular one or a religious one. He foresaw that a sectarian explosion might occur because the regime did not allow the normal development of the nation through a democratic process. He also talked about the problem of terrorism, explaining that the government applied the name “terrorist” to every form of opposition. He suggested that the government may itself have staged a series of mysterious bombings. In 2006 he talked about the influence of the internet on the people, and he spoke of poverty and the large social gaps as causes of a future social explosion.

On page 108, Haj Saleh anticipated that the marginalized people of Syria will resort either to jihad or to politics. He explained that if the regime keeps investing in oppressive security methods rather than in solutions to social problems— promoting neoliberal economics without democracy—this will be a formula for sectarian strife. In 2006, he could not predict a revolution in Syria since the country had neither political parties nor unions. Nor did external Arab forces like Saudi Arabia, Qatar or Turkey play a big role there.

When the revolution erupted in March 2011, Assad was ready to fight against his people to the last one, while Syrians believed that the West would intervene and not let it happen. The revolutionary youth rallied around the Syrian National Council (SNC), which was a natural continuation of the Damascus Declaration, consisting of the Left, the Islamic Brotherhood, and figures such as Burhan Ghalioun and George Sabra. The SNC got immediate international recognition and a seat at the Arab League. Then Saudi Arabia and Iran, the two big enemies of the Arab Spring, who fear the Muslim Brotherhood on the one hand and democracy on the other, began counter-revolutionary intervention.

Qatar, for its part, believed that if Saudi Arabia continued opposing the revolutionary wave, the rule of the Saudi royal family would be endangered. Qatar threw its support behind the Muslim brotherhood, using both money and its al-Jazeera satellite channel. Saudi Arabia saw the new, democratically elected president of Egypt, the Muslim Brotherhood’s Muhammad Morsi, as a major danger, so it staged a military coup led by the present Egyptian president Abed al-Fattah Sisi. Meanwhile, in Syria, the Saudis started pumping up Salafi and Jihadist forces like Ahrar A-Sham and al-Qaida.

Then—in November 2012— the Saudis, with the help of US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, made a kind of coup in the national leadership of the Syrian opposition, putting their man, Ahmad Jerba, at the head of a new, more “representative” body called “The National Coalition of the Opposition in Syria.” In the meantime, Assad released a bunch of jihadis he had kept in his jails. He knew their expertise with weapons, and naturally they started to use them. Syria’s peaceful demonstrators now stepped aside, because from the start they had intended a peaceful revolution. During this whole period, the West held useless international conferences, expressing solidarity with the Syrian opposition but not giving any kind of material or military support.

In the summer of 2013, Assad used chemical weapons against the people of Gouta A-Sharqia near Damascus, breaching all international commitments and crossing President Obama’s famous red line. He promised to act forcefully against the Assad regime, and the Syrian people pinned their hopes on him. We in DAAM supported any action that would stop Assad from massacring his people, and we waited for Obama to act. At the very last minute, Obama decided to wait and see what British PM David Cameron would do. The rest is history. Britain’s Labor Party opposed any action, as did some of Cameron’s own Tory party, so Obama found an excuse to back off. Instead of attacking, he reached an agreement with Russia on the removal of chemical weapons from Syria, leaving the regime untouched.

At the end of 2011, Obama pulls his army out of Iraq. At that very minute, Iraqi PM Nouri al-Malaki, representing the ruling Shia majority supported by Iran, starts a wave of repression against the Sunni minority, which had begun a peaceful rebellion in the Sunni areas of Anbar province. The Americans continue to support al-Malaki. Suddenly, in June, ISIL storms Mosul, the Iraqi army vanishes into thin air, and all its expensive American arms fall into the hand of ISIL, which is run by the defrocked Baath officers of Saddam Hussein’s army. At the same time, Assad retreats from the northeastern Syrian desert, enabling ISIL to invade without resistance and declare the Syrian city of Raqqa as the capital of the Islamic State.

Where does that leave us? Assad has already destroyed Syria, its people are starving and dying, but Obama’s new strategy is to fight ISIL. After 9/11, the Americans lost faith in Saudi Arabia and opted for Iran as a more reliable partner. Iran may represent a problem in the Middle East and is a bitter rival of Israel, but it presents no threat to Europe and New York as ISIL does. Therefore, Obama signs the nuclear agreement with Iran, disregarding Israeli and Saudi opposition. The USA works with Iran in the fight against ISIL in Iraq, while Iran sides with Assad and Russia against the (by now) fundamentalist opposition supported by the Saudis and Turkey. At the same time, the Saudis fight the Iranian intervention in Yemen with low-profile American support. All this goes to show how confused American policy is in the region, and why the US is so discredited.

The protracted war in Syria was leading to the disintegration of the Syrian Army. Young people were refusing to enroll in the Army to fight a lost war, regime supporters had lost faith in the possibility of defeating the opposition. For their part, however, the Syrian refugees in Turkey understood that although Assad’s regime is weak, the opposition is not strong enough. This led to the massive emigration to Europe in summer of 2015. At that point Vladimir Putin decided to bring in his air power to save the Assad regime. Under the pretext of fighting ISIL, the Russians started bombing the Syrian Opposition, spreading destruction and killing civilians.

In the wake of the Iran nuclear agreement, the Obama administration fell in love with diplomacy. The refugee crisis in Europe, the barbarian attacks in Paris staged by ISIL, and Russia’s intervention in Syria were seen by the Obama administration as offering a golden opportunity to go for another successful diplomatic agreement in Syria. The US convened a new international gathering in Vienna, with the participation of its new partners, Iran and Russia. Here a new formula was reached, in which the demand that Assad give up power was dropped. After the Vienna talks, the UN Security Council voted unanimously for a resolution establishing a framework for negotiations, with no mention at all of Assad’s fate. Following this resolution, the Syrian opposition formed a new High Negotiations Committee (HNC) in the Saudi capital of Riad. The committee includes for the first time Jihadist formations supported by Saudi Arabia. These are now accepted as a legitimate part of the opposition forces.

At Kerry’s urging, the veteran Syrian opposition agreed to participate in a new Geneva convention to negotiate an agreement with the Assad regime, despite its disbelief that such an agreement is reachable as long as the Russians keep bombing the opposition. Meet the HNC in Riad, Kerry put an ultimatum: If you don’t go to Geneva, we will withdraw our support. Under these circumstances, the HNC decided indeed to go to Geneva, but under one very clear condition: stop the Russian bombing and stop the starvation of Syria’s besieged cities.

The present conditions are these: in Iraq a sectarian Shia government, supported by Iran and the US, is waging a war against ISIL and repressing the Sunnis. In Syria the Assad regime continues its barbaric war against democracy with the support of Russia, Iran, and the passive agreement of the Obama administration. Under these conditions there are no real prospects of “containing and defeating” ISIL, which was the aim that Obama declared more than a year ago. As long as Iraq is being ruled by a sectarian government under a religious constitution, the Sunni population will seek refuge with ISIL. And as long as Assad remains in power, ISIL will stay in northern Syria. The Russian idea that Assad is the key to a solution leads only to more carnage and more refugees. Assad must go and be held responsible for the mass murder of 250,000 civilians, the destruction of more than 2 million homes, and the displacement of more than 10 million Syrian citizens. We in DAAM support all democratic forces in Syria that agree to build a new country based on religious tolerance, democracy, and social justice.

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