From Syria debacle to a deadly sectarian war

GulfNews.com

More than three years after the start of the brutal Syrian conflict, the debacle sheds a shameful light on our incredulity. Hundreds of thousands of civilians and fighters are dead, there are millions of refugees and an entire generation has been lost. Nobody will win the war, everybody has now understood that. But nobody cares because there is something more crucial than stopping Syrian people from being killed: making sure that Iran will not become a larger threat

Beyond miserable and pathetic proxy wars, the military support provided by some Arab states to jihadists and other fundamentalists in Syria – with the knowledge and assistance of Turkey (when it is not up to dirty tricks like using sarin gas, as alleged by America journalist Seymour Hersh) — is not only shameful but also a political mistake.

One could summarise the somewhat intricate situation in Syria as follows: on the one hand, there is the Syrian army that is recovering lost positions thanks to Russian armaments, Hezbollah’s fighting forces and the Iranian Revolutionary Guards; on the other hand, a force that has nearly disappeared (the Free Syrian Army) together with the so-called ‘national coalition’, and the Islamic Front made of salafists, iihadists and Muslim Brotherhood, with the Kurds playing their apart. Each Arab financial provider supports a particular group, which is perplexing. The Afghan experience it seems has been forgotten.

One should, nevertheless, understand that the conflict in Syria is first an Arab issue. US analyst Edward Luttwak recently said “we have nothing to win [there]. None of the belligerents is a friend of America. We should limit [ourselves] to arming [them] and making sure none of them carries the day”. For its part, Europe is only (and rightly) concerned by its own jihadists, and fears the day they come back home.

The matter indeed concerns the Arabs – and their relationship with their Iranian neighbour. On the ground, some subtle Arab minds will argue that they only support Ahrar Al Sham’s salafists and not to Jabhat Al Nusra jihadists, linked to Al Qaida. Others will try and make you believe that the Iraqi extremists are just a friendly association of Iraqi Sunnis giving a temporary hand to their Syrian brothers, to help them get rid of Bashar Al Assad’s rule. Last, whoever supports the Muslim Brotherhood will explain it by saying it is essential to build a fence against the well-known Iranian plans for the region.

But there is now worse: Syrian is becoming the place where Sunni fighters from around the world are converging to attack Shiite fighters from the around the world. Syria has been transformed into a magnate for extremists. Congratulations to the sponsors.

One can therefore not be surprised when newspapers headlines inform that ‘Israel is holding secret talks with some Arab states that do not recognise it’ (Tuesday April 15th, 2014). One can wonder why Israelis made public this information now, or why Kuwait’s Arab Times reported it on its front page and other regional newspapers deep inside. But it is finally of little importance. The point is that George W. Bush’s insane rhetoric is still there and – worse — is being validated by those very ‘thinkers’ who despised the Israelis for not being able to live in peace with their Arab neighbours. They are now behaving just the same with Iran.

Greater frustration

Nobody disputes the reality of a Sunni-Shiite divide, but until the US put a friendly hand in it, brothers in faith were able to understand that what unites is stronger than what divides. What’s happening in Syria is not only a terrible failure for mankind but is also a substitution of a dramatic situation by another, one that will bring even greater frustration. It will also have an effect on the victims of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (a case in point is the collapse of the latest ‘negotiations’ between the Israeli government and the PLO, at a time when Hamas and PLO are renewing links, which is great news for the Palestinian cause).

Transforming the Syrian revolution into an international battle was a masterstroke, which degenerative regional diplomacy will historically find hard to be proud of – and will be held accountable for. Developing it into a deadly Sunni-Shiite conflict will transform this part of the world into a hopeless land of frustration, until the West draws conclusions about Syria having turned into another Afghanistan. Is it too much to ask some Arab countries to realise how dangerous it is to play with fire?

Luc Debieuvre is a French essayist and a lecturer at IRIS (Institut de Relations Internationales et Strategiques) and the FACO Law University of Paris.