How strange is the cycle of history! Twelve years ago, practically the whole world - excepting Iran and Russia - agreed to overthrow the power of President Bashar Al-Assad. A devastating civil war opposing all tendencies had broken out throughout Syria and the country was completely torn apart. Eight years ago, Bashar's regime was on the verge of collapse despite Iranian support. But Russia intervened and saved him. And now, after twelve years of its exclusion from the Arab League, Syria is invited to reintegrate it.
Nevertheless, the armed organizations hostile to the Syrian president - supported by the United States, Turkey and bearing the impact of significant Israeli influence - are still in place and dominate almost a quarter of the country's surface. The political process of normalization of relations between political forces and the reconstruction of the regime on a constitutional basis is still underway according to "the Astana formula", thanks to the sponsorship of Russia, and far from "the Geneva formula”, supported by the European Union and the United States and managed by the United Nations.
Inside Syria, Al-Assad seems reassured about his power after having gathered the support of Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Iraq and Jordan and that a consensus is in sight with Erdoğan, if ever he is re-elected. With this development of the situation in the Middle East, Israel appears to be the most concerned party as well as the United States. In addition, some local forces are now devour by worry and have to recalculate their moves in the light of the new situation. These include the Haya Tahrir al Sham (formerly al-Nusra Front), the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and Kurdish and Turkmen groups that enjoy the support of external parties.
The Arab League's decision is in fact only a political test for Bashar Al-Assad's capacity to normalize the political situation in his country and to establish a new balance on the eastern Arab front, which has become a field of confrontation with Israel and the United States and which includes, in addition to Iran, Syria, Iraq and Lebanon, the West Bank and the Gaza strip. According to the US State Department and the US Security Council, Washington has informed its partners in the Middle East that the sanctions imposed on Syria remain in force despite its return to the Arab League. The United States' partners in the Middle East have pledged to maintain direct contact with the Syrian President's government in order to keep it under pressure and to move forward on the path to resolving the Syrian crisis, to achieving more humanitarian aid, the creation of safe conditions for the return of refugees and to ensure that the terrorist organization "Daesh" cannot reappear.
The Arab decision for Syria return is only the first step on a long and challenging road. Syria must be serious in order to achieve an internal political solution: this is the sine qua non condition for the exercise of pressure aimed at lifting Western sanctions and which is considered essential to make available the financing necessary for the reconstruction projects. Within the framework of the Arab League a ministerial group will be created whose mission will be to communicate with the Syrian government for preparing solutions to the current problems. Consequently, the roadmap for the total integration of Syria into the Arab League includes, in addition to the internal political settlement, the facilitation of access for humanitarian assistance to beneficiaries, the settlement of the problem of refugees and missing persons who were held by the Syrian authorities, and the fight against drug trafficking, which goes from Syria to the Gulf countries via Jordan and which constitutes a major challenge to overcome, on the way to the normalization of relations between Syria and the Arab countries as well as putting an end to the presence of Iranian militias.
The ongoing debate in Israel is that the Middle East has entered a new phase where regional relations are developing under Iranian influence. Consequently, the United States and Israel have lost a large part of their regional influence since 2018 and for reasons that have nothing to do with Iran. In recent months, this influence has shown a marked decline until the outbreak of the great political earthquake with the resumption of Saudi-Iranian relations. It has caused a turmoil in the American-Israeli strategy in the Middle East region: Iran is no longer the sworn enemy of the states of the region and Saudi Arabia no longer has the political interest in joining a regional alliance against Iran led by Israel or the United States.
There is no doubt that Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad has an interest now, when he has taken the first step in the direction of Arab reintegration, to adopt a policy which allows him to continue the internal political process, to begin the work of reconstruction and to move away from anything that could weaken his desire for internal stability. Such a policy requires avoiding undertaking risky adventures so as to encourage Arab countries to exert diplomatic pressure to lift economic and other sanctions on Israel, with a view to stopping the recurrent attacks against vital Syrian infrastructure, including airports, in order to begin reconstruction efforts in a climate of peace and security. This policy could become a fertile field for interaction between the parties to the conflict in the Middle East in order to adopt a formula that helps to lower the level of tension and establish peace and stability in the region.