Simon and Weinstein note that U.S. President Donald Trump sees promise in Syria's new leader, who has a jihadist background (Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham, HTS), and has suspended much of the sanctions previously imposed on the former regime. "Since Shara assumed power, he has courted foreign support by disavowing jihadism and raising the prospect of normalizing relations with Israel. Such rhetoric..., persuaded current and former U.S. officials that Shara was the man for the moment."
However, according to the writers, Syria is now facing a new wave of violent fragmentation. The core problem with U.S. policy, the two scholars argue, is its support for al-Sharaa's demand of a centralized government for a diverse, sectarian country deeply torn by a profound lack of trust.
"The problem with Washington's Syria policy is not that it backs a former al-Qaeda ally but that it endorses Shara's vision of centralized rule over a diverse and sectarian country riven by deep mistrust. In July, the U.S. special envoy for Syria, Tom Barrack, went so far as to rule out U.S. support for any sort of federal arrangement, such as allowing for local control of policing," they state.
The Syrian government under al-Sharaa's leadership fiercely rejects a federal system, viewing it as a precursor to chaos, state disintegration, and the loss of HTS control. Furthermore, "some of Shara's allies believe it is the prerogative of Syria's Sunni Muslims, who make up a majority of the population, to rule over religious minorities."
Simon and Weinstein consider al-Sharaa and his government to lack a clear vision for the country they want to build. They are attempting to apply their system of governance, designed for the small, single-main-street province of Edleb (Idlib), to the whole of Syria, which is a complex mix of peoples including Syriacs (Arameans-Chaldeans-Assyrians), Kurds, Arabs, Druze, Alawites, Yezidis, Turkmen, Circassians and others. "Shara is not an all-powerful authoritarian; he is constrained by his inner circle and makes decisions in consultation with them. His advisors are inclined to hoard power," they state, emphasizing that "for the country to have a chance at recovering from 50 years of despotism and a decade of civil war, it must allow minority communities to retain a degree of autonomy."
Simon and Weinstein warn that continuing with an exploitative centralized government will lead to continued severe sectarian violence and will push communities to resist, potentially by seeking protection from external actors. Therefore, according to two writers, Syria's partners should encourage power-sharing arrangements.
The article details the disastrous consequences of l-Sharaa's insistence on tightening his grip and seeking to implement a totalitarian system across all of Syria. These include massacres on the Syrian coast against Alawites and massacres in Suwayda against the Druze. These events were a reason for Israel's deep incursions into Syrian territory to play the role of defender of the Druze. Furthermore, there has been a lack of flexibility in implementing the March 10 agreement between al-Sharaa and General Commander of the Syrian Democratic Forces Mazloum Abdi.
The article concludes that U.S. policymakers have begun "slowly coming around to the idea of a federal structure for Syria. embrace the idea of a federal system for Syria." This shift is particularly evident after U.S. Envoy to Syria Thomas Barrack changed his previously rigid rhetoric advocating for Syria's full unity to one of greater flexibility when he said that Syria can not be a federation but "something short of that, in which you allow everybody to keep their own integrity their own culture, their own language, and no threat of Islamism.
Prof. Steven Simon and Adam Weinstein conclude their argument by calling on the Trump administration to "recognize the weight of its words and ensure that it is not inadvertently encouraging the interim government's worst inclinations, which could wind up pushing the country back into civil war."
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