A few more thoughts on Syria and what comes next

Statement by the HTS, translated below

As my co-bloglord Trevor wrote an excellent piece yesterday summarizing the events of the past week in Syria, I have a few thoughts about the subject as well.

In the immediate aftermath of the fall of Bashar al-Assad's regime—with him scarpering off to Moscow to join other dictators-in-exile—I was not all too sanguine about what would come next. The main rebel group which spearheaded the lightning offensive, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, has its roots in the Syrian branch of al-Qaeda. This did not encourage me. Its leader, Mohammed al-Jolani, has claimed that his group repudiates al-Qaeda's ideology. But, of course, this could have just been posturing for the Western media and governments. In the decade and more since the Arab Spring, we have seen its promise wither on the vine in every country it ran through like wildfire. From Tunisia to Algeria to Egypt, autocrats have come back into power. In Egypt, the military overthrew the Muslim Brotherhood government. In Tunisia, the one bright spot, the democratically elected president has undone all of the reforms, taking the place of the former dictator, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. Libya is another Somalia, with the country split in two. The 2011 revolutions didn't even touch any Gulf state autocracy.

In this catalog of failure, Syria's was an egregious case. Peaceful protest was immediately suppressed by a president more concerned for his own factional loyalties than for the well-being of the entire nation. The country soon descended into a war of all-against-all, with al-Assad using chemical weapons on his own people, all the while calling the forces arrayed against him "terrorists." Russian president Vladimir Putin, sensing an opportunity to gain a foothold in America's sphere of influence, sent troops to Syria at al-Assad's behest. While that saved him, it didn't end the war, which had been in a bloody stalemate for several years. 

Al-Assad has just fled Syria. Everything is up in the air. In a civil war, armed groups are loath to give up their weapons and their leverage. All of these groups serve as proxies for outside forces. So it's quite rational to look at the situation and withhold judgment as to what is to come.

As a group coming out of the Islamist camp, there was no reason to think that HTS would shed its former affiliations. It was perfectly reasonable to think that it would move to impose some sort of Sharia law on the territories it controlled.

And then it issued this statement. (Translation by Google Translate.)

General Command: It is strictly forbidden to interfere with women’s dress or impose any request regarding their clothing or appearance, including requesting modesty.

We affirm that personal freedom is guaranteed to all, and that respect for the rights of individuals is the basis for building a civilized nation.

Well. This is something we hadn't really heard in any of the Arab Spring movements. 

The problem inherent in the Arab Spring is that for decades Arab autocrats had repressed any sort of secular opposition. Therefore, opposition to existing regimes centered on Islamist parties like the Muslim Brotherhood, whose dedication to democratic pluralism was, at the least, suspect. It's the old trope of groups like the Muslim Brotherhood, or the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) in Algeria's 1991 elections, having one poll and then doing away with elections once they assumed power. (If you haven't studied Algeria's election and its aftermath, you should. The military intervened, setting off a decade-long insurgency which slaughtered 150,000 Algerians, with unspeakable atrocities both by the state and by FIS.)

Again, it's early days. But his is a startling statement in the context of Middle Eastern history for the past thirty years. HTS, at least as of now, is not seeking to impose any sort of religious orthodoxy. Syria is a multi-confessional state; Sunnis, Shi'a, Druze, and Christians make up its mosaic. Arabs and Kurds live side-by-side. Any attempt to impose Islamist ideology would lead, inevitably, to another decade of war, destroying the country even more utterly. That this is one of the first things HTS issued is remarkable, and, perhaps, indicative of a political sophistication which one could not have hoped for in such a morass of violence.

I'm trying not to get burned again by the hopes which 2011 inspired in me. But if Syrians can get this right, if they can rebuild a pluralistic, democratic state after decades of dictatorship and civil war, the region and the world can take it as an example that one does not have to seek retribution. One does not have to seek vengeance. That human beings, after suffering horrific trauma, can forgive and heal.

We will see. But this is a good beginning.