Alone and fighting against a renewed insurgency, is Assad's regime in danger of falling?

BEIRUT (AP) – The last time Syrian President Bashar Assad was in serious trouble was a decade ago, during the height of the civil war, when his forces lost control of parts of the largest city, Aleppo, and his opponents closed in. in the capital, Damascus.

At the time, he was saved by his biggest international backer, Russia, and long-time regional ally Iran, which along with Lebanon's powerful Hezbollah militia helped Assad's forces retake Aleppo, swinging the war in his favor.

Now, as the insurgents pursue a shocking offensive that has quickly taken not only Aleppo, but the key city of Hama and a string of towns in the northwest of the country, the Syrian leader appears to be alone.

Russia is preoccupied with its war in Ukraine, while Hezbollah, which once sent thousands of its fighters to bolster Assad's forces, has been weakened by the year-long conflict with Israel. Iran, on the other hand, has seen its proxies across the region destroyed by Israeli airstrikes.

In addition, the Syrian army is tired and after 13 years of war and economic problems, there is little left to fight.

So will Assad's regime fall in the near future?

“The coming days and weeks will be critical in determining whether the rebel offensive is a real threat to the Assad regime or whether the regime is able to regain its footing and roll back the gains of the rebels,” said Mona Yacoubian, a United analyst. States Institute for Peace.

“While they are weak and distracted, Assad's allies are unlikely to simply give in to the rebels' anger,” he wrote in an analysis.

Not out of the woods

Until recently, it seemed that the Syrian president was almost out of the woods. He never really won the long civil war, and large parts of the country were still outside his control.

But after 13 years of conflict, it seemed that the worst was over and that the country was ready to forget. Once viewed as a regional entity, Assad saw the Arab countries draw closer to him again, renewing ties and restoring Syria's membership in the Arab League. Earlier this year, Italy also decided to reopen its embassy in Damascus after ten years of strained relations.

After one of the world's largest humanitarian crises, aid groups and international donors in Syria began to spend more money on reconstruction than on emergency aid, providing for the lives of Syrians and restoring basic services.

However, a surprise attack launched by the terrorists on November 27 started the war and caught everyone off guard with its scope and speed.

It has also left Syria's neighbors worried, wary that violence and refugees could spill over the borders and worried about the growing influence of Islamist groups, a major concern of many of Syria's Arab neighbors.

Geopolitical shifts

Analysts say a confluence of world events starting with Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, followed by the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza that began on Oct. 7, 2023, helped create an opportunity for Assad's opponents to attack.

As the rebels advanced this past week, the Syrian army appeared to be melting away, unable to resist, with many reports of defections. Russian troops attacked from time to time. The leader of Hezbollah in Lebanon said the group would continue to support Syria, but stopped short of sending troops again.

Yacoubian wrote:

“Its sudden explosion and the speed with which rebel groups were able to conquer Aleppo … reveals the power that lies beneath Syria and could turn a superficial calm into a major conflict.”

Aron Lund, a Syria expert at Century International, a New York-based think tank and a researcher at the Swedish Defense Research Agency, said what is happening in Syria is a disaster for Russia and Iran.

“They're also really surprised by what happened, and they have all kinds of resource problems,” including Russia's war in Ukraine and Hezbollah's losses in Lebanon and Syria.

Tired and broken

While the country's conflicts have been stagnant since 2020, Syria's economic problems have increased over the past few years.

The imposition of US sanctions, the banking crisis in neighboring Lebanon and last year's earthquake have contributed to almost all Syrians facing serious financial difficulties.

That has caused state institutions and wages to wither.

“If you can't pay your soldiers a living wage, maybe you can't expect them to stay and fight when thousands of Islamists attack” their cities, Lund said. “It's a tired, broken and dysfunctional government” to begin with.

Part of the insurgents' efforts to consolidate their power in Aleppo, a city they were driven out of in 2016 after a heavy military campaign, has been to call on government forces and security agencies to defect, giving them what they call “protection cards,” which offer a form of amnesty and assurances that they will not be hunted.

The spokesman for the terrorists, Hassan Abdul-Ghani, said that more than 1,600 soldiers applied for cards in two days in the city of Aleppo.

Hundreds of rebels lined up outside police stations in the city on Thursday to register their information with the rebels.

Hossam al-Bakr, 33, a native of Hama who worked in Damascus and defected to Aleppo four years ago, said he came to “fix his position” and get a new identity card.

The laminated card given to each victim was titled “rebellion card.” Show the name, ID number and service location of each item. Issued by “The General Command: Military Operations Room.”

On Thursday, Maj. Mohamed Ghoneim, who was in charge of registering the rebels, said that more than 1,000 soldiers or police came to register. Others who were carrying their guns surrendered, he added.

“There are thousands who want to apply,” he said.

Charles Lister, a long-time Syria expert, said that while most of the international community has dismissed the conflict as frozen or over, the armed opposition has never given up and has been training for this scenario for years.

A ragtag group of soldiers, beset by fighting and rivalries, have spent years preparing and planning, driven by a dream to regain control of territory from Assad.

“The state has been more vulnerable in the last year or two than it has been throughout this conflict,” Lister said. “And you've gotten used to the idea that if you can wait things out, you'll prove to be a winner.”

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Karam reported from London.