Jubilation and trepidation as Assad falls in Syria

There is jubilation in much of Syria now that the government of Bashar - Al-Assad is overthrown. Hundreds of thousands are joining celebrations in cities acoss the country. This isn't surprising. He was a deeply unpopular dictator who killed tens of thousands of people and disappeared many tens of thousands more in his torture prisons. 

 

Watching the scenes from the prison breaks, particularly the notorious Sadnaya prison, gives a sense of the nature of the Syrian state under Assad. Many of the prisoners are women and we even see children as young as 2 years old being liberated. According to Amnesty International the regime executed 13,000 people between 2011 and 2015 at the prison.

 

Assad routinely worked with the US and other NATO countries during the war on terror - including torturing Canadian Maher Arar. At least 700 of the prisoners that have just been released are Palestinian - including many resistance fighters. 

 

He also oversaw a vicious neoliberal attack on the country's infrastructure while hoarding billions for himself. He was no anti-imperialist and no friend of working people. 

 

The rapid collapse of the government is testament to the lack of popular support. Soldiers abandoned their posts with little fight.

 

Any socialist should support the fall of a dictator. The people who are arguing that this was just imperial interference are wrong. It was a state on the verge of collapse for many years.

 

As has been the case since the initial uprising against the Assad government in 2011, there are 'campist' positions that confuse the situation and lead to really bad political takes from different groups. 

 

On the one hand you have the line that wholeheartedly supports Assad and believes any action against him is orchestrated by the US and Israel - denying any agency for the Syrian people. On the other there are those who uncritically support the opposition and are purblind to the contradictions, complexities and context of the current state of the resistance. 

 

Our position is based on the bedrock of socialism from below. We recognize the imperial and regional powers are doing all they can to manipulate the situation to their advantage - it would be shocking if they weren't - but the distortions that creates does not negate the genuine desire by Syrians for a liberation from a brutal regime. This sometimes means we will get into disagreements from both sides. 

 

Axis of resistance?

 

Assad is held up as a beacon in the fight against Israel but without any real evidence. Yes, he allowed weapons to be shipped to Palestinian resistance groups but he did so to maintain power which involved deals with Iran, certain Iraqi factions and with Hezbollah, who all supported the regime. There is, as yet, no indication from any of the groups that have taken Damascus that this will change. We simply don't know yet. 

 

And Palestinian resistance groups are applauding the overthrow. Hamas released a statement that read “The Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, congratulates the brotherly Syrian people on their success in achieving their aspirations for freedom and justice. We call on all components of the Syrian people to unite, enhance national cohesion, and rise above the pains of the past.”

 

But the Israeli state is concerned. Assad was a known commodity but this new leadership in Damascus is a wild card. Israel is currently moving more equipment to the Golan Heights to thwart any potential attack and has started moving into the country to build a ‘buffer zone’ to protect Israel’s borders.

 

Differences from 2011

 

But at the same time we need to be clear that the groups that won on the battlefield this time - chiefly the Turkish supported Hayat Tahrir al Sham (HTS) - bear little resemblance to the mass popular mobilization that occurred during the Arab spring in 2011. The leaders were part of Al-Qaeda until 2016. They may have “moderated” their positions on many fronts but that was mainly to gain a semblance of a base in Syria. We should expect their commitment to real democracy to be shallow.

 

And different groups operating within the borders of the state are backed by various local and imperial powers who are more interested in using the political vacuum that has been created to gain an advantage.

 

Turkey, as a sub-imperial power in the region, has multiple motivations: controlling Kurdish forces in northern Syria, sending Syrian refugees back, and being a strong party in the reconstruction of the new regime with an expanded economic power. The new political authority will also diminish Turkey's dependency on Russia against the Kurdish forces.

 

Turkey might also seek a new Syria with territorial integrity without giving autonomy to Kurds or anything that would resemble that. However, like all the powers, they don't know what this new episode will generate - a renewed mass mobilization or restoration of capitalism from above. 

 

There are of course, US backed and Russian backed groups and bases in the north and east of the country that will try and vie for expansion at the expense of the new Syrian state in whatever form it takes. There will be a push towards a sectarian conflict by countries like Saudi Arabia and Israel is looking for advantage to expand into the areas south of Damascus to expand the zionist state. 

 

But there is reason for optimism and comrades in Syria are hoping this opens space for more political activity. The release of tens of thousands of opposition activists could be decisive in the next weeks. Syrian refugees are returning to the country en masse and they have high expectations about what the new Syria could look like.

 

We know that what happened in Syria this week has two dimensions.  A leadership which pretends to carry the soul of the uprising 13 years ago although it merely uses its historical legitimacy. People in the street, on the other hand, are real and their memory matters more to us than the Turkish backed forces. 

 

As yet, we simply don't know what the future will bring in Syria but as our comrades in Egypt write in a statement:

 

"This fall will only be a victory by rebuilding the popular movement that challenged the Syrian regime in the 2011 revolution. A mass movement that transcends sectarianism, participated by all of the Syrian people."

 

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Suggested readings:

 

What does the fall of Assad’s bloody regime mean? Interview with Syrian socialist

“There’s joy because no more do we have this Assad regime—that authoritarian, bloody, dictatorship. But, alongside this joy, we have some fears because the agent of change is not the one we want it to be. There is so much fear because of HTS and what it is.”

https://socialistworker.co.uk/international/what-does-the-fall-of-assad-regime-mean-interview-with-syrian-socialist/

 

The dynamics of the Assad regime’s downfall

Anne Alexander looks at how the Syrian Revolution of 2011 and its defeat shaped the toppling of Bashar al-Assad

https://socialistworker.co.uk/features/the-dynamics-of-the-assad-regimes-downfall/

 

For background on the uprising in 2011 and the militarisation of the struggle.

 

Interview: Lessons of the Syrian Revolution

“Syria makes for a very particular case study in that virtually all the imperialist and regional powers are in action in the same territory.”

https://isj.org.uk/interview-lessons-of-the-syrian-revolution/

 

Nationalism, resistance and revolution

Simon Assaf: Bassem Chit's article (2015), Nationalism, resistance and Revolution, is useful for navigating some of the issues raised by the collapse of the Syrian regime.

https://isj.org.uk/nationalism-resistance-and-revolution/