https://www.jacobinmag.com/2015/12/achchar-arab-spring-tunisia-egypt-isis-isil-assad-syria-revolution/
Self-styled "anti-imperialism"
"If the Syrian regime did not conclude a peace treaty with Israel, the truth is that it was not for lack of want on the Syrian side, but for lack of want on the Israeli side. There have been actually several rounds of negotiations between the two states. Before 2011, the Turkish then-Prime Minister Erdogan was mediating between his then-good friend Bashar El-Assad and Israel."
Regime's double game with jihadis
"If Islamic fundamentalist forces managed to become dominant among the organized forces in those uprisings, with no exception, it is surely due, on the one hand, to the practical and/or political weakness of the Left, but, on the other hand, it is also and above all a product of decades of rule by the despotic regimes. No one should miss that. The Syrian regime was not a shield against Islamic fundamentalism, nor were Mubarak or Ben Ali, and nor are Assad and Sisi today."
"as has been documented in many articles and books, the regime released from its jails the jihadists that it had been detaining after having used them in Iraq. This release of those jihadists was a purely Machiavellian trick by the regime, in order to accomplish the self-fulfilling prophecy that it propagated from day one in claiming that the uprising was but a jihadist conspiracy. The regime did everything to create the conditions for Islamic fundamentalism to grow in Syria so as to alter the character of the uprising.
At the same time, it relied increasingly for its defense on Iran’s regional proxies from Lebanon and Iraq, which are certainly no less Islamic fundamentalist than the majority of Syrian Islamic anti-Assad forces. Those who claim that the Syrian regime is “secular” completely overlook this obvious fact which flies in the face of their assertion."
ISIS is Assad's friendly opposition
"The truth is that ISIS is the Assad regime’s “preferred enemy,” because they are so repulsive for the West that they are the regime’s best argument in trying to seduce Western powers into changing their attitude toward it. You can see now very clearly how the Syrian regime is trying its best, with Russia’s help, to seduce the West into supporting it in the name of the fight against ISIS."
How to defeat Al-qaeda and ISIS
"The only possible way to get rid of ISIS and Al-Qaeda is by removing the causes that lead people to join these groups. When the United States tried to crush Al-Qaeda by sheer force during the battle and massacre of Fallujah in Iraq, it failed miserably. It is only when it changed strategy and empowered the Arab Sunni tribes through funds and arms that it managed to marginalize Al-Qaeda.
Al Qaeda-turned-ISIS managed later to recover control over large parts of Iraq in the summer of 2014, because the Iran-backed sectarian government of Nouri Al-Maliki recreated the conditions of Iraqi Arab Sunni resentment that allowed Al-Qaeda to develop under US occupation initially. This is why most of Iraq’s Arab Sunnis paradoxically dreaded the US evacuation of Iraq in 2011. By an irony of history, they had come to see US troops as a protection against the Shia sectarian government of Maliki.
In Syria, the conditions for Arab Sunni sectarian resentment must be removed in order to end the sectarian appeal of Al-Nusra, ISIS, and other fundamentalists. The first condition for doing that is the removal of the Assad clan from power, as they are resented by a major part of the Syrian society."
American inaction
"When it came to Syria, Washington never seriously contemplated a direct military intervention. At one point in 2013, Obama got entangled in his own “red line” on the issue of chemical weapons, and was much relieved by the compromise with Assad that Russia offered him. Overall, the situation is far more complex than the simplistic “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” logic that informs much of the knee-jerk “anti-imperialist” left."
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