He will likely never have a sweeter moment in his life. Here was the victorious conqueror in one of the greatest temples in the lands of Islam, on ground once trod by Caliphs like Muawiya and Sultans like Saladin. Abu Muhammad Al-Joulani – real name Ahmed Al-Shar'a – spoke on December 8 at the glorious eighth-century Umayyad Mosque in Damascus in humble gratitude to God at the fall of the tyrant Assad and the restoration of Sunni Muslim rule to Syria after almost 60 years. Syria was ruled since 1966 by Alawite strongmen, first Salah Jadid, and then the Assads, father and son.
Al-Joulani at the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus
These Alawite rulers were able to come to power through the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party and especially through the Syrian Army. A hundred years ago, when France had a League of Nations Mandate over Syria, they began to build a colonial army. They favored "the martial races," better fighters and more loyal than the Sunni Arab Muslim majority. In Syria, that meant the Druze and the even more populous Alawites, a syncretic amalgam of paganism, Shi'ism and Christianity, traditionally a despised heretical underclass. When Syria became independent in 1946, the army was still filled with Alawites and would essentially remain so until December 2024. Syria needs a new army that reflects both the country's Sunni majority and its diversity.
Although Ahmed Al-Shar'a was the key architect of the fall of Assad, he and his organization were not the only ones to bring it about. They provided the spark and the startling string of initial victories, but in the end, others rose up in the Syrian south and east to help finish the wounded beast off. Al-Shar'a is the most powerful, most important of these victors but he and they now face a daunting task. So far, he has handled the military offensive and the political transition extremely well, but now the difficult work begins.
The greatest fear is not so much that Syria will now be an Islamic state but that it will be a failed one (it already had many of the characteristics of one under Assad), not tyrannical but chaotic. The danger is as much or more that anarchy will prevail rather than Shari'a Law will.
The country is bankrupt and broken, most Syrians now live in deep poverty and Assad likely stole whatever was left. Even though Assad was defeated by Syrians alone, part of the country is still controlled by Turkey through a gang of failed revolutionaries-turned-mercenaries whose main goal is to fight and kill Syrian Kurds. Turkey would like to control the future of the new regime in Damascus and at some point soon, Al-Shar'a and company will have to knuckle under to Erdoğan or find a way of breaking with him. Syria's Kurds at least are pragmatic and will be looking to secure some sort of arrangement with the powers that be that preserves a certain measure of local autonomy. Too much autonomy will anger Ankara, not enough autonomy will keep the country divided.
Al-Shar'a, his Hay'at Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS) organization, and many of their allies are hardcore Islamists, the closest comparison being not ISIS and Al-Qaeda, but the Taliban and Hamas, political projects that were both Islamist and nationalist. But Syria is much more diverse than either Gaza or Afghanistan. The so-called Syrian Revolution had both Islamist and more nationalist, secular-leaning faces. Al-Shar'a has to deal with not only the Kurds, but also the formerly favored Alawites (ten percent of the population), Druze (concentrated in Southern Syria near the border with Israel), Christians (internally insignificant with 80-90% of their population departed since 2012 but significant on the world stage), with tribal elements, with hardcore Jihadists of the Islamic State still in the wilderness, and with possible subversion internally and from abroad by Assad regime remnants much like that carried out by Izzat Ibrahim Al-Douri in Iraq after Saddam Hussein fell.
Syrian political prisoner, former air force officer, freed after 43 years
In the first flush of victory, things seem easier, anything seems possible. It is impossible not to be moved at videos of political prisoners (Syrian, Lebanese, and Palestinian) liberated after 30, 40 years of brutal Assad regime imprisonment. Al-Shar'a and company can be both Islamist and seemingly tolerant for a while. But what happens if the situation, the precarious living conditions of ordinary citizens, continues to deteriorate? Other established Islamist regimes in the past – the Taliban, Hamas, Al-Bashir in Sudan – have resorted almost invariably to internal repression and/or military adventures that ended disastrously. The temptation for Syria to do the same, to crush dissent and interfere with its neighbors, will be great.
Al-Shar'a will be remarkable indeed if he avoids the trap – assuming that he wants to – of using power responsibly. I am not talking about the chimera of Western-style liberal democracy, that is not in the cards and anyone who thinks that it is is dreaming. The best-case scenario for Al-Shar'a and Syria's new rulers is something like HTS-ruled Idlib – clearly Islamist, clearly but not immoderately authoritarian, but with a real focus on good governance. Syria will need both order and security, something that it really did not have under Assad's chaotic, criminal regime.
Expect the new Syria to still be anti-Israel but how it is will greatly matter. Having political objections to the Zionist state is one thing. Al-Shar'a has admitted that he was deeply influenced as a teenager by the plight of the Palestinians. But Syria becoming, as it was under Assad, a safe haven and breeding ground for terrorist attacks against any of its neighbors, including Israel, would be extraordinarily unwise given the country's parlous state.
The incoming Trump Administration has – wisely in my opinion – signaled a cautious, wait-and-see attitude toward the Syrian debacle. This is a crisis created by Iran, Russia, and Hezbollah (all now weakened as a result of Assad's fall) with an assist from the feckless Obama and Biden Administrations. But Arab regimes do not have the same luxury of standing by. They will have to overcome their dislike for Al-Shar'a's ambiguous type of Islamism and find ways to engage and support the Syrian people rather than leaving them to the tender mercies of Turkey and Qatar. The fact that Syrians are often talented and well-educated people who have flourished outside their country is a positive element. Certainly, the Syrian people are in desperate, urgent need of humanitarian help. The bill for reconstruction and development will be massive.
Al-Shar'a's initial Jihadist organization in Syria – the Nusra Front – had a media outlet, the Manara Al-Bayda ("White Minaret") Foundation. That white minaret is one of the towers gracing the same Umayyad Mosque in Damascus where Al-Shar'a just spoke. It is associated with Islamic apocalyptic literature and the end of all things. Syria's putative new rulers are going to have to worry much more about the dire, volatile situation they face before them rather than how the world ends. Making sure the world does not end them will have to be the first priority.
*Alberto M. Fernandez is Vice President of MEMRI. He served in Syria at the US Embassy in Damascus from 1993 to 1996.
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