Bringing Syria into the fold

Asia Times Online
October 31, 2006

By Jim Lobe

WASHINGTON – While US President George W Bush appeared last week to
reject suggestions that Washington directly engage the government of
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, pressure for the United States to
work out some accommodation with Damascus is rising both at home and
abroad.

While never officially designated part of the "axis of evil" with
Iran, Iraq and North Korea, Syria has received the same "silent
treatment" as Washington has given its two surviving members, Iran and
North Korea, since the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister
Rafik Hariri in February 2005, allegedly by Syrian agents.

But Syria’s geostrategic relevance, particularly in the wake of last
summer’s war between Israel and Hezbollah and growing popular
sentiment for withdrawing the more than 140,000 US troops bogged down
in Iraq, is making it increasingly difficult to reject appeals for a
new diplomatic tack.

"In all of the major challenges we have in the Middle East – Iraq, the
Arab-Israeli conflict, the role of Hezbollah and Hamas, Iran – things
are more complicated without Syria’s cooperation," Edward Djerejian,
who served as US ambassador to Damascus under presidents Ronald Reagan
and George H W Bush, recently told the National Journal.

That reasoning is being made by Republican "realists" such as
Djerejian, who currently heads the James A Baker III Institute for
Public Policy in Houston, and Senate Foreign Relations Committee
chairman Richard Lugar, as well as some of Washington’s closest
European allies, notably Britain.

A number of prominent Israelis, including even cabinet-level members
of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s government, who believe that Assad’s
recent appeals via Germany’s Der Spiegel magazine and the British
Broadcasting Corp, as well as other media, for a peace agreement with
the Jewish state should be tested, have also called for Washington to
engage Assad, if for no other reason than to try to pry Damascus loose
from its alliance with Iran and Hezbollah.

"Assad is very keen to get the Golan [Heights] back [from Israel], but
he is even more keen to engage the United States," David Kimche, a
former head of Israel’s Foreign Ministry and president of the Israel
Council on Foreign Relations, said at a recent dinner in Washington
sponsored by the New America Foundation.

"It is in America’s interest to wean away Syria from Iran’s embrace,
[a move that] would also be appreciated by moderate Arabs" in the
region, he said, adding that renewed engagement between Washington and
Damascus could also facilitate the resumption of talks between
Israelis and Palestinians.

The fact that the White House cleared a meeting last month between
former secretary of state James Baker, who heads the congressionally
appointed task force the Iraq Study Group, and Syrian Foreign Minister
Walid Muallem in New York has added to speculation that Bush may prove
more flexible than he has been to date, especially after next month’s
mid-term elections.

Nonetheless, asked at a press conference last Wednesday about his
willingness to "work with" Syria, as well as Iran, if it would improve
the situation in Iraq, Bush echoed his administration’s customary
mantra that both countries "understand full well" what they have to do
to get back in Washington’s good graces.

"Our message to Syria is consistent," he said. "Do not undermine the
[Prime Minister Hanna] Siniora government [in Lebanon] … help Israel
get back the prisoner that was captured by Hamas; don’t allow Hamas
and Hezbollah to plot attacks against democracies in the Middle East;
help inside of Iraq. They know our position," he declared, suggesting
that all of these were preconditions for the kind of engagement that
the critics have been urging.

Behind Bush’s latest statement, however, lies a familiar divide within
his administration. From the first days of the Israeli-Hezbollah
conflict last summer, the State Department was urging the White House
to engage Damascus, particularly after Olmert reportedly asked
Washington to enlist Syria in an effort to secure the release of the
two Israeli soldiers captured by Hezbollah.

But hawks centered in the National Security Council, particularly
assistant secretary of state Elliot Abrams, and Vice President Dick
Cheney’s office, notably his national security adviser, John Hannah,
and Middle East specialist David Wurmser successfully opposed such a
move, and Olmert’s request was rejected.

Two months later, when an attack, apparently by Islamist militants, on
the US Embassy in Damascus was repelled by Syrian security forces, the
State Department’s Near East Bureau again reportedly pushed for some
kind of opening to the regime, only to be checked by the hawks, most
of whom have long favored a policy of regime change in Syria.

In their view, Assad is not only insincere in his recent appeals for a
peace settlement with Israel, but his hold on power is weak and
growing weaker. That weakness has made him so reliant on Iran that
Damascus has in effect become a client regime of Tehran and should be
treated accordingly.

Moreover, according to this view, engaging the regime would not only
provide it with a form of legitimacy it doesn’t deserve, but would
also undermine the moderate opposition in Syria and, even worse,
discourage pro-Western forces in Lebanon, which would see it as a
first step toward the re-establishment of Syrian hegemony over their
country.

But these arguments appear to have been losing ground – at least in
the public debate – in recent weeks as the situation in Iraq has
deteriorated and demands, particularly among Republicans, for a
"course correction" both there and in the region as a whole have
mushroomed.

In the first place, Assad’s hold on power is seen as much more secure
than the hawks have suggested. "It’s pretty clear to me that the
regime is not on its last legs," said Dennis Ross, Washington’s top
Middle East peace envoy under former presidents George H W Bush and
Bill Clinton and currently counselor to the Washington Institute for
Near East Policy, a think-tank that has generally been hawkish on
Syria.

Moreover, a growing number of experts believe that Syria’s
relationship with Iran is tactical rather than strategic and hence
much weaker than the hawks believe. In the view of these experts, to
the extent that the Bush administration now sees Iran as the greatest
threat to US influence in the region, it should be willing to offer
all kinds of carrots to begin prying Damascus from Tehran’s influence.

"The United States should convey its interest in a broader strategic
dialogue [with] Assad, with the aim of re-establishing US-Syrian
cooperation on important regional issues and with the promise of
significant strategic benefits for Syria clearly on the table," said
Flynt Leverett, who served as the National Security Council’s top
Middle East expert under Clinton and for the first two years of the
current administration.

"I remain absolutely convinced that Bashar wants to realign towards
the US," he noted recently.

(Inter Press Service)

t/HJ31Ak03.html