After decades of brutal dictatorship in Syria, the regime of Bashar al-Assad fell in a matter of days. WSJ’s Yaroslav Trofimov reports on the rebel leader Abu Mohammed al-Jawlani and how regional players are responding to political change in Syria. Further Listening: - What the Ceasefire in Lebanon Means for the Middle East - Ten Days That Shifted Power in Syria Further Reading: - The 11-Day Blitz by Syrian Rebels That Ended 50 Years of Assad Rule - Assad’s Downfall Marks a New Realignment in the Middle East - How a Syrian Rebel Went From an American Jail to Seizing Aleppo Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Chapter 1: What led to the fall of Assad's regime in Syria?
Yesterday, in Syria, after nearly 13 years of civil war, rebel forces took control of the capital, Damascus. For decades, the country had been under the dictatorship of the Assad family. Here's our chief foreign affairs correspondent, Yaroslav Trofimov.
Well, the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has collapsed in a matter of days, in a stunning collapse of a system that was built on murder, torture, brutality, and repression that had few parallels in the modern world. So really, this closes the chapter on some of the darkest periods in the history of the Middle East.
Footage showed Syrians celebrating in the streets, prisoners walking out of confinement, and residents standing on a toppled statue of Assad's father. At the same time, it remains unknown how the fall of Assad could reverberate across the Middle East and the world. What are the big questions you have today about the future of Syria?
Well, the question is obviously, what next? There are two ways it can end. It can either end in a relative peace with the rebels agreeing to basically cooperate and avoiding another round of civil war, or they could go at each other again and plunge the country into a new round of disaster.
Chapter 2: Who is Abu Mohammed al-Jawlani?
Welcome to The Journal, our show about money, business, and power. I'm Jessica Mendoza. It's Monday, December 9th. Coming up on the show, a historic moment for Syria and a realignment of power in the Middle East. The largest of the rebel groups that stormed the Syrian capital over the weekend is called Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, also known as HTS. The group's leader is Abu Muhammad al-Jolani.
When did you first encounter the name Abu Muhammad al-Jolani?
He became reasonably well-known about 10 years ago when he was leading an affiliate of al-Qaeda called the Nusra Front. As a young man in 2003, he boarded a bus from Damascus to Baghdad and became an insurgent against American forces in Iraq at the time. There he joined the nascent Islamic State.
Jolani later returned to his homeland, Syria, with the blessing of Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Jolani's mission was to establish ISIS there.
But then once in Syria, he broke with al-Baghdadi because he didn't share some of his murderous ideas, such as the need to slaughter all the Shiites. And so he decided to move to a slightly more moderate al-Qaeda. I see. OK. Then he traveled further and further along this road to moderation.
And in doing so, he rejected the basic principle of Al-Qaeda and Islamic State that, you know, the big fight is the fight for a global Islamic caliphate and against America in the West. So at the time, he made headlines by saying, look, our fight is in Syria, for Syria, and we don't care about America. America is not our enemy.
Got it. So just to make sure we have the timeline clear, he started out with Islamic State. He broke with them and then joined al-Qaeda. And then he broke with al-Qaeda as well. Correct. And the reason for that is because he just became increasingly moderate in his politics? Yes.
Well, he became more and more in his politics, but also the main reason is that he wanted to focus on Syria and fighting the Assad regime in Syria. He wasn't interested in al-Qaeda or the Islamic State's global ideology, the idea of conquering the West, blowing up civilian targets in European cities. That was not his fight.
During the civil war that started in 2011, Jolani's group fought against ISIS and al-Qaeda. But it's unclear if Jolani's turn to moderation is genuine, or if he's trying to appease other Syrians in the West as he pursues power. Jolani remains on a U.S. terrorist list, along with his organization, HTS. The militant leader has said his focus was Syria and fighting the Assad regime.
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Chapter 3: What strategies did the rebels use to gain control?
Even as it became clear that his forces were getting hollowed out, Assad stood firm. He announced he would give an address to the nation on Saturday. But it never happened.
What we know is that he left Damascus either late on Saturday evening, on the first early hours of Sunday morning, likely to a Russian military base, and then from then on to Russia itself. And we have heard from the Russian presidential spokesman that President Putin himself had authorized his asylum in Russia.
And now, Assad's fall has created a new power dynamic in the Middle East, with winners and losers. That's next.
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Over the weekend, a group of rebels appeared on Syrian state television.
In an address, they called for a newly liberated country. They said, quote, What happens to Syria now? Like, what indications do we have about how the rebels might govern?
The indications of them governing are positive so far. I mean, they named a moderate politician as a figurehead prime minister. So Javlani himself is not taking the reins of power. And the edicts they issued are, you know, maintain tolerance, do not force women to wear the hijab, head covering, respect minorities. But it's still very, very early days.
Can the alliance between the rebel groups hold now that Assad is gone?
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Chapter 4: Why was Assad unable to hold off the rebels?
Chapter 5: What role did Russia and Iran play in Assad's downfall?
Chapter 6: What does the future hold for Syria after Assad?
Well, the question is obviously, what next? There are two ways it can end. It can either end in a relative peace with the rebels agreeing to basically cooperate and avoiding another round of civil war, or they could go at each other again and plunge the country into a new round of disaster.
Welcome to The Journal, our show about money, business, and power. I'm Jessica Mendoza. It's Monday, December 9th. Coming up on the show, a historic moment for Syria and a realignment of power in the Middle East. The largest of the rebel groups that stormed the Syrian capital over the weekend is called Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, also known as HTS. The group's leader is Abu Muhammad al-Jolani.
When did you first encounter the name Abu Muhammad al-Jolani?
He became reasonably well-known about 10 years ago when he was leading an affiliate of al-Qaeda called the Nusra Front. As a young man in 2003, he boarded a bus from Damascus to Baghdad and became an insurgent against American forces in Iraq at the time. There he joined the nascent Islamic State.
Jolani later returned to his homeland, Syria, with the blessing of Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Jolani's mission was to establish ISIS there.
But then once in Syria, he broke with al-Baghdadi because he didn't share some of his murderous ideas, such as the need to slaughter all the Shiites. And so he decided to move to a slightly more moderate al-Qaeda. I see. OK. Then he traveled further and further along this road to moderation.
And in doing so, he rejected the basic principle of Al-Qaeda and Islamic State that, you know, the big fight is the fight for a global Islamic caliphate and against America in the West. So at the time, he made headlines by saying, look, our fight is in Syria, for Syria, and we don't care about America. America is not our enemy.
Got it. So just to make sure we have the timeline clear, he started out with Islamic State. He broke with them and then joined al-Qaeda. And then he broke with al-Qaeda as well. Correct. And the reason for that is because he just became increasingly moderate in his politics? Yes.
Well, he became more and more in his politics, but also the main reason is that he wanted to focus on Syria and fighting the Assad regime in Syria. He wasn't interested in al-Qaeda or the Islamic State's global ideology, the idea of conquering the West, blowing up civilian targets in European cities. That was not his fight.
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Chapter 7: Why did Assad's military collapse so quickly?
Will they allow attacks against Israel from Syria? So it's all one of these many questions. And one of the reasons why Israel in recent hours has expanded its occupation zone in the Golan Heights and has been launching airstrike after airstrike to basically take out all the heavy weapons that the Syrian rebels will inherit from the regime.
The U.S. says it will continue to support the Syrian people. The military keeps a force of around 900 troops in southeast Syria to defend against ISIS fighters. And on Sunday, President Biden launched airstrikes on ISIS targets in Syria. He said they were intended to ensure that ISIS does not take advantage of the power vacuum.
Chapter 8: What happened to Assad after the regime's collapse?
We will engage with all Syrian groups. including within the process led by the United Nations to establish a transition away from the Assad regime toward independent, sovereign, and independent, independent, I might say it again, sovereign Syria with a new constitution, a new government that serves all Syrians. And this process will be determined by the Syrian people themselves.
Over the weekend, President-elect Trump posted on social media, quote, this is not our fight. Let it play out. Do not get involved. And so in broad terms, how does the fall of Assad change the map of power globally?
Well, globally, we're seeing that the axis of Russia-Iran that is also allied with China and North Korea has suffered a setback. It shows that this axis is not always winning and it can be defeated.
So what are the best and the worst case scenarios for Syria going forward?
I think, well, the best case scenario, there's liberal democracy in Syria, but it's also not a very realistic scenario at this stage.
I think the more realistic scenario to which a lot of Syria's neighbors and Western countries aspire is a peaceful Syria that will have an Islamist-led but more or less tolerant authoritarian regime along the lines of many other such regimes in the Middle East that will be at peace and that will allow the millions of Syrian refugees to come back from Europe and Turkey and other countries and that will not be embroiled in wars with its neighbors such as Israel.
And the worst case scenario?
Well, the worst case scenario is a renewed civil war and the return of the most violent and extremist movements we have seen in the region. A new incarnation of Islamic State, which is still lurking in parts of the Syrian desert. And Syria's return to being an epicenter of global terrorism.
What about for average Syrians? What does this change in power mean for the people in Syria who've seen years of war and oppression?
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