My Word: War here, there, and everywhere

At the start of the Arab Spring, a senior IDF officer on the northern front gave an interview in which he said he missed the days when he could look out over the Syrian side of the Golan Heights through his binoculars and be reasonably sure that the view wouldn’t have changed the next day.

That was a time when too many people looked through rose-colored glasses rather than binoculars. Even the name “the Arab Spring” carried a hint of optimism, a fresh start, and growth. So much for that. Instead of roses, the world got thorns and a ton of manure.

I was not shocked. My instinct is to look at the alternatives. In Egypt, for example, it was clear that only the Muslim Brotherhood was organized enough and had sufficient support to overthrow president Hosni Mubarak.

The Arab Spring started with the self-immolation of Tunisian street vendor Mohamed Bouazizi in December 2010. He lit a fire that spread out of control across the Middle East and beyond.

Fanning the flames, or at least exploiting the smoke screen, was Iran. The Islamic Republic was happy to extend its influence anywhere it could by widening cracks in a regime or society until there was room for it to step in. Iran quietly and patiently extended its octopus tentacles of terrorism from Tehran to Bahrain, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Yemen, Sudan, and elsewhere.

I have often thought of that officer and his binoculars. Toward the end of Barack Obama’s presidential term, his secretary of state John Kerry made a desperate bid to create an Oslo Accord-style agreement between Israel and the Palestinians. The “peacemaking” was accompanied by increasing Palestinian terrorism (a pattern we had seen from Oslo on), and by the summer of 2014 it had blown into an intense and harrowing full conflict – Operation Protective Edge.

What Kerry was missing while shuttling between Ramallah and Jerusalem was the rise of ISIS, which quickly took over vast areas of Iraq and Syria.

This week, the view through the binoculars changed yet again. A fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah was drawn up last Wednesday. Theoretically, the agreement is between Israel and Lebanon, which somehow was not held accountable for the thousands of rockets and drones launched on Israel from its territory since October 8, 2023, but is now expected to implement the ceasefire terms. 

Unsurprisingly, Hezbollah has since launched more rockets, testing its limits. Nor did the rocket launched on Sunday by Iranian-backed Houthis in Yemen come completely out of the blue, and it is likely that Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and other terrorist organizations will continue sporadic attacks.

World caught off guard by news that Aleppo has fallen 

But while the world was again fixating on Israel, it was caught off guard by the news that Aleppo had fallen, and Syrian President Bashar Assad’s regime might be toppled. Assad had survived the Arab Spring and consequent civil war by the skin of his fang-like teeth, with more than a little help from his friends: Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Russia’s President Vladimir Putin.

Nonetheless, the world has changed. Many commentators note that Putin’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 did not result in the quick, easy victory he anticipated, and he is still bogged down there as 2024 draws to a close. Similarly, Iran has been orchestrating the war against Israel with its proxies, but Israel fought back and decimated the Hezbollah leadership and terrorist forces.

Hezbollah is now not as able to come to Assad’s aid. And, in response to Iran’s direct rocket attacks on Israel, Israel also knocked out many Iranian weapon production facilities, reducing its abilities to help the endangered Syrian tyrant. The binoculars should be monitoring the moves of Iranian-backed Iraqi militias.

Incidentally, after the stunning success of Israel’s pager and walkie-talkie attacks on Hezbollah, as well as the elimination of its top cadre in targeted attacks based on extraordinary feats of intelligence, when the action series Fauda and Tehran return to Israeli TV screens later this month, I’m not sure what plot twists will be ruled out as completely implausible.

The current situation demonstrates that what we are seeing goes way beyond the Middle East. This is a global conflict with Iran, Russia, China (and to a certain extent North Korea) creating one expansionist axis. Follow the money, the advisers, and the flow of weapons.

THE “REBELS” who now control Aleppo and Idlib, and threaten other parts of Assad’s Syria, are not nice guys. They are dominated by the Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) movement, a mutation of Jabhat al-Nusra, which itself evolved from al-Qaeda. As Sunni extremists, they have the support of Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Turkey – absurdly a NATO member – and as a result, the first victims have been the Kurdish population in Syria.

The Kurds, unlike the Palestinians, have their own language, culture, and history, and – as long as they reject terrorism – I would be happy to see them finally rewarded independence. But this Sunni community has never mustered anything like the support the Palestinians have managed. I suspect it’s because the Palestinians continue ancient blood libels against the Jews and the Jewish state and have made replacing Israel their rallying cry: “From the river to the sea.”

A cartoon by Uri Fink in Maariv on Tuesday underscores the hypocrisy. It shows a Western-looking protester carrying a Syrian flag and placards in English reading: “Queers for Syria”; “Stop the Syria Genocide”; and “Boycott the Assad Regime.” The speech bubble of the lone demonstrator asks: “Where is everyone?”

It is the height of political cynicism to let the Kurds risk their lives to beat back ISIS but not back it when threatened by its successors. In October 2019, I participated in a small solidarity rally in Jerusalem, where the message was a plea to the world to stop the massacre of Kurds and Christians following the decision by then-US president Donald Trump to pull forces out of northeastern Syria. This was perceived by Turkish President Erdogan as the go-ahead to carry out a campaign of ethnic cleansing.

The world is now holding its breath to see what will happen when Trump returns to the White House. His term as the 45th president of the United States concluded with the Abraham Accords between Israel and four Arab countries, but they are not guarantees of future successes.

Some of Trump’s achievements were based on his unpredictability. When Obama warned Assad that a chemical attack on his own citizens was a red line, Assad skipped across it and suffered no consequences. When President Joe Biden issued a resounding “Don’t” in the direction of Iran after October 7, the Iranian regime heard an empty echo. 

This week, Trump warned Hamas that if the hostages being held in Gaza are not released by his inauguration on January 20, there would be “all hell to pay.” 

When Trump says “No,” it might give pause for thought; but if tested and found not willing to follow through, the results could be disastrous.

The events in Syria currently present more of a dilemma than a danger to Israel, but that doesn’t mean the threats will remain distant and theoretical. When HTS declared it is not interested in attacking Israel, its word should be treated with all the respect due to any jihadist organization. Remember the Taliban promising that its return to power in Afghanistan did not signify the end of women’s rights there? And the thought of the Islamist fighters in Syria getting their hands on the stockpiles of chemical and conventional weapons presents nightmare scenarios, not just for Israel.

A member of the Alawite minority, Assad is teetering much like his statues in rebel-controlled areas. He could be toppled or resurrected. He was eulogized several times during the devastating civil war and survived.

As Seth Mandel wrote in Commentary, “... the renewed rebellion can be Assad and Iran’s just deserts without being cause for bandwagoning. We don’t always have a dog in every fight.

“But it does demonstrate the Jenga tower created by Iran’s regional adventurism. The more power Tehran took from Gaza, parts of the West Bank, South Lebanon, and Syria, the more precarious the whole construct became...

“All these states and statelets have been attempting to bring ruination to Israel’s sovereignty at the price of their own.”

Before supporting one side or the other, Assad or the Islamists, it’s wise to consider the alternatives. Whether it’s the devil you know or the devil you don’t, it’s still the devil.