President Donald Trump recently embarked on a short “Middle East Tour” this past week, engaging in several high profile diplomatic engagements with Middle Eastern leaders and economic figures. Trump met with the crown-prince of Saudi Arabia, the Emir of Qatar, and most importantly the interim President of the new Syrian Transitional Government, Ahmed Al-Sharaa. This meeting was especially notable because Al-Sharaa led HTS (Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham) in their recent overthrow of the former Syrian Dictator Bashar Al-Assad. Assad’s government, which had been locked in a devastating civil war with dozens of movements since the Arab Spring in 2011, was overthrown in a short month-long offensive spearheaded by HTS in cooperation with the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army and the Southern Operations Room, which led to Assad fleeing the country on December 8th, 2024. 

Donald Trump meets with Ahmed al-Sharaa, the first meeting of a US President with his Syrian counterpart in over 25 years. (Bandar Al-Jaloud/Saudi Royal Court/Handout/Anadolu via Getty Images)

Al-Sharaa has been struggling since his official appointment as interim president to secure international support for his new government, and is also going through a complicated process to disarm local militias, prevent sectarian violence against Syrian minorities, and to unify the latest Syrian government with the unrecognized Kurdish-led government, known as the Peshmerga, in the Northeast of the country. Peshmerga forces had effectively created their own government after the rise of ISIS in the mid-2010s, and are backed by the United States. However, US support for the Kurds has started to decline over time, and Turkey has also taken advantage of this decline to seize control of Kurdish territory in the north of the country. Turkey also backed their own local militia force, the Syrian National Army, which was (and in some cases still is) at war with the Peshmerga since the late 2010s.

After the capture of Damascus and the creation of the new Syrian government, the SNA, HTS, and SOR unified into the new Syrian Arab Republic and the Syrian Arab Army. However, questions have arisen concerning the background of Interim President Al-Sharaa. Al-Sharaa used to lead an ISIS cell, which later split off from the leading ISIS group to become HTS in the late 2010s. Al-Sharaa also had a $10 million bounty for his capture, paid for by the US Department of State. Al-Sharaa has been accused of perpetrating ethnic violence against both Druze and Alawite Syrians using the new SAA, most prominently by Israel.

Israel has been heavily involved in the Syrian Civil War due to concerns about Assad’s government launching chemical attacks on Israel. After the fall of Assad, Israel used the opportunity to seize a “new zone of control” past the 1970s era Purple Line in the disputed Golan Heights region, just south of the Syrian capital. Israel accused the new Syrian government of perpetrating ethnic cleansing against the Druze, a religious minority that is located in Southern Syria and the Golan Heights. Israel began striking Assad-era military infrastructure, and also launched attacks on the new Syrian army, demanding that they withdraw from Druze areas. In response, the Syrian government withdrew non-local and non-Druze security forces from areas South of Damascus, and replaced them with specifically local and Druze security forces.