Background to the protests

Syrians have long struggled with many of the same challenges that have bred deep dissatisfaction in other Arab autocracies, including high unemployment, high inflation, limited upward mobility, rampant corruption, lack of political freedoms, and repressive security forces. These factors have fueled opposition to Syria’s authoritarian government, which has been dominated by the Baath (Renaissance) Party since 1963, and the Al Asad family since 1970. President Bashar al Asad’s father—Hafiz al Asad—ruled the country from 1970 until his death in 2000.

The Syrian population, like those of several other Middle East countries, includes different ethnic and religious groups. Under the Asad regime strict political controls have prevented these differences from playing a divisive role in political or social life. A majority of Syrians, approximately 90% of the population, are ethnic Arabs; however, the country contains small ethnic minorities, notably Kurds. Of more importance in Syria are religious sectarian differences. In addition to the majority Sunni Muslims, who comprise over 70% of the population, Syria contains several religious sectarian minorities, including three smaller Muslim sects (Alawites, Druze, and Ismailis) and several Christian denominations. 

Despite the secular nature of the ruling Baath party, religious sects have been important to some Syrians as symbols of group identity and determinants of political orientation. The Asad family are members of the minority Alawite sect (estimated about 12% of the population), which has its roots in Shiite Islam. The government violently suppressed an armed uprising led by the Muslim Brotherhood in the early 1980s, killing thousands from the majority Sunni Muslim community.

Within ethnic and sectarian communities are important tribal and familial groupings that often provide the underpinning for political alliances and commercial relationships. Socioeconomic differences abound among farmers, laborers, middle-class wage earners, public sector employees, military officials, and the political and commercial elite. Finally, local attachments shape Syrian society, as seen in rivalries between Syria’s two largest cities of Damascus and Aleppo, in differences between rural agricultural communities and urban areas, and in the concentration of some sectarian and ethnic communities in discrete areas. Despite being authoritarian, Syrian leaders have often found it necessary to adopt policies that accommodate, to some degree, various power centers within the country’s diverse population and minimize the potential for communal identities to create conflict.

Since taking office in 2000, President Asad has offered and retracted the prospect of limited political reform, while aligning his government with Iran and non-state actors such as Hamas and Hezbollah in a complex rivalry with the United States and its Arab and non-Arab allies (including Israel). As unrest emerged in other Arab countries in early 2011, Asad and many observers mistakenly believed that Syria’s pervasive police state and the population’s fear of sectarian violence would serve as a bulwark against the outbreak of turmoil. Limited calls in February 2011 to organize reform protests failed, but the government’s torture of children involved in an isolated incident in the southern town of Dara’a in March provided a decisive spark for the emergence of demonstrations. The use of force against demonstrators in Dara’a and later in other cities created a corresponding swell in public anger and public participation in protests. The government organized large counterdemonstrations.

The Sunni Muslim majority has been at the forefront of the protest movement and armed opposition to the Alawite-led regime, with Syria’s Christians and other minority groups caught between their parallel fears of violent change and of being associated with Asad’s crackdown. Economic class dynamics also are influencing the choices of Syrians about the uprising: many rural, less advantaged Syrians have supported the opposition movement, while urban, wealthier Syrians appear to have more divided loyalties.

Sectarian considerations cannot fully explain power relationships in Syria or the dynamics of the conflict. The Alawite leadership of the Syrian government and its allies in other sects perceive the mostly Sunni Arab uprising as an existential threat to the Baath party’s nearly five-decade hold on power. At the popular level, some Alawites may see their community’s fate as tied to that of the current government. Some Sunni Arabs may view the conflict as a means to assert their community’s dominance over others. Some Kurds may view the conflict as an opportunity to achieve greater autonomy. And, some Christians and other minorities may fear that their place in a future Syria is not guaranteed.[1]

Key Issues

1) The situation of human rights in the Syrian Arab Republic. According to the report of the independent international commission of inquiry on the Syrian Arab Republic[2], the situation is getting worse since 15 February 2012. Armed violence increased in intensity and spread to new areas. Government forces and the Shabbiha had committed the crimes against humanity of murder and of torture, war crimes and gross violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law, including unlawful killing, torture, arbitrary arrest and detention, sexual violence, indiscriminate attack, pillaging and destruction of property was found. Government forces and Shabbiha members were responsible for the killings in Al-Houla. War crimes, including murder, extrajudicial execution and torture, had been perpetrated by organized anti-Government armed groups.

2) The costs of conflict are not completely determined. The Strategic Research and Communication Centre, a research organization on Syria, reports that as of August 13, 2012, more than 25,000 Syrians had been killed since the revolt began in March 2011. The United Kingdom-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported on August 10 that at least 22,242 people have been killed since March 2011, including 15,578 civilians, 5,658 regime soldiers and police, and 1,006 army defectors. Intense fighting in recent months has driven an increasing number of Syrians out of their homes as internally displaced persons or outside of Syria as refugees. As of August 15, 155,226 refugees have registered with the United Nations (U.N.) in Turkey, Jordan, Lebanon, and Iraq, and up to 1 million Syrians may be internally displaced. 

Due to the fact that the conflict extends, these numbers change every day. Until the human life is of the highest value, the stopping violence and preventing human victims should be done on a priority basis.

3) Socioeconomic problems.

The crisis precipitated a rapid decline in the State‘s economy. It has exacerbated pre-existing levels of poverty and unemployment driven by a decade-long drought in rural agricultural areas, which led to the displacement of farmers to cities, and growing resentment against those who were, or appeared to be, enjoying the economic benefits distributed by the Government. The sharp drop in economic growth has been accompanied by alarming indicators, such as the devaluation of the Syrian pound, which has lost 30 per cent of its value since the onset of events, and inflation that soared to over 50 per cent.

On 23 September the Council of the European Union decided to ban investment in key sectors of the Syrian oil industry and the delivery of Syrian-denominated bank notes and coinage produced in the EU to the Syrian Central Bank. It also added two more persons and six entities to the list of those targeted by the current asset freeze and travel ban. The EU continues to put pressure on the Syrian authorities to meet the Syrian people’s legitimate demands for democracy, freedom of expression and other fundamental human rights[3]. However, these methods are not effective enough because they can make a result only after a long period of time. So, these sanctions are rather a signal to the government showing society that world’s organizations work.

The militarization of the conflict deepened the humanitarian crisis. Thousands of Syrians have been internally displaced or have fled to neighboring countries. At the time of writing, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) estimated that 1.5 million people had been internally displaced, more than 280,000 have fled to neighboring countries.

Refugee Numbers

* data.unhcr.org/syrianrefugees/regional.php, September 23, 2012

Accounts from interviewees demonstrated that entire communities are suffering from a lack of food, fuel, water, electricity and medical supplies. Shortages are especially acute in areas such as Homs, Idlib, Dar‘a and Hama. People forced by the hostilities to leave their homes are in urgent need of shelter.[4]

4) Security Issues: Al Qaeda, Extremism, and Foreign Fighters. The violence and disorder paralyzing Syria was creating opportunities for Al Qaeda operatives and other violent Islamist extremists to infiltrate the country and conduct or plan attacks. As of July 2012, Sunni extremist groups appear to be increasingly active in Syria, and some observers and officials fear that more groups may be sympathetic to or directly affiliated with Al Qaeda.[5]  Among these groups, the most prominent are the Nusra Front (Jabhat al Nusra li-Ahl al Sham, Support Front for the Syrian People), the Abdullah Azzam Brigades, the Ummah Brigade (Liwa al Umma), and the Islam Brigade (Liwa al Islam). Other groups suchas the Free Ones of the Levant Brigades (Ahrar al Sham) use jihadist rhetoric in some statements although their overall orientation is unclear. The Lebanon-based extremist group Fatah al Islam has released a number of statements on the conflict and members of the group are reported to be fighting (and dying) in Syria.

Some conservative Sunni clerics have issued religious edicts characterizing thefighting as a "defensive jihad” and endorsing the provision of material support to fighters and direct participation in the fighting.12 Al Qaeda leaders Ayman al Zawahiri and the late Abu Yahya al Libi also released statements in 2012 urging support for Syrian fighters.[6] The conflict in Syria has provoked a visceral public response in the region and is encouraging some people to make donations to support the Syrian uprising or travel to Syria to support the armed opposition. For example, the Iraqi government has expressed specific concern that individuals associated with Al Qaeda in Iraq have travelled to Syria and are using the conflict there to their advantage.

Statements from some armed groups indicate that their leaders are cognizant of the risks that certain tactics and rhetoric may pose (i.e., suicide bombing or attacks against civilians). The underlying incompatibility of different groups’ motives and intentions is difficult to ignore, particularly to the extent that some extremist groups are critical of other armed groups and may oppose efforts to establish democracy in any post-Asad Syria. The pro-sharia rhetoric and transnational orientation of some extremist groups make it possible that they may end up in conflict with secular, nationalist, or Islamist opposition elements. The prominent Syrian Salafist-Jihadist ideologue Abu Basir al Tartusi has characterized some of the groups and individuals now active in Syria as "extremists” and "fanatics.[7]

Security Issues of Syrian Weapons of Mass Destruction. The primary question of this topic is a threat to use weapons of mass destruction. Syrian government spokesperson Jihad Maqdisi claimed in his statement: "any chemical or bacterial weapon will never be used - and I repeat will never be used - during the crisis in Syria regardless of the developments. These weapons are stored and secured by Syrian military forces and under its direct supervision and will never be used unless Syria faces external aggression.” Syrian government was condemned for this statement by such countries as the United States, Russia, and several other ones. They underscored their intention to hold the Asad government responsible for its actions with regard to the weapons.

According to the report of Rachel Oswald,[8]Syria’s chemical weapons program suggests that nerve gas and mustard gas production and storage infrastructure is concentrated at facilities in and around Al Safira (southeast of Aleppo), Damascus, Hamah, Latakia, and Homs. Stockpiles also may be dispersed in other military locations around the country, and some reports suggested that the Syrian government may have moved or consolidated chemical weapons-related materials in order to better guarantee their security.

In the wake of any sudden regime collapse, efforts to find and secure stockpiles would be both a high priority and a difficult challenge. Elements of the Syrian military may be in a position to aid in securing materials and sites in the event of regime change, but it remains unclear whether an orderly or chaotic transition situation might ensue and whether such units would be cooperative or antagonistic toward outsiders.

According to some press estimates, about 75,000 military personnel could be required to fully secure various WMD-related sites in Syria.