Why the Syrian Civil War Is Not a Sectarian Conflict (and What That Means for Any Possible Solution)

Despite frequent assertions to the contrary, the civil war raging in Syria is not a sectarian conflict. In fact, there is little evidence to support such an assumption. Anti-government protests and skirmishes have broken out across the country, in predominantly Sunni, Shi‘i, Alawi, Druze and Christian areas, respectively. One of the single most consistently restive areas of Damascus has been Mezzeh—one of the richest neighborhoods in the capital and located in the shadow of the Presidential Palace—which has a significant Alawi population.

Syrian Notes, June 27

Remember the smoldering conflict I described as a low-intensity civil war back in March? Well, other people are beginning to agree with me. (Bashar al-Assad, for one.) The situation shows no sign of improving; Assad remains defiant, Russia still supports him, anti-government forces are still resisting, Homs is still being shelled (watch here), the West is still putting “pressure” on the government and there’s still no end in sight. (And Jadaliyya is still providing some of the best information and analysis.)

The Wisdom of Foreign Intervention

It appears that the UN-brokered ceasefire in Syria has failed. Just last week there were two bombings in Damascus suburbs and Syrian forces again shelled Homs (something expressly forbidden under the ceasefire agreement). With the situation in the country remaining violent and unstable, France and now Turkey have broached the subject of armed foreign intervention in Syria, specifically by NATO forces.

The argument for intervention, as it goes, is generally based on the avoidance (or rather prevention) of war crimes on the part of the Syrian government. Writers have drawn parallels to Srebrenica and Rwanda and wondered why the prevention of war crimes merited intervention in Libya but not in Syria.

This rationale underlies the UN action. Expressly designed to bring a peaceful solution to the conflict, the ceasefire and UN monitors are in place to bring an end to the humanitarian crisis and prevent any gross acts of violence.

How Do You Solve a Problem like Syria

When last we checked in, the Syrian government had just approved Kofi Annan’s UN-backed peace plan for ending the conflict. With the deadline for the ceasefire tomorrow at 6AM local time (11PM Eastern), how is the outlook for peace? Not good. All signs point to the deadline coming and going without any letup in the violence. The regime has already publicly declared that they will not honor the ceasefire without written assurances from the rebels that they will do the same. Those assurances are not forthcoming, and the Free Syrian Army has in response accused the government of preemptively undermining the peace plan. The backdrop to all this was the announcement last week that the so-called “Friends of Syria” international coalition, which includes Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, would begin funding anti-government forces. Since then, the Syrian army has increased attacks in conflict areas in the days leading up to the ceasefire.

Syrian Notes, March 28

“Syria is free”

I’m currently busy finishing up an article for the journal Islamic Law and Society, so the frequency of posts has gotten a bit lax. And apparently nobody cares about Afghanistan: collectively, my two previous posts on Syria got over 120 views. The last post on Afghanistan got 14. (Duly noted. But I’m still going to talk about Afghanistan occasionally.) But here are a few disparate things on Syria that are worth reading/pondering:

For keeping up with events in Syria, the Syrian Revolution Digest is absolutely required reading. Updated daily, it has links, videos, pictures and tons of information from Syria. It’s certainly (and transparently) pro-revolution, but so is this blog, I guess. Anyway, this site is still quality stuff. I recommend it to everyone.