بواسطة Aron Lund | أكتوبر 25, 2018 | Roundtables, غير مصنف
Looking back at seven years of Syrian civil war, it is striking how many pivotal moments have been the result of foreign intervention and external meddling.
That is not to say events since 2011 have played out according to a foreign script. Portraying Syria’s civil war as a process masterminded by foreigners would be unfair to Syrians – and, given the state of Syria, probably also to the foreigners. In reality, although many outside powers have tried to rearrange the Syrian battlefield, most of their grand ambitions have sunk without rescue into Syria’s swamp of competing factions.
But although local realities have fixed the conflict’s terms and frustrated many meddling outsiders, Syrians have had little power over their fate. Once it was clear that President Bashar al-Assad would not bend to the demands of his opponents and that those opponents had waded so far into the struggle that they could no longer see a way back, events began to unfold according to their own infernal logic.
In that spiral of state breakdown and social polarization, what one side felt to be a desperate act of survival would be perceived by the other as unconscionable escalation and met in kind. The structural makeup of the warring sides largely determined their behavior from 2011 onward, with many little situational upsets and gambles but few big-picture surprises – except for those that came from outside Syria’s borders.
In retrospect, some such interventions stand out as especially important. Most have of course been thoroughly dissected.
For example, the 2013 chemical weapons crisis has gained near-mythical significance in both Syrian and US politics, becoming a strange sort of shibboleth. But though the events of that summer and autumn were undeniably important, it is hard to shake the impression that President Barack Obama’s decision to settle for a Russian-inspired deal instead of firing missiles into Syria did more to disperse the fog of politics from existing circumstances than to break new ground.
Had Obama opted to pull the trigger anyway, for a one-off display of overwhelming dominance, Assad’s regime would likely have received one more disfiguring scar, the conflict would have taken a few extra spins, and the question of Syria’s chemical weapons program would have lingered as an equal or greater problem than it is today.
But there is little reason to assume that the conflict’s fundamentals would have evolved along radically different paths. Given the way the regime worked and the opposition did not, Obama had no credible path to victory on terms compatible with US politics – he knew it, and was trapped by that understanding.
In some sense, the 2013 crisis was like Assad’s December 2016 retaking of eastern Aleppo: a devastating turning point for the opposition and its backers, but also, ultimately, an unsurprising outcome of the war’s configuration at that moment.
Less obvious, but no less important, were the roads not taken.
In June 2012, the late Kofi Annan, who at the time served as a joint envoy of the UN secretary-general and the Arab League, summoned a group of major international players to sign off on basic principles for a peaceful solution in Syria. What came out of the Geneva I meeting could not have ended the war – the actual plan was idealistic claptrap. But if a UN-guided framework for international talks had been brought forward with appropriate caution and a stringent focus on more achievable goals – like trying to limit civilian suffering, preventing regional spillover, and hashing out mutually acceptable red lines – Annan’s gambit might have succeeded in routinizing conflict management habits more effective than the angry shouting matches that were to follow.
A display of early diplomatic pragmatism and collaboration on second-order issues might have spared Syrians some of the heartbreak that followed. Or maybe the opportunity would have been squandered by clashing agendas and over-ambitious diplomats.
We will never know, because Russian-US collaboration instantly broke down in a clutter of irreconcilable statements, partly, it seems, due to the strains on the White House in election season. Not until 2015 were Syria’s main foreign actors brought into the same room again, in very different circumstances: then, as a result of the reality-check provided by a Russian military intervention.
Unlike the United States, Russia did have a stand-alone partner that it could work with on the ground toward an end state that would be ugly but acceptable to Moscow. That combination allowed for the deployment of untrammeled military power in Assad’s favor, which made all the difference.
The Russian intervention in September 2015 became one of the Syrian war’s decisive turning points. Ever since President Vladimir Putin’s air force went to work against the rebellion, it has slowly and brutally transformed the battlefield.
The intervention also wrought changes on the regional and international stage. Being browbeaten by Russia was what finally forced Turkey to shift its position, in mid-2016, to seek some form of understanding with Assad’s allies. That, too, was a game changer.
History writes itself in a terrible hand, which can take time to decipher. But it seems clear that Syria is now in a new and different phase of the war, which looks to be an endgame of sorts. Barring a regional war or a dramatic upset inside the Syrian, Russian, or Iranian regimes, all of which are structurally unsound in their own ways, the battle for Damascus is over: Assad has won.
What is left is a mostly Russian-piloted contest over Syria’s economic future and independence, including the refugee crisis and the fate of three remaining border enclaves: the US-controlled areas in Tanf and the northeast, and the Turkish-run northwest. Will these areas revert to central government control, or stay propped up by external patronage in a frozen conflict? Again, foreigners will call the shots.
[Other roundtable submissions can be found here]
بواسطة Nikolaos van Dam | أكتوبر 25, 2018 | Roundtables, غير مصنف
Describing critical turning points in the Syrian Conflict, implies giving a very concise survey of some of its most important developments. Of course, there are many more critical turning points than can be described in this short article.
At the beginning of the Syrian Revolution (March 2011), the wall of silence and fear was broken for the first time among large sections of the Syrian population, as they rose and demonstrated massively against the Syrian regime. It was a miracle that the demonstrations generally remained so peaceful for a relatively long time, when taking into consideration the severe repression and atrocities committed by the regime against the peaceful demonstrators. Concurrently with the peaceful demonstrations, however, there was already armed anti-regime violence during the early stages of the revolution, probably committed from the ‘side lines’ by radical Islamists and others.
Many officers and soldiers started to defect, and constituted military opposition groups, first small, but later on a larger scale, big enough to threaten the regime.
By June 2011 violence and counterviolence had increased to such an extent that any peaceful discussions and dialogue between regime and opposition
had become extremely difficult. At this point, the Syrian Revolution had already, to some extent, become overshadowed by radical Islamists. They saw the so-called Arab Spring developments in the region as an excellent opportunity to present themselves as viable alternatives in their efforts to spread the rule of Islam, and many wanted to settle accounts with the regime that earlier had severely suppressed them.
The solidarity visits of US ambassador Robert Ford and his French counterpart Eric Chevallier to the opposition movement in Hama in July 2011, meant the end of the possibility for the United States and France or other countries to play any role as mediator in the conflict. Their visits rather created false hopes among the opposition that essential Western support was forthcoming – but in the end it turned out not to be given as had been expected or suggested.
US President Obama’s demand that President al-Asad should step aside, created an almost irreversible momentum. Many other countries followed suit and demanded the same, without having the intention, will, or capacity to militarily force al-Asad and his regime to do so. Most countries which had turned against the regime, claimed they wanted a political solution. In reality, however, these countries only wanted to consider a solution which implied regime change. It was unrealistic, however, to expect the regime to be prepared to voluntarily give up its own position, and for President Bashar al-Asad to be willing to sign his own death warrant. Various countries created false expectations among the Syrian opposition groups that military intervention was forthcoming, which it was not.
By way of an alternative, the United States, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and others, started to supply huge quantities of financial and military aid to the military opposition groups, but their support was channelled to their respective favourites. Their lack of efficient coordination caused their help to be insufficient to help the opposition in winning the war. Their success in endangering the regime’s military position triggered a large-scale Russian military intervention in September 2015 and onwards, on top of the military support of Iran and Lebanese Hizballah, who all wanted to protect their strategic ally to stay in power. All this, strengthened Russia’s position considerably.
The Geneva Communiqué, adopted on 30 June 2012 by the Action Group for Syria, and endorsed by the permanent members of the UN Security Council, became a cornerstone for any future negotiations between the Syrian regime and the opposition. The Geneva Communiqué described a number of principles and guidelines for a Syrian-led transition. One of the most important guidelines dealt with a political transition that should be made possible through the establishment of a transitional governing body which was to establish a neutral environment in which the transition could take place. The transitional governing body was to exercise full executive powers. It could include members of the Syrian government, the opposition and ‘other groups’ and was to be formed on the basis of mutual consent. Although the Geneva Communiqué did not mention anything about the role of the Syrian president, the position of Bashar al-Asad became a principal point of dispute. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton suggested that President al-Asad could not take part in such a transitional governing body, whereas Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov denied this. The Syrian opposition, in general, strongly rejected any role for President al-Asad in the ‘transitional period’. For the Syrian regime itself it was President al-Asad who was to decide on such issues, not the opposition, nor foreign countries. The fixation on the departure of al-Asad constituted a serious obstacle in finding a solution to the conflict, the more so as he was in power in most of the country.
A great number of countries officially recognized the Syrian Opposition Coalition. They supported its demand that there was not to be any future role for Syrian President Bashar al-Asad and his supporters with blood on their hands, and that they had to be brought before justice. Most Western and Arab countries supported these demands, without providing the means to implement them. Thereby these demands became little more than declaratory policies, because no real will existed for any direct Western and Arab military intervention in Syria. Such intervention was even officially rejected in the United States and the United Kingdom after parliamentary discussions. The direct foreign military threat against the regime was thereby eliminated.
The war in Syria clearly developed into a war by proxy, with various countries (particularly the United States, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar) interfering in the internal affairs of Syria by supporting different armed and other opposition groups. Russia and Iran wanted to militarily maintain their strategic interests in Syria and did not want to lose their Syrian ally.
After the expansion of the Islamic State (IS) from Iraq into Syria in 2013, attention to the fight against the Syrian regime shifted to the fight against IS. Because of the IS terrorist threats in Western countries this came to be viewed with greater priority. The support for the direct struggle against the regime thereby gradually diminished.
As a result, the opposition felt abandoned and betrayed by Western countries, but was left with few, if any, alternatives. With Western countries providing the opposition with insufficient support, the chances for Russia and Iran to get the upper hand increased. The Russian military intervention that started in September 2015 made the prospects for the opposition even worse. Providing more intensive foreign support to the military opposition forces led to an intensification and prolongation of the war, but not enough for a defeat of the regime.
The ability to achieve peace in Syria does not only depend on the Syrians themselves, but also on the various countries involved in the war by proxy, and whether or not they are prepared to give priority to ending the Syrian conflict above their rival regional ambitions. Such a turning point has not yet been reached, and the prospects for real peace in Syria are still far away, even if the Syrian regime would militarily win the war.
[Other roundtable submissions can be found here.]
بواسطة Josephine Lippincott | أكتوبر 25, 2018 | Roundtables, غير مصنف
The Syrian conflict has witnessed seven years of overwhelming violence and death. An endless cycle of confrontation and ceasefire, punctuated by repeated aborted negotiation attempts, have all further complicated and prolonged what we have come to understand as the Syrian Civil War. Every aspect of the conflict, becomes either embroiled in discussion or debate, results in no action, or adds to the hardships faced by the Syrian population. Throughout the conflict, scholars and experts have debated the idea of turning points or critical junctures.
When examining the idea of critical turning points, it is imperative that we consider events not just at the macro-level. What cannot be overemphasized is the fact that each of these turning points, while changing the broader trajectory of the conflict, also had very real, life-altering consequences for local communities. Through merging the idea of the local into the discussion of the macro, we gain a better understanding of the reality of some of the critical junctures within the Syrian conflict.
While there are many potential turning points, I identify three critical turning points in the Syrian conflict. They are as follows: the militarization of the Syrian uprising in early 2011, Obama’s failure to uphold his red-line declaration in 2013, and the 2015 commencement of Russian military intervention. Each of these situations altered the trajectory of the conflict dramatically, not just on a macro-level, but for local communities.
The militarization of the peaceful protests that began in March 2011 transformed the Syrian uprising into a bloody, violent full-scale military conflict. When the protests began in March 2011, Syrians across the country raised their voices in protest against the repression and tyranny of the Assad regime. In response, the government forces employed violence, cracking down on protesters. These events would escalate into more violence from the regime as well as the protesters. This initial event would usher the uprising in a direction that would leave a mark on Syrian history forever. The militarization of the opposition changed Syria from a country facing civil unrest to a country ensnared in conflict. Moreover, the escalating level of violence led to the formation of various opposition groups. These groups would develop different identities, sponsors, and alliances; resulting in a myriad of armed groups which would subsequently fractionalize the opposition and result in further fighting and violence. From this point on, the Syrian uprising had transformed into a civil war.
The escalation from protests to conflict altered the way the international community viewed Syria, but more importantly, it changed and disrupted the lives of Syrians. The militarization of the conflict would lead to the regime tightening its grasp on state services, leading to access challenges for Syrians. The fighting across the Syrian geography would disrupt daily life, prevent children from attending school, create financial problems for families, or lead Syrians to flee their homeland. These disruptions in daily life would be further exacerbated when the international system began to intervene and to strengthen certain parts of the armed opposition.
The second turning point was the Assad regime’s use of chemical weapons and President Obama’s subsequent failure to uphold his red-line declaration in 2013. In August 2013, Assad and his forces used Sarine gas near Damascus, killing more than fourteen hundred civilians. The US intelligence assessment asserted that the regime used chemical weapons as a method to push Syrian opposition forces back from rebel-held territory when government forces were unable. With the failure of President Obama and the United States to provide any actionable response, the Assad regime became even less fearful of any foreign intervention. The regime action and the US inaction altered the geopolitics surrounding the Syria conflict. Given the lack of direct military action or an escalation in support to rebel groups by the United States, other countries such as Qatar and Saudi Arabia also began to disengage. The stalled support created a feeling of abandonment within the armed opposition. The lack of intensified engagement by the United States, prompted bolder action by the Assad regime, Iran, and eventually Russia. However, beyond the macro-level implications, this event also had large ramifications for the Syrian population. The chemical weapons attack signaled that Syrians’ fears would not be limited to airstrikes or gunfire, but would have to also include weapons such as sarine gas.
The third critical turning point that altered the conflict on both the macro and micro level was Russian military intervention. In September 2015, Russia launched airstrikes that were reported to target ISIS, however US intelligence reports argued that the airstrikes targeted key Assad opponents, including US-backed units. On an international level, the Russian-intervention altered the geopolitical dynamics. The Russian intervention solidified the alliance between Assad, Iran, and Russia, but also further demonstrated the lack of heightened support by Western actors. Moreover, as a result of this inaction, it became even more apparent to opposition groups and the Syrian population that they could not expect help or aid from the United States or other western countries. Rather, it would be the Russians who would ultimately guide how the Syrian conflict would unfold and negotiations for the conflict’s termination. Russian actions under the intervention have attempted to restrict the number of Russian casualties, but has led to higher civilian casualties due to less discriminate military tactics. The attempt to restrict Russian casualties raises the level of violence and the number of threats for Syrians. Now they must prepare for a bombing or chemical weapon attack from their own government, as well as attacks from a world superpower.
Following these events and so many other daily tragedies, the Syrian population has remained isolated from the international community. These three critical turning points have contributed to further deterioration of daily life for Syrians and altered geo-politics in the region. While the Assad regime has escalated its attacks through chemical weapons, international powers have delineated new rules and retained new spheres of influence. The failure of US engagement in the conflict, both militarily and diplomatically, along with the Russian-Syrian alliance has allowed for Russia, Iran, and Syria to largely control the results of the Syrian conflict. With the United States continuing its inaction to implement change or alter the status quo, other countries have also taken a less direct approach. As a result, the Syrian conflict continues as the Syrian population faces even more hardship.
[Other roundtable submissions can be found here.]
بواسطة Joel Veldkamp | أكتوبر 25, 2018 | Roundtables, غير مصنف
Syria’s seven years of war have been indelibly shaped by foreign interventions. Both the Assad regime and the rebel coalition that opposes his rule owe their continued existence to support from the outside. The most spectacular, and decisive, of these interventions was the air war that Russia launched against rebel forces in September 2015. Discussions about the United States’ role in Syria’s war, on the other hand, tend to focus on what the United States did not do – on why it never intervened militarily to topple the Assad regime, the way Russia intervened militarily to support it.
These discussions, while important, neglect the equally important US decision to provide arms, training and material support for the armed revolution in Syria, and to assist its allies in the region in sending far greater amounts of support.
Without this support, a sustained armed revolution against the premier police state in the Arab world would have been impossible. Indeed, when the United States withdrew their support in 2016-2017, the armed revolution quickly collapsed. These two “turning point” decisions – to begin providing lethal support to the uprising, and later, to withdraw it – were both taken behind-the-scenes, without public debate. They also permanently changed the course of the war.
Beginning in the autumn of 2011, the United States and its allies began providing funding, supplies and weaponry to Syria’s burgeoning armed rebellion. To those Syrians who were willing, this arms pipeline provided the means to fight back against a regime that had been killing protestors for six months and turn a protest movement into a full-scale civil war.
Over the next six years, billions of dollars and thousands of tons of weapons flowed to Syria’s rebel groups, usually airlifted into Turkey or Jordan and then smuggled across the border. At first, the weapons were supplied mostly by Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Turkey, while the CIA provided logistical assistance.
For several years, this assistance was at odds with stated US policy. On 11 April 2013, Assistant Secretary of State Elizabeth Jones testified to the Senate’s Foreign Relations Committee, “We do not believe that it is in the United States or the Syrian people’s best interest to provide lethal support to the Syrian opposition.” By then, the CIA had already been involved in the airlift of some thirty-five hundred tons of weapons into Syria.
The fact that the United States was apparently reluctant to arm the opposition directly, and initially restricted itself to providing logistical support for its allies’ operations in Syria, is sometimes taken as evidence that the United States was not leading the effort but being led. Perhaps the United States was hoping, by its involvement, to restrain its allies, prevent jihadists from acquiring the weapons being distributed, and retain some influence over the course of events in Syria. But this view of the United States as a reluctant player warrants some skepticism. As Aron Lund says, in the Syria conflict, “for reasons of evident geography, the Gulf states have always been forced to work through regional allies, and they also appear to have relied quite heavily on CIA coordination and facilitation.”
One cannot help but see a parallel in Saudi Arabia’s current war in Yemen: the United States often complains about the war’s atrocious human toll, but Saudi Arabia is carrying out the war with US-supplied bombs, and with US planes refueling Saudi bombers in mid-air. Researchers should not be too quick to accept US pretensions to reluctance in its participation in Middle East conflicts. Future research may yet reveal Washington as the driving force behind the Syrian intervention, as it was in Afghanistan in the 1980s.
In any case, by June 2013, the United States began providing support directly to Syria’s rebels. With President Obama’s go-ahead, the CIA launched a one billion dollar operation called “Timber Sycamore” to supply Syria’s rebels with weapons and support, including US-made anti-tank missiles. By the end of the program, an estimated one hundred thousand pro-regime fighters had been killed by CIA-backed groups in Syria (out of a total war toll of around five hundred thousand).
Crucially, though, the United States never gave the opposition enough support to actually defeat the regime. In April 2014, one rebel commander summed up the situation: “The aid that comes in now is only enough to keep us alive, and it covers only the lowest level of needs.” Another rebel leader angrily, but persuasively, noted, “We know that if you wanted to, you could topple Bashar al-Assad in ten days.” Charles Lister likewise compared the CIA program to “drip-feeding the opposition groups just enough to survive.” The intention of this “no victory, no defeat” aid strategy may not have been to prolong the Syrian civil war indefinitely, but that was the predictable effect.
The US intervention also affected Syria’s war in another way. Despite repeated claims from US officials that only “vetted,” “moderate” groups in Syria were receiving support, jihadist groups were ultimately the best poised to take advantage of the US-backed weapons flow. The jihadists were bolstered by foreign cadres hardened from earlier conflicts, received semi-discreet backing from Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar, enjoyed more ideological coherence than the loose coalition of non-Islamist rebels, were hindered by fewer local attachments and conflicts, and were less restrained by humanitarian or international PR concerns. Early on, the jihadists became the opposition’s strongest players.
Debate continues about how US policy affected this development. Charles Lister claims that the moderate opposition never received enough support from its foreign backers to defeat the jihadists (or resist the jihadists’ seizure of weapons provided by those backers). Sam Heller argues that the moderate opposition was never going to subordinate their fight against the regime to a fight against fellow rebels, whether they were jihadists or not. Regardless, in the final analysis, the jihadist movement in Syria was empowered by the US-backed weapons flow into Syria, much of which found its way into the jihadists’ hands. The jihadists’ resulting prominence undermined popular support for the opposition and drove Syria’s multi-religious population closer to the Assad regime.
In March 2015, an al Qaeda-led rebel coalition seized Idlib province. In that battle, US-supplied antitank missiles gave the rebels a crucial edge. That fall, with the Syrian regime retreating on multiple fronts, Russia launched a massive bombing campaign against the opposition, making it clear that they would never countenance Assad’s fall. That commitment was not matched by the United States. It was President Trump who officially terminated Timber Sycamore in June 2017, but President Obama who allowed the rebel stronghold in East Aleppo to fall, offering little more than rhetorical resistance to the regime’s signal victory.
Without the United States in the rebels’ corner, Jordan and Turkey both moved to mend ties with the Syrian regime and with Russia, and the Gulf States found themselves without the partners they needed to bring weapons to their proxies in Syria. The regime followed its victory in Aleppo with the re-conquest of Eastern Ghouta and Dara’a, leaving Idlib as the last rebel stronghold in Syria. As Syrian and Russian forces bore down on Dara’a in June 2018, the US Embassy in Amman released a curt statement advising the rebels not to “base your decisions on the assumption or expectation of a military intervention by us.” Within weeks, resistance in Dara’a evaporated.
Determining the full impact of US support for Syria’s revolution – and its later withdrawal – will require a great deal of research in the future. But while the Syrian civil war cannot be reduced to US intervention, it is difficult to escape the conclusion that US decision-making was crucial both to the war’s prolongation and to the uprising’s eventual defeat.
The consequences of these decisions for Syria’s civilian population have been horrendous. One may sympathize with policymakers making difficult choices about a complicated region. But all of this was easily foreseeable, and foreseen. Way back in October 2011, as the first decisions about arming Syria’s rebels were being made in Washington, an article in International Organization by Salehyan, Gleditsch and Cunningham summarized existing political science research on foreign intervention this way: “Civil wars with outside involvement typically last longer, cause more fatalities, and are more difficult to resolve through negotiations.” It seems clear that Syria is no exception to this rule. In the future, scholars, policymakers, and concerned citizens should give American support for rebel groups – whether in Syria, Nicaragua, Angola, or elsewhere – the analytical and moral attention it deserves. It can be at least as important an “intervention” as airstrikes.
[Other roundtable submissions can be found here]
بواسطة سلوى زكزك | أكتوبر 23, 2018 | غير مصنف
“Once used as a status symbol, jewelry is now being traded in by Syrian to secure liquidity writes Salonsyria.
At the end of the second millennium, Syrian women would trade their jewelry for work and a living for their spouses and children. Fleets of small buses appeared to transport passengers, with many women paying the price of the ticket with their jewelry, to the extent that the expression spread: “All Syrian women’s gold is in the jeweler’s shops.”
Jewelry, and especially gold, is considered a way of life for many Syrian women. They live in hope of wearing a sliver of it on their hands and necks as a sign of marriage or a mark of riches and affluence, and it signals to other that all this is mine; or, this was my dowry; or I have taken nothing from the world but that which shines on my hands in gold.
I remember the day a mortar fell on the house of my neighbor, a widow in her 60s. She was bloodied in the face, slipping out of consciousness and crying. She asked me to take four bracelets from her right hand and hide them out of fear they would be stolen in the hospital or she would die with them.
During the war, a hysteria about hiding jewelry, even wedding rings, has spread. This hysteria has led to people losing more jewelry than what has been stolen by thieves. Those who hide their gold in the heater, or a sofa, or an oven or washer have lost them along with losing these appliances, like a gift to the thieves of the house furniture. No one imagined the “ta’afeesh” — that is, that looting would affect wedding rings, spoons, wheelchairs and toilet seats.
During the war, women have also voluntarily given up jewelry in order to cover the costs of their sons and husbands’ trips to start a new life after losing a house, work and sources of income. New brides have also agreed to acquire the cheapest types of gold, such as Brazilian and Russian, and many have even been forced to accept bracelets “stitched” with dyed yellow metal and decorated with engravings so as not to feel lacking.
On the margins of the war a trade in “falso” gold — as it is called in the popular language — has also flourished, and another market has developed to buy real gold at low prices from those who are in need, because the goldsmiths have even stopped buying due to a lack of liquidity and the dramatic price fluctuations.
These changes have caused a state of stagnation in the gold market, which has forced people to sell their gold to women who have access to money. Those buying the gold fear that their money will depreciate or because funds from looting and war commerce have fallen into their hands and they want to exchange it for goods that are more liquid.
In a famous jewelry store in George Khoury square, where the affluent live, and women have their own cars and jewelry bought for appearance — not to provide money or as an investment — three women arrived in five minutes to sell their wedding rings. The first explained, with shame overwhelming her, that she was the wife of a former jeweler who lost all he had and that the ring was her deceased mother’s, and that she wanted to sell it to cover her tomb with marble. The second presented it to the jeweler without preamble. He weighed it, offered her the price, and she nodded her head in agreement, and then took the small amount, still staring into the void. The third said that it was small on her finger and that the fashion now was white gold, and so she claimed she would wear a diamond ring.
Despite the deterioration of the gold market, the sales have helped it maintain its strength, especially for those who have been able to stay working as jewelers. However, the nature of the market has changed. Previously there was demand for the most modern and beautiful jewelry, but now it is valued by weight. By selling this way there is an economic guarantee, which does not take into account the workmanship that has gone into the piece.
By selling pieces by weight, sellers can secure pure capital, and the pieces can be traded without notable losses, especially given the relative stability in the price of gold.
Recently, there has been a notably heavy attendance at gold-selling stores in some areas, with many women buying and wearing gold to draw attention and turn gazes — and not only to save. In contrast, there is also heavy attendance and more intense demand for traditional jewelry whose market has experienced a recession in recent years. Some jewelers have announced savings offers and installment plans for traditional jewelry.
One gold seller explained this phenomenon by saying that migrant families send their families amounts in foreign currency to buy gold for them. He adds, “Our gold is the best and cheapest.” Some women receive limited amounts of money from their children to buy gifts for foreign wives or for newborn children, especially Quranic verses, crosses and images of saints. In total, there has been little notable recovery in the gold market — not enough to suggest a sudden abundance or stability, which is adapting to the current situation.
The traditional jewelry market is impressive and able to reproduce all ornaments and inscriptions, and the seller reduces losses if they deteriorate rapidly, saying: “Paint it with nail polish, so it doesn’t change its color! Put it in a high place so it does not cause allergies, and do not bring it near paraffin or soap, to keep it shiny.”
[This article was originally published and translated by The Syrian Observer.]
بواسطة رياض الزين | أكتوبر 22, 2018 | Reports, غير مصنف
سيطر النظام السوري في نهاية يوليو/تموز الماضي ٢٠١٨على كامل جنوب غربي سوريا بدعم جوي روسي، وتخلل العمليات التي استمرت لمدة شهرين ونصف اتفاقيات مع فصائل المعارضة جنوب سوريا.
وترافق تراجع الأعمال العسكرية في المناطق الجنوبية مع انتشار حواجز لقوات النظام على مداخل ومخارج معظم القرى والبلدات التي سيطر عليها، مما أثار قلق الأهالي من ارتكاب قوات النظام لمداهمات واعتقالات بحق المدنيين، كما حصل في قرى وبلدات الحارة واللجاة في درعا.
وأدت الأعمال العسكرية التي سبقت سيطرة النظام على الجنوب لنزوح مئات العائلات عن قراها، خوفاً من القصف والمعارك التي كانت مشتعلة في المنطقة قبل اتفاق فصائل المعارضة على التسوية مع الجانب الروسي. يقول أحد سكان ريف درعا “إن غالبية الأهالي التي كانت مهجرة من قراها وبلداتها عادت إلى منازلها، وسط نقص حاد بالخدمات الصحية، والبنية التحتية؛ فالقصف والمعارك في المنطقة خلفت دماراً هائلاً، سواء بالأبنية السكنية أو المرافق العامة كالمدارس والنقاط الطبية، وتسببت بتقنين الكهرباء وتدمير عدد كبير من المنازل والمدارس، كما تعرضت منازل المدنيين لعمليات التعفيش والسرقة”.
و لم يف النظام بالوعود التي قدمها خلال عمليات التفاوض بإدخال الخدمات إلى المناطق التي سيطر عليها، فالكثير من المدارس المدمرة مازالت تنتظر عمليات الترميم، كما تحتاج البنية التحتية للإصلاح كالكهرباء. فرغم عمل ورشات الكهرباء على إصلاح العديد من محطات التوزيع إلا أن الكهرباء مازالت تعمل وفق نظام تقنين قاسي، حيث تحصل كل منطقة على ساعات محددة من الكهرباء لتنقطع بقية اليوم. وأما الطحين، فهو يصل إلى المناطق الجنوبية، إلا أن الأفران التي تعرضت للتدمير نتيجة القصف لم تُرمم بعد، وبهذا لا يمكنها تأمين الخبز الكافي للسكان، مما يفرض عليهم السفر يوماً إلى المناطق المجاورة لتأمين الخبز. ويعترض حاجز النظام من يحمل كمية كبيرة من الخبز لمنع بيعه داخل درعا.
المحروقات أيضاً يتم توزيعها على المحطات المتواجدة في المناطق الخاضعة لاتفاق المصالحة والتسوية بشكل غير منتظم، حيث تحصل بعض الكازيات على طلبها دون مناطق أخرى، وتتدخل المحسوبيات والواسطة لحصول صاحب الكازية على طلبيته والاستعجال بها.
ومازال الأهالي في بعض المناطق يعتمدون على شراء مياه الآبار للشرب، فشبكات المياه لم تتم صيانتها حتى الآن.
أما الحركة التجارية في جنوب سوريا فهي تقتصر على المواد الغذائية والتموينية، نتيجة سهولة وصولها من العاصمة دمشق، إلا أن أسعارها مازالت كما كانت أثناء الحصار فما يزال بعضها يباع بضعف سعرها الحقيقي.
حركة إعادة الإعمار تبدو بسيطة وخفيفة في بلدات ريف درعا وهي تقتصر على ترميم منازل بجهود شخصية وعمدت بعض العائلات التي دمرت بيوتها بالكامل للسكن في منازل المغتربين في المنطقة، أو إلى استئجار منزل آخر.
يقول أحد سكان درعا إن “الوضع الأمني حتى غير مستقر”، فقد اعتقل النظام خلال الأشهر الأولى من سيطرته حوالى ١٣٠ شخصاً بحسب مصادر محلية، منهم عناصر من فصائل التسويات أو مدنيين وجلهم من منطقة اللجاة.
يبرر النظام الاعتقال بعد “تسوية الوضع” بوجود ادعاء شخصي على المعتقل، ومسألة الادعاء الشخصي لا تشملها التسوية الأمنية للشخص.
وتقول الفصائل المفاوضة إنها تضغط على الجانب الروسي للمطالبة بالمعتقلين، إلا أنه لم يتم الإفراج إلا عن بضعة معتقلين من مناطق الجنوب آخرهم الشاب علاء أحمد الصياصنه ابن الشيخ “أحمد الصياصنه” خطيب الجامع العمري في مدينة درعا البلد، وأفرج عنه بعد اعتقال دام سبع سنوات.
روسيا في الجنوب
فيما يتعلق بالوجود الروسي، تجوب شوارع درعا بشكل شبه يومي دوريات الشرطة العسكرية الروسية.
ومن اللافت أيضاً مشاهدة عناصر من فصائل المعارضة سابقاً يجلسون على حاجز مع قوات النظام السوري في معظم المناطق التي خضعت للمصالحات. يقول أحد عناصر هذه الفصائل “إن بعض العناصر فضلوا البقاء ضمن الفصيل و في بلداتهم بدلاً عن تهجيرهم إلى إدلب، ولحماية المدنيين من تجاوزات حواجز قوات النظام السوري التي انتشرت في المدن والبلدات.”
وتلقت فصائل المعارضة بعد سيطرة النظام، عروضاً لجعلها قوات رديفة للجيش السوري، إما بانضمامها لـ”لفيلق الخامس اقتحام” الذي تشرف عليه روسيا، أو الانضمام إلى “الفرقة الرابعة” التي يقودها ماهر الأسد شقيق الرئيس السوري، أو “قوات الهجانة” حرس الحدود، أو الانضمام بعقود مؤقته لمدة سنة إلى فرع الأمن العسكري.
ويقول العنصر إن روسيا سعت لكسب الفصائل التي وقعت على التسوية في الجنوب نظراً لبقاء عدد كبير من عناصرها في درعا ورفضهم التهجير ولإبعاد ميليشيات إيران و”حزب الله” عن المنطقة بحسب التعهدات الروسية التي قدمتها قبل الاتفاق.
ووافقت روسيا على طلب فصائل بريف درعا الغربي يقودها أبو مرشد البردان بتشكيل قوات من الفصائل بإدارة مباشرة من قاعدة حميميم ومستقلة عن “لفيلق الخامس – اقتحام” الذي تشرف عليه روسيا في سوريا، كما سمحت للمدنيين بالانتساب إلى هذا الفصيل الجديد، سواء من المتطوعين أو المتخلفين عن الخدمة الإلزامية أو الاحتياطية في جيش النظام السوري.
ويتلقى هذا التشكيل الجديد أوامره مباشرة من قاعدة حميميم الروسية، أما شرط روسيا للموافقة على هذا التشكيل فهو مشاركته في قتال تنظيم داعش في كافة الأراضي السورية.
أما الفصائل في ريف درعا الشرقي فيقودها أحمد العودة الذي انضوى وعناصره ضمن الفيلق الخامس اقتحام، وشاركت عناصره في المعارك الدائرة في بادية السويداء ضد تنظيم داعش.
وتسعى روسيا لإعادة فصائل الجنوب إلى إدارتها لعدم ترك الساحة في الجنوب لأطراف أخرى، ورغبة منها في أن يكون جنوب سوريا نموذجاً للدفع بعجلة المصالحات في بقية المناطق الحدودية التي لا تزال خارج سيطرة النظام، وخاصة بعد أن باتت الشرطة الروسية تسيطر على معابر بين مناطق المعارضة في إدلب ومناطق النظام شمال سوريا ووسطها.
