Iran’s hegemonic ambition in expanding Iranian influence on Middle East started after the Revolution in Iran 1979 and coming Mullahs to power and exporting the revolution with the ideology of supporting vulnerable against arrogant everywhere in the world. (مقلد: 1984) In another way means supporting the Shia minorities in the Arabian Sunni countries that have Shia minorities.
This led to the deterioration of the relations between Iran internationally and with Saudi Arabia particularly by imposing large changes in Iranian Foreign Policy. (باديب: 1983) and establishing a strong relations with the only Arab Sunni majority country which rules by Alawites, Syria.
When the conflicts erupted in Syria in 2011, Assad exploited the global and regional efforts by consequently asking him to move peacefully, made him be more aggressive and using more power in suppressing the demonstrations, and from another side understanding that unstable political situation effects some neighboring countries which not interested in having destabilized Syria as a neighbor while some of those groups and powers fight Assad they are pro-Alqaeda. And being almost sure about Iran’s support while the geopolitical location of Syria is an inevitable for Iran to continue the support to Hizboolah and strengthen the Shia hegemony in the region , at the same time there was fear among the Sunni Arab countries to face the same demonstration by their people, like Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Bahrain which the ruling families are Sunni but they have Shia minorities and it is easy for Iran to move Shia minorities against these governments in order to reduce their force and impact on being persistent in calling for Assad to leave the power or to support the Assad’s opposition groups.
The Iranian President’s visit Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to Abu Musa Iceland, one of the three small disputed islands between UAE, United Arab Emirates and Iran, in August 2013 was just a message by Iran to make the Gulf countries busy with the issue of these disputed Icelands and reduce their impacts and concentration on Syria.
The alignment of Syria and Iran and their relations belongs back to the time when Khomayni, the revolutionary leader in Iran got power in 1979, the Assad’s Father Hafiz Al Assad from an Alawite family was ruling the country. Alawites are a Muslim sect related to Shia branch in Islam and they consist about 7 percent of the population of Syria while the rest which is the majority are Sunni.
in 2013 and 2014, Iran has doubled its support to Assad by training Militias with the purpose that they fight against Al Qaeda in Syria, Hizboolah changed their concentration and main role also to fight ISIL, Islamic State in Iraq and Levant in Syria and Iraq by sending Hizboolah militias to both Iraq and Syria, and the central government in Iraq which was ruling by Noori Al Maliki and under the influence of Iran, sending Iraqi Shia militias to Syria to support Assad.
Iran’s wish in expanding their power in the region started after the United States war on Afghanistan in 2011 and later on Iraq in 2003 which caused the fall of Saddam Hussein and Shia majority in Iraq got power. Economically, a new market emerged for Iran while at the time of Saddam almost all the trade relations were zero due to the 8 years of war between Iran and Iraq.
Since 2003 the trade volume between Iran and Iraq reached 16 billion dollars only in Basra province in Iraq, and reached 150 billion dollars between the both countries as the authors of this book mentioning that the Iran’s trade with central and south of Iraq is to win the mind and heart of the people also “Moreover, Iranian investors, parastatal foundations (bonyads), construction firms, and companies are very active in the largely Shiite south of the country, as well as in Baghdad and the KRG. Iranian foundations have also helped build hospitals, clinics, and schools in southern and central Iraq, as part of Iran’s efforts to win Iraqi “hearts and minds.” Iranian firms lead in the field of housing construction in southern Iraq, which in the coming decade will represent a $16 billion market in Basra province alone and a $150 billion market nationwide”.
According to Ari Heistein’s article in July 2015 published in HAARETZ newspaper under the title “The true winner in Syria: Iran”, Iran is the largest cement and iron producer in Middle East and it gets huge benefit in reconstruction of Syria after the war as he mentions “ “However, after the uprising against Assad began and Syria’s trading partners abided by the sanctions against it, Iran was not placed “in a foreign-policy predicament” but rather was positioned to exploit the fact that Assad no longer had the luxury to keep it at arm’s length. Despite Syria’s declining economic state, Syrian-Iranian trade has tripled since 2010, reaching $1 billion in 2014, and is expected to continue growing. Also, Iran’s close ties to the regime and its status as the Middle East’s largest producer of cement and iron mean that it is well-positioned to benefit from Syria’s ongoing destruction and reconstruction”.
For Iran, in Syria apart from having biggest share in reconstruction or expanding the trade volume between the two countries, the geographical location of Syria is significant for Iran’s dilation and expansion or having a secure path from Iran to the Mediterranean Sea and then to Europe through Syria and sea rather than through Turkey. In 1989 Iran and Qatar started to develop in the largest natural gas field in the world with reserve, South Pars-North Dome locates in the Gulf sea, one of third of the reserve is located inside Iran’s sea borders and the rest is locates in Qatar borders.
After Russia cut off the gas delivery to Ukraine for two weeks in 2009 in the midwinter, Europe is not certain anymore and doesn’t look at Russia’s natural gas as reliable, and searching for new routes and sources to secure the energy. For Middle East rich countries with natural gas resources is an opportunity to be an alternative and at least export their natural gas through pipelines due to less transportation costs. The Iran-Iraq-Syria pipeline which was agreed by these three countries in 2011 just before starting the Syrian civil war and they signed the agreement in July 2012 according to Mitchell A. Orenstein and George Romer in Foreign Affairs magazine, even the Russian intervention quickly in Syria is because both of the projects which is exporting either Qatari or Iranian natural gas through Syria to Europe is against the Russian interest in being the main natural gas supplier without having competitors.
Since starting the Syrian civil war, Iran supported Assad’s regime with military personnel, sending weapon and training Shia and Alawi militias such as Hashd Al Shabi in Iraq to fight against ISIS inside Iraq and also fighting on behalf of Assad Regime in Syria.
According to Will Fulton, Joseph Holiday and Sam Wyer in a joint report which published by Institute for the study of war in May 2013 “Iran has directly supported a number of Syria’s pro-Assad paramilitary organizations. At the same time, Iran’s proxies and regional partners, namely Lebanese Hezbollah and Iraqi Shi‘a militant groups, have taken a more prominent combat role. These elements have augmented Assad’s forces in an effort to preserve their mutual interests, as well as those of Iran.”
The existence of the Iranian revolutionary army in Syria uncovered when in the August 2012, 48 Iranians seized by opposition Syrian army, and Iran claimed that they are Iranian pilgrims who visited the holly place for Shia “Seyida Zeyneb” while Stephen Larrabee and Alireza Nader in their book “Turkish-Iranian Relations in a Changing Middle East” depending on Iranian opposition source, Al-Quds, the Iranian revolutionary forces, using religious travel agencies to cover sending militias by Iranian Airway from Tehran to Damascus.
The statement by the commander of Iranian Revolutionary forces, Mohammad Ali Jafari in September 2012 left no more doubts about the Iranian support to Assad when he confirmed for the first time that their revolutionary guards are in Syria for supporting Assad and called him as an Arab ally, and threatened by getting involve in Syria militarily if its ally will be under attack.
Till the wave of the uprisings in the region not reached Syria, Iran was appreciating and calling Arab Spring as Islamic awakening against dictatorship and secular Arab leaders under US influence, while falling Mubarak in Egypt was not with the interest of Saudi Arabia. But when the uprisings hit Syria, an Arab ally in the region for Iran and a good opportunity for Saudi Arabia in the way that Iran will lose an ally in the most important land geopolitically in the region.
3.1.2 Saudi Arabia
The relations between Hafiz Al Assad with Saudi Arabia was positive in 1990s and cooperated in the Gulf war alongside with US-led coalition against Saddam Hussein which resulted in Liberating Kuwait from Saddam and to defend Saudi Arabia in 1991.
In June 2000 when Hafiz Assad’s son, Bashar Al Assad got power once his father died, the relations between Syria and Saudi Arabia were positive too. In October 2000 Assad visited Saudi Arabia and met King Fahd and they agreed to open a free zone between Saudi and Syria.
Apart from having strong relations between Syria and Iran, Saudi Arabia supported Syria with 1.6 Billion Dollars annually in 1980s to ensure the Saudi Arabia economic interests in Lebanon and reduce the Iranian role in the Sunni Arab countries. Lebanon was under the control of Syrian Army from 1975 till 2005, the occupation ended with the withdrawal of the Syrian Army. Saudi Persuaded Al Assad to approve Rafik Al Hariri as the new prime minister of Lebanon who had Saudi citizenship In 2003 when United Stated removed Saddam Hussein in Iraq, Iran started to have more influence on another Arabian country which was ruling by a Sunni leader, Saudi Arabia’s fear from the Iranian Hegemony in the region started to be more serious.
When the Arab Spring started from Tunisia in 2010, which was a wave of demonstration in the Arabian and Middle East countries by people due to low employment and poverty and asking for improving the economic and political situation of the countries. In March 2011 people started to demonstrate in Syria, first months of the protests were only gathering people on Fridays asking Assad to leave the power, Assad tried all means to finish the demonstration by force and step by step became civil war. The neighboring and regional powers involved also such as Iran supporting the Regime, the Gulf Arabian countries and Turkey supporting particular and distinguished opposition groups according to their interest.
Saudi’s main reason for supporting the Syrian opposition army is to fight against Assad and remove him to break these old ties and relations of Iran with an Arabian ally. The efforts of Saudi Arabia. At the begging of the clashes between the Syrian regime with the protestors, most of the Arab league countries called Assad to step down and leave the power peacefully and called emergency UN session in August 2011 as BBC reported “An emergency session of the UN Human Rights Council will be held on Monday following a request from all 24 members – including Jordan, Kuwait, Qatar and Saudi Arabia.”
The first demonstration was in Dar’a which some Sunni tribes lives there and they have relativity to Saudi tribes in Najd in Saudi. Either with encouraging them by Saudi Arabia or due to the severe repression by Assad, the demonstrator’s slogans in improving the economic situation and calling for Assad to leave the power changed to sectarian slogans offending Christian people and Alawites such as ‘Christians to Beirut, Alawites to the grave’.
In November 2011 Arab League decided to suspend the membership of Syria, 18 countries voted on that, only Yemen and Lebanon with Syria itself voted against the decision. Qatar’s foreign minister stated ““Syria is a dear country for all of us and it pains us to make this decision,” bin Jassim said. “We hope there will be a brave move from Syria to stop the violence and begin a real dialogue toward real reform.” And on the reaction to this decision, the representative of Syria in the league called this decision as “serving a Western and American agenda”.
In February 2012, in an emergency session of Arab league in Cairo for the foreign minister of 22 members of the league issued a resolution appealing to UN calling for sending United Nations peacekeeping forces to Syria in order to stop the violence. At the same day the Syrian ambassador to Egypt who didn’t attend in the emergency session stated “The Syrian Arab Republic categorically rejects the decisions of the Arab League".
As the diplomatic efforts failed to persuade Assad to leave the power, Saudi Arabia started to support FSA, Free Syrian Army which was formed in August 2011 , financially and with weapons, especially to those sub-groups were fighting alongside Free Syrian Army that have Salafi ideology and working for establishing an Islamic country with Salafi principles after Assad such as Islamic Front and Ahrar Al Sham, this mentioned in the report of Department of Policy in European Union in 2003 as “When the current civil war began, in March 2011 with a series of nationwide demonstrations, President Bashar al-Assad denied the existence of civil protests and blamed a “foreign backed conspiracy” as responsible for the riots. In an interview he said: “Many people were misled in the beginning, thinking that what is happening is a state of excitement, a wave of the ‘Arab spring’…. [But it] isn’t a revolution or a spring; it is terrorist acts in the full meaning of the word”.
Both Saudi and Turkey are cooperating on helping the Free Syrian Army and the aim is to remove Assad from power. For both, the matter is not only removing Assad from power, who are removing him and will have significant place in the political decisions in the future of Syria after Assad is more important while several ethnic groups and religions are living in Syria with having different ideological backgrounds and each of them rather than their own internal interest, they are under the influence of other regional powers and implementing their politics.
Saudi’s fear over the future of Syria is they don’t want to see the same scenario happened In Iraq when United Sates invaded Iraq and removed Saddam from power in 2003, which led to changing a Sunni government to establishing a Shia government in Iraq and after a decade it realized that the government of Iraq is totally under the influence of Iran, the balance of power in the region changed and it made the tensions between these two rivalry countries increased in the region. And now Iran has wider role in Iraq particularly and generally in the region after US withdrew their military in Iraq in 2011.
after all diplomatic efforts and supporting Free Syrian Army by Saudi Arabia, all these supports and efforts were not effective in removing Assad from power while other regional powers such as Iran is supporting Assad regime itself and Iran backed groups such as Hizboolah and Iraqi Shia volunteers which they are fighting alongside Assad against the Saudi backed groups. And after the Russian intervention in Syria to help Assad, almost all the Saudi backed groups were targeted too besides ISIS.
Assad was almost close to loose Damascus, the Capital, when the Free Syrian Army was successfully expanding and gaining more lands on Assad’s account near Damascus and having FSA activities in some quarters inside Damascus since the beginning of the classes
The FSA advances near Damascus, even made Iran to ask for the Russian support. In a secret visit to Moscow in July 2015 as reported by Reuters General Qasem Soliemani, the commander of Iranian Qudis force since 1998 cleverly persuaded Moscow to intervene in Syria with supporting Assad by Airstrikes on FSA and ISIS. He showed with a map the real dangers on Assad regime and explaining the possibilities to change and reverse all these defeats in the interest of Assad with the Russian support.
In September 2015, Russia started to send combat aircrafts to the Russian military base in Lathakia, a city on the north cost of Syria and the important district for Alawites, and increased the military personnel up to 2.000.
Just with the first few months, the Russian airstrikes saved Damascus and Lathakia from Free Syrian Army and gradually losing more controlled cities and weakened them in a way that made Saudi to threaten Assad with the direct intervention and support FSA with antitank missiles according Frank Gardner, BBC correspondent, Saudi officials confirmed the delivery of 500 TOW antitank missiles to Free Syrian Army after hundreds of FSA and other affiliated rebels killed in the process of retaking the cities under the control of FSA In northern of Hama district by regime tanks with the support of Russian airstrikes.
In December of 2015 Saudi Arabia announced an anti-terror coalition by 34 Muslim countries in Riyadh, as it claimed in the announcement that the coalition is for humanitarian affairs while Syrian people are suffering, the human rights violated by Assad and to save the international peace and security.
According to Adam Withnall’s article from Independent newspaper “Saudi Arabia assembles 34 Muslim country coalition to fight ‘terrorism’ – but there’s no mention of Isis” the coalition aim is not to fight ISIS while the region is suffering from ISIS terrorism
As it mentioned in the announcement that the alliance is to protect the Muslim nations from any sect from terror while the alliance doesn’t include none of the important Muslim countries such as Iran and Iraq and any other Shia dominant governments or even Syria itself as a Muslim country.
Although the rivalry, strategic and geopolitical competitions between Saudi Arabia and Iran have historical background in power and influence over Middle East, but the political relations between these two countries through recent history have never been like after the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003 when Sunni Arab minority had been weaker and destitute in ruling the country.
3.1.3 Turkey
Location of Syria, and Syria culturally, socially economically is very important for Turkey as Syria was ruling by Ottoman Empire and after the collapse of the Empire which resulted in establishing new countries on the lands in Middle East were under the control of the Empire. Turkey is established in 1923 by Kemalist revolution during 1918-1927 with the leadership of one of the three top leaders of the movement, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk . During this period Syria was occupied by French and in 24 October 1946 the Join UN/French mandate ended.
Christopher Philips in his report “Turkey and Syria” explaining the roots of the conflicts between Turkey and Syria as he writes “After the establishment, Turkey culturally and politically orientated towards Europe rather than its former territories and changing Arabic script to Latin. When Syria got independence from France in 1946, promoted the idea that the historical enemy of Syria is Turkey due to Ottoman Empire ruling Syria for centuries, and one of the reasons for promoting that was giving the Syrian district of Alexandretta, Hatay district nowadays to Turkey”.
The relations remained same or worse by Hafiz Al Assad’s support PKK, Kurdistan Workers Party and requesting for more share in Euphrates water flow from Turkey to Syria due to low inflow by Dam projects on the River inside Turkey and conflicts over Hatay District. The PKK Leader, Abdulla Ocelan was sheltered in Syria till 1998 when Turkey threatened Syria by invading if they provide shelter to him anymore, Syria obliged Ocelan to leave the country.
From 2003, When Tayeb Erdogan became the prime minister of Turkey, for the first time a conservative and Islamic party in Turkey started to rule since the establishment of the country. With the policy of “Zero problems with neighbors” , Turkey policy changed from isolation form the Arab world and middle east problems towards being a key political player and regional power with going closer and establishing new relations with Muslim Arab countries. Good economic and political relations established between Turkey and Syria.
It seemed that the importance of the location of Syria for Turkey with a new policy of the country which is making the previous conflicts zero and establishing political and economic relations with Arab Gulf countries needs a tide relation with Syria. This reflected in The Turkish President’s visit Abdulla Gull to Syria in 2009 when he stated “Syria is Turkey’s door to the Middle East, and Turkey is a gateway to Europe for Syria”.
Turkey’s interest was keeping Syria united and stopping the violence, due to havening Kurdish minorities in the north of Syria that may gain more freedom and power or violence crosses the borders to Turkey. In August 2011, Foreign Minister of Turkey Davutoglu visited Damascus and with 7 hours of meeting and consultation with Assad to stop the violence and repression against Syrian people, the outcome was not effective and Turkey foreign policy towards Syria changed for the first time in November 2011 when the Prime Minister, Erdogan called for Assad’s removal
SNC, the Syrian National Council established by the Syrian opposition and mostly previous Syrian Muslim brotherhood or affiliated in November 2012 in Istanbul, and Turkey were giving sanctuary to the defectors including previous high ranks in authority, military and politicians. Syria’s response to that was retaliating through using PKK card by letting PYD. to control the Kurdish inhabited areas in the north of Syria alongside with the Turkish borders and threatening to cut all the Turkish business and economic ties with Arabian counties ran through Syria while this young business and trade relation just started when Development and Justice Party came to power in Turkey. Before that Turkey’s policy and relations was towards West due to economical and poetical interest from the both sides. West supported Turkey in order to be kept from external communist influence and the movements inside too, and from the other hand it was Turkey’s dream towards these relations with West.
In 2012 the business and trade relation between Turkey and Syria totally halted, and Turkey lost the inland connection to Arab World and Arabian Gulf countries. For compensating the Turkish business in Syria, Turkey had another option to increase, develop and strengthen business relation with KRG , Kurdistan Regional Government in Iraq, as Christopher Philips mentioned in his briefing paper Turkey reached an understanding with KRG president Masoud Barzani to make the booming area (KRG) to a major market for Turkish goods . Although Turkey relations started earlier with KRG in North of Iraq in constructing roads, buildings and other projects. In 2014 Turkey and KRG signed a 50 years deal which obliges Kurdistan Region to export oil only through Turkey which obliges KRG to go back to Turkey for political resolutions apart from getting benefit from the Kurdish oil. This reflected when KRG closed the Iraqi-Syrian border on PYD in North of Syria while they were in fight and seized by Islamic State from South and having closed border in the north by Turkey. At the same time Turkey allowed KRG military to enter Kobani through Turkey to help Kurdish people when they were seized by Islamic State for two months. While Turkey didn’t allow thousands of Kurds from Turkey to cross the border to help YPG to defend Kobani.
This was a clear message from Turkey to Syrian Kurds that prefers and accepts KRG policy or generally Kurds in Iraq but belonging to PKK or having the same ideology is not accepted. Turkey doesn’t have fear from the Kurds in Northern Iraq because the region economically depends on Turkey especially with the completion of oil pipeline in 2003 from Erbil to Ceyhan port in Turkey which increased the tensions between KRG and central government in Baghdad due to exporting oil independently, through this Turkey can make political and economic pressure on KRG in order to work with Turkey in fighting against and isolating PKK.
With strong defense by PKK affiliated YPG and YPJ and re-controlling the occupied lands from ISIS in North of Syria, YPG became a valuable partner in fighting against ISIS for both US-Led Coalition and Russia. It increased the Turkey’s fear from the international support to Kurds in Syria in fight against ISIS will became an opportunity for the Kurds to have a safe haven similar what happened in 1991 when US and UK established no fly zone in the north of Iraq and led to a de facto autonomous Kurdish region. This encouraged Turkey to intensify aid and support for the rebels such as FSA in order to become more valuable character in fighting Assad and ISIS and gaining more lands instead of the Kurds. One of the reasons for Turkey to hesitate in participating in US-Led coalition against ISIS.
Turkey first tried to confront YPG as emerging threat on Turkey through supporting KDP as Ankara has tide relation and has a decade of experience in supporting KDP against PKK as two historical rivals, to send 5000 Syrian Kurds trained by KDP to Syria in order to change the balance of power in North of Syria with interest of Ankara. Lack of political and armed presence inside Syria for this force trained by KDP this strategy failed and led Ankara to support the Islamic groups such as Ahrar Al- Sham and Turkmen groups in order to gain control of Northern Syria.
ISIS, Islamic State in Iraq and Sham emerged in 2013 in Syria and in 2014 captured large areas of Northern Part of Syria, became the strongest rebel groups with radical Islamic ideology and calling for establishing Islamic caliphate. In June 2014 attacked Mosul, the second largest city in North of Iraq and controlled the city by attacking through Syria and after 5 days kidnapped the Turkish diplomats by seizing the Turkish Consulate in the city including Consular and the staff . Later in September in an ambiguous deal ISIS released the 49 Turkish hostages as The Guardian quoted from Anadolu Agency news “no ransom had been paid and” and “no conditions were accepted in return for their release”.
Turkey refused to join the US-Led coalition against ISIS when announced in 10 September 2014 due to having Turkish hostages by ISIS and even refused to host the Anti-ISIS coalition forces. Once the military situations on the ground were changing opposite to Ankara interests such as announcement of the three Cantons in the North of Syria in 2013 which YPG gained control over the lands with the air support from the US-Led coalition as the leader of PYD declared as self-governance for the Kurds, Geographically the declared Cantons were separate and there was no connections between till they re-controlled the territories between Cizire and Kobani Canton. Turkey warned the Kurds in advancing more and set crossing the Euphrates River as red line. For several times Turkish officials consisted on that and repeated again last was Davutoglu’s speech in an interview with AHaber Tv. He stated “We have said 'PYD will not cross west of the Euphrates, we will hit them the moment they do' and we have struck them twice". while for Kurds crossing the river and linking Afrin Canton is vital.
Turkey’s main fear for the military and political situations in Syria is all the political and economic relations with Syria’s Assad halted due to Turkey’s insistent on removing Assad while after 5 years of regional and international efforts and military support to the opposition groups, Assad has not removed and even becoming stronger in defeating the opposition groups by getting benefit from the Russian intervention. And from the other hand Kurds exploited the situation to their interest by fighting ISIS as the most effective force on the ground currently in Syria by getting benefit from the international efforts to encounter ISIS. This increases the Turkey’s fear that having autonomous and safe region for the Kurds in North of Syria widens the ambition of separate among the Kurds inside Turkey.
Since 2012, Turkey was calling for no-fly zone inside Syria in Aleppo district bordered with Turkey, exactly between Kobani and Afrain Canton. This call for International actions towards the Syrian crises step by step softened especially when Erdogan during a visit to Germany in October 2012 when he stated “This subject is something for the UN Security Council to decide, If the UN hasn't made this decision, we have no authority, no right to declare such a zone in northern Syria."
Germany was the only actor among the great powers and NATO members who appreciated the Turkish call for establishing no fly-zone when Angela Merkel the German chancellor stated in welcoming Erdogan in February 2016 for refugee talks. And United States continuously rejecting the Turkish proposal for establish a no-fly zone for keeping the civilians from Assad regime air attacks, despite having different efforts by United States.
The goal of the no-fly zone idea for Turkey is mainly to reduce the migrant flow from Syria to Turkey which currently hosts around 2.5 million Syrian refugees, exploiting the proposed no-fly zone to create the direct contact and support for Anti-Assad rebels which leads them to be stronger and keep from the air strikes by Assad and also to abort the PYD plan in linking the Cantons. Turkey intensively tried the proposal will be approved by UN and west powers even used the Syrian refugees as a pressure card on Europe to accept the proposal, suddenly in 2015 hundreds of thousands of refugees arrived Greece via Turkey route . In February 2016 President of Turkey, Erdogan in a speech threatened Europe to send millions of refugees in Turkey to Europe, as quoted from The Guardian newspaper “he confirmed that he had threatened the EU leaders in the summit meeting in November 2015 that Turkey could say “goodbye” to the refugees” and he said “We do not have the word ‘idiot’ written on our foreheads”.