It was only a matter of time until the Haya’t Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) gunmen of Syria’s post-Bashar al-Assad interim government took violence against non-Sunni Muslims into their own hands.

Reports emerged early on March 9 about large-scale round-ups, home invasions and subsequent street executions of Alawite Syrians in the Alawi heartland of Syria’s Latakia and Tartous governorates. On March 6–7, over a thousand Alawis members of the former ruling Alawite sect — a schismatic branch of Shia Islam — were, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, executed by HTS fighters and associated al-Qaeda-affiliated gunmen, including foreign fighters. The International Committee of the Red Cross has called for access to allow medical and humanitarian relief to be given to the survivors.

The scale and nature of this Alawite execution are reminiscent of the large-scale murders carried out by the Islamic State in the Levant (ISIL) during its 2017 insurgency in Iraq and Syria. Witness reports say that the HTS-led executions were carried out by both Syrian extremist militiamen and foreign fighters who are now again revealing their religious extremism.

Path to end Syria’s religious wars

Looting of homes, workplaces and shops added to the violent mayhem which Syria’s de facto leader Abu Mohammed al-Jolani (now known as Ahmed al-Sharaa) must stop and punish to be able to say that his path is towards peace and inclusion. He and his cabinet have yet to take material measures to discipline and disarm those persons and groups who perpetrated the killings. But he has urged militants not to abuse people. Notably, he has blamed former regime fighters for starting the incident which spread over a wide area along with fighters “unaffiliated” with the interim government. The United Nations appears shocked at the fighting.

The Syrian civil war may have begun in 2011 with public discontent with the Assad regime, its corruption and egotistical violence of those military, police and other officials allowed to carry it out. It did not take long before ISIS and al-Qaeda affiliated Sunni jihadists turned towards Syria from Iraq bringing weapons and a religious war against the Alawite regime.

There is little doubt that HTS extremist fighters wanted to crush the Alawites and command the country. Aside from a few cases of inter-sectarian Muslim cooperation against foreign coalition forces, the post-2004 Iraq insurgency increasingly split along sectarian lines. Attacks against civilians, shrines and notables, and the formation of self-defense and aggressive militias were almost entirely Sunni Muslims acting against Shia Muslims. Al-Sharaa was part of this ISIS-affiliated insurgency; he went to gaol (prison) and then to Syria to continue the war against non-Sunnis.

The post-2011 Libyan revolution situation is being repeated in Syria. Disarmament, demobilization and reintegration face a grave and likely violent path. Most of Syria’s 60 to 70 armed groups will want enrichment from the barrel of a gun before they even consider the alternative: collaboration with al-Sharaa. By agreeing to merge into what will be a factionalized and unsettled new Syrian army, these extremist militias would lose their independence and bargaining power.

Any national reconciliation process cannot advance while non-Sunni Muslim religious sects or non-Arabs face terror and extortion. Post-conquest Syrian retribution and expropriation — that is, murder, theft of property, kidnapping and enslavement — will surely follow what now is the expected path just as it did in Yemen, Libya, Sudan and regions of Iraq.

State of Western aid 

The West is in a bind. EU leaders’ early remarks to Syria’s leadership conditioned aid assistance on adherence to and implementation of a long list of governance principles and methods. Some of these are more specific than respect for and inclusion of minorities, unity of Syria, commitments against terrorism and neighborly peacefulness. From early January, there were calls to remove global terrorist listings against HTS and its leaders to assist aid delivery and political interaction. Such delistings cannot reasonably go ahead unless Syria’s leaders initiate steps to transparentize the internal situation and work against violence.

The United States has stalled aid which reduces the West’s internal and external leverage over Syrian regime management and progressive emergence of civil society.

The US aid freeze and possibly permanent cuts also threaten the ability of the Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) coalition to maintain guard over dozens of camps holding ISIL captives and their civilian supporters, as well as displaced persons. HTS fighters may well try to storm camps to release former colleagues and their families. Such attacks have happened before, such as in 2022. The SDF itself faces pressure from Turkey and now the HTS regime in Damascus, who appear to see Syria’s Kurds as an obstacle to its state control rather than a social component with which a durable modus vivendi must be reached.

Al-Sharaa’s next move toward peace

Al-Sharaa moved quickly on the idea of a national dialogue, using terms well-known to these processes. This rushed move was also botched with relatively wide but rapid, unprepared consultations prior to a National Dialogue Conference of 600 delegates over a single two-day session, which ended on February 25.

This pace and depth were not adequate for a split society to find a path ahead after 14 years of violent civil war. Views on its effectiveness were split. The dialogue process will need to be revisited and continued even after the somewhat delayed announcement of a new interim government is made this March.

Al-Jolani, formerly an al-Qaeda extremist commander, now sees real evidence that he exists in a jungle and its predators need to be controlled. He may not be able to do this by disarming his militant fighters still keen to exact revenge, nor may he succeed by assaulting possible Assad loyalists. His main path is to outrun these groups by use of real inclusion of all Syrians in the hope of a safer and secure future. Simultaneously, he seeks to demonstrate, where he can, an ability to suppress and divert violence by previously useful but now so-called “unaffiliated” Sunni extremists.

[Lee Thompson-Kolar edited this piece.]

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy.