The Bridge with Peter Mansbridge - Syria -- Why This Story Affects Us All - Encore

Episode Date: December 11, 2024

An encore of Syria's Assad government fell and the dictator fled the country.  What happens now and who will pick up the pieces?

And hello there, Peter Mansbridge here. It's time for your Encore Wednesday episode, and we're not going back far, just two days, to Monday's episode of The Bridge, which featured, as it always does on Mondays, Dr. Janice Stein. The question and the issue was Syria. Rapid change in Syria, perhaps one of the most significant events this century in the Middle East. So we wanted to talk to Janice Stein about that and give you basically an understanding of what happened, how it happened. Lots is going to change in Syria in the next little while. So this is kind of the basis for your understanding of the story there. Enjoy.

And hello there. It's our regular Monday episode with Dr. Janice Stein from the Munk School at the University of Toronto. And I know many of you look forward to this because Janice is able to kind of walk us through some of the significant changes that have been happening in our world in these last couple of years. And perhaps this one is the most significant. It's not often that Janice gets so excited to tell us a story that she's just amazed at what's happened. She didn't see it coming.

Now, when you sort of look back at these last 10 years in Syria, you can say, well, you know, things were starting to shift. But this, what happened this past weekend and happened so quickly has left the experts going, what happens now? What's going to happen next? This could have enormous implications.

And we're going to get to that in a moment. And it's a lot of new stuff for many of us, including Janice. And there are times, especially at the beginning of this interview, where we've got to say, like, slow down. Okay, this is all new. We've got to walk carefully through this. And we do, and I think you'll find it really interesting. But first, as we always say on Mondays, a little housekeeping to do.

And a couple of things to be thinking about as we go into this week. And the main one being what the question of the week is. Now, let me tell you as a preface, I get a lot of mail. I don't know, a couple of hundred at least, emails a week from listeners from you, many of you with answers to the question of the week, but also many of you with just thoughts about the program, ideas about topics we could discuss.

And I want to tell you, I read everything. I don't, I literally don't have time to reply to everything. Certainly in the kind of detail that many of you talk about in your letters. But I want you to know I read them and they do influence me. Sometimes I'll get into a back and forth with some listeners, which is all good. We don't have to agree on everything. And, you know, often we don't. And that's okay. Because, as I've said before, it makes us think. Anyway, in the mail last week came this letter with an idea. One that I think is a pretty good one.

I think all your ideas are great. But I don't have time to deal with all of them. I guess is what I'm saying. Anyway, this one comes from Jane Fitzwilliam. Where's she from? Oh, she's from Toronto. And this was after last week's question about what is a journalist, right? Where we had lots of your answers.

Didn't mention this one. Jane says, a journalist is an impartial observer of current events who take multiple actions to ensure that they are not a participant in the story. Good point. We have numerous editorialists,

podcasters, entertainment personalities that do not take the serious responsibility of seeking truth over doctrine or advantage. And then, Jane says, that was a great question. I'd love to hear another one now. And you know what, Jane? We're going to take your advice.

And this is going to be the question for this week. It's in so many ways a natural follow to last week's What is a Journalist? This week the question is, what is a politician? You know, we talked about how the definition of a journalist seems to have changed over these last years as a result of the changes in technology, the changes of the kind of news landscape, the changes in the way we handle news. But what about politicians?

What is a politician in today's world? And is it any significantly different than it was a generation ago? So there's your question for this week. What is a politician? You have until Wednesday at 6 p.m. Eastern time to answer it. Keep it short. Include your name and the location you're writing from. And send your answers to themansbridgepodcast at gmail.com.

themansbridgepodcast at gmail.com. What is a politician? Good question, Jane. We're asking it now. Okay, today's program. Let's get to Dr. Janice Stein and this situation that we've witnessed at breakneck speed over the weekend. Here we go. Dr. Janice Stein from the Munk School at the University of Toronto.

So Janice, you know, governments don't get overthrown every week, and usually there's a buildup to these things. But this one, you know, in a sense there was a buildup over a number of years. But in many ways, this happened in like two weeks. How did it happen like that? You know, it's really an astonishing story. And it surprised all the regular Middle East watchers, including me, how fast this was. And this story actually, of course, starts with the Arab Spring Muslim movements that were trying to throw Assad failed. And they failed because Russia intervened from the air and started bombing.

And then Iran and Hezbollah made a crucial decision. They were going to send in really well-trained guys on the ground. And so Assad survived this, but he never really regained full control of the country. And to bring us up to today, in the northeast of the country where nobody was really paying a lot of attention, the Kurds, the beleaguered Kurds established an autonomous regime and managed to survive and thrive.

And of course, that just infuriates Erdogan in Turkey continuously because he, the majority, a large number of Kurds live in Turkey as well as in Syria and some in Iran. And Erdogan sees Turkish Kurds as a mortal threat to his regime. It's a longstanding Turkish problem, but Erdogan is particularly militant. So that enclave sitting there in the northeast always bothered him. So in the northwest of the country, at the other side of the country,

but in the northwest, there's another group. There's two of them. And one is called the Syrian interim government. And these are Turkish-backed militants that Erdogan has sent over the border to secure that part of the Turkish-Syrian border to prevent the Kurds from moving further west. And right next to him, right next to these groups, was Jelani and the Tahrir al-Shah. They coexisted in the northeast.

It's inconceivable, Peter, that they would have broken out like this, Jelani, without Turkish support. The government of Turkey has really, they're on the ground. They get great real-time information. And they're advanced fingerprints, frankly, all over this. So I think the first thing that is going to be on the agenda to the Kurds in the West, survive this. Yeah. Right?

Yeah. And that's where American forces are in the West with the Kurds. That's where those 900 American troops are. They are squarely within Erdogan's sight right now. And in fact, some of those Turkish militias have already started to move east to launch an offensive against the Kurds in the West. That's going to take place in the north of the country,

away from the spotlight, away from the media that are on the West. That's going to take place in the north of the country, away from the spotlight, you know, away from the media that are on the ground. But that's a big story coming over the next few weeks for sure. Okay. Let me stop you for a minute, because you've thrown a lot at us here, and, you know, we're trying to understand this. It's an incredible story that sort of, for most of us, came out of nowhere, right?

You're right, the buildup over the last 10 years since the Arab Spring, I can remember there was a time at which we thought Assad was going to fall back then. And I can remember, you know, the great Neil Macdonald telling us, Assad's not going to fall back then and i can remember you know the great neil mcdonald telling us sod's not going to fall now it's a you know do you you guys think everything collapses right away that's not going to collapse right away not in serious and he was right he was right at the time there is absolutely no doubt about it but obviously uh over the last 10 years a lot of things have happened and you've named some of them you you you mentioned Jelani a number of times.

It's a name we're going to have to get used to that we didn't know of a week ago. Abu Muhammad al-Jelani is basically the leader of one element of this that's taken over. What do we know about him? He's really, really interesting. There's a really interesting story. First of all, that's what we call a war name that the leaders assume. Al-Jalani means from the Golan. So from the Golan Heights. So you could see how this story is going to connect up.

He was originally a member of Al-Qaeda, militant Islamist. No question about it, that's where his roots are. But about 2017, around then, broke with Al-Qaeda, claimed that they were too extremist, that they would never attract allies. And his signature stamp on this is what he calls the importance of governing. So during these years that he's in this small pocket in the northwest corner he trained his people to collect taxes uh to stand up schools to stand up health clinics you know wearing a hijab in that part of which is the covering that

really observant muslim women it's not mandatory. He did not make it mandatory. Unlike, for instance, in Iran, where we've seen women beaten because they don't. Most women do. I was watching the pictures of the fighters that were in the chiefs as they rolled into Damascus yesterday. Some of them did not have beards. And I look for those things because they are kind of the, you know, the body language of a militant organization like this.

He has told his men as they came through, do not attack Christians or Druze. And Druze are another minority don't fire your guns in the air because you're going to scare civilians and when they came into Damascus again consistent with this governance theme don't take over any of the institutions other than the radio station we will have a formal transfer of power

from the Prime Minister who's still there. So we haven't seen this before, Peter, when we think about all the other Islamist groups that we've watched over the last 15 years. And there's an argument that he learned something from the failure of Al-Qaeda and ISIS, which was so bloody and brutal. He has governed for 10 years.

And Syria is a multi-ethnic state, frankly, with Christians, Druze, Sunni, Shia. And if you don't want one more brutal round of civil war, you have to bring other elements of the coalition in. That's what we're seeing in 24 hours now. I don't want to provide false optimism after 24 hours, but it sure is different. So much has changed in a few hours. Who knows what's going to change in the next 24 or 48 hours.

So we'll be careful about what we try to forecast. But I found you learn something every time I listen to you. And I did not realize the significance of names to places where people came from. So Al-Ghalani comes from the Golan Heights. Right. Which he may be moderate in his actions, certainly compared with what we've seen in the past from al-Qaeda and ISIS. But it's clearly got the Israelis concerned because they've already moved into or they're moving into a kind of buffer zone between the Golan and Syria. So they must be concerned about what's happening.

Well, they are. There's no question they are. Before he moved out, before this last 10 days when all this happened, Jelani wanted to organize a big commemorative event in honor of Yaya Simar. So that would not have escaped Israeli attention for sure. So the real question is, are they going to focus on building a government in Syria, which is huge, the problem? This is a country that's really, frankly, been devastated.

It was, you know, half a million people dead and dispersed as a result of the last brutal round of the Syrian civil war. And we saw something, Peter, which always strikes me. I don't know if you've watched any pictures, but the Syrian army, Assad's army, they didn't fight. Yeah, it reminded me of what happened in Afghanistan in the summer, a couple of summers ago, when the Afghan army basically said, we're out of here. We're gone. We're not going to fight. And clearly, Assad's army chose the same thing. I mean, this march through the different cities up to Damascus was a walk in the park.

It absolutely was. So why? These are really poorly paid soldiers. You know, Syria's been impoverished. It is not the Syria that it was 15 years ago. How do you buy loyalty in an army and buy is the right word here?

You pay your soldiers really well. You know, in those last desperate hours, Assad decides he's going to increase the salaries of the Syrian army by 50%. That was 24 hours before he left the country. That really tells you everything you need to know. So this is, the army has collapsed.

So there's a big security problem right away. Right? In the big cities. Again, Jelani is not doing what we've seen, what the Americans did when they came into Baghdad, frankly. Right. He has not dismissed all the officials. He's told them that they will be safe, that if they agree to work with his government, they will not be prosecuted, and that there'll be an orderly transition. The prime minister, who worked for Assad all these years, is still there. There's a picture of him getting into a

car, so who knows? But they've made clear that they want an orderly transition and they are not going after the officials of the former government. That army situation, you know, in terms of what all those soldiers do now, I appreciate the difference you did put between what happened in Iraq when the Americans moved in. They basically fired everybody. But part of the problem for the Americans there was that everyone in the army was dismissed, so they didn't have a job.

They didn't have any money. Yep. These guys have fled. They burned their uniforms, the whole bed. So one assumes they're not going to get paid. So you have that problem too, because we're not talking about insignificant numbers here. It's a huge problem.

It's a huge problem because all these, they know how to fire a gun. They're not going to get paid. If you don't give these ex-army guys, frankly, a way back in to get jobs and support their families, they become the charband of discontent in a society. And then before you know it, you have an insurgency going on. And he doesn't have a lot of time to get that organized. So that alone, the fact that the Syrian army melted away, no uniforms, don't know who they are, don't know where they are, and they're unpaid, that's a point of tremendous vulnerability for the new government. something about providing food and clean water to the civilian

populations that are destabilized by this, that's for sure. I want to get to the other kind of losers in this in a second, but first of all just tell me about Syria.

There clearly was a time that Syria was a rich country. What is it rich from? Is it oil? Is it resources? What is it? It's rich because if you look at its geography up here, it is absolutely, it a stride the trade routes from all of Asia

could cross over through Iraq through Syria use the ports on the Syrian coast and you go right through the Mediterranean and you go through Europe so it was a trading center for, you know, thousands of years, frankly. You know, the great Caliphates were there. They were there for a reason. These were rich, rich Muslim societies with enormous, you know, authority because they were rich enough to support all the scholarship.

They had some of the greatest institutions and they were the transit point, the entry point for European goods that would come by sea and go across land to Asia. That brings me to the countries that are the big losers in this, or it seemed to be at this moment anyway over this last couple of days, the big losers, and those would be Iran. Speaking of using Syria as a land bridge, they've done that for years, moving stuff to Hezbollah in Lebanon, but also Russia and also Hezbollah seem to be the three big losers here who could do nothing to prop up Assad in the final days of his regime.

And they could have, right? They could have. So let's start with Iran. Just astonishing, Peter. And this is where this is connected to the Israel-Palestine conflict and to what went on between Israel and Hezbollah and Israel and Iran since August the loss of Syria to Iran

that was the core strategy for Iran for the last 25 years. It was fundamental to the axis of resistance, because where was that axis? It was Iranian militias in Iraq, which are still intact. But then it was, Hezbollah was the building block for an enormous investment. And the Iranians propped up Assad as well. And there's a long history of friendship between Iran and Syria because Assad was ostracized in those years after the civil war,

but the relationship goes back even further. Iranis have 48 hours. They could have told whatever active ground units there still are in Hispala, and there are, this is it. You have to go and fight now because otherwise we lose everything. They didn't. In fact, they emptied out their embassy, which is always assigned to everybody. When you start evacuating the dependents in the embassy, Everybody else knows the game is over, right?

That's one of the first things that intelligence agencies watch for when their wives and the children are told to leave and go home. They evacuated their embassy and did nothing. I'm astonished. Now, why? The only way to explain this is that last Israeli strike against Iran, in which they took out all their air defenses, which leaves the Iranians vulnerable to any kind of Israeli airstrike until Russia can replace those air defenses. And Russia can't right now.

It doesn't have enough. It's using them in its war with Ukraine. It cannot resupply in the short term. And the Israelis took out a nuclear research station. That was a signal to the Iranians. So they do not feel they can take the risk right now. They are so vulnerable and so exposed, they did not take the risk. Plus, one more thing happened, which 10 days ago, there were two private Iranian aircraft that were overflying Syria on their way to deliver munitions to Hezbollah.

Israeli fighters, jet fighters scrambled and told those planes to turn around and go back to Iran. Because otherwise they would shoot them down if they tried to land and offload the military equipment and the Iranian aircraft turned around. You know, this is such an incredible situation to be looking at and watching the chess pieces on the board moving around here. You've got Netanyahu in serious political trouble domestically for a lot of different reasons to go back some time and his own personal future and whether he ends up in jail or not. And yet, in this last, since about September, militarily, everything's gone its way. Yeah. Everything.

Everything. Everything. You know, in two months, the whole strategic balance in that part of the Middle East completely changed. The Iranian access of resistance, 25-year investment, gone. And by the way, Hezbollah, which is a Shia militia, right? Jalani has no interest in them.

They're Sunni. You cannot supply Hezbollah through the air right now because of what we just talked about. And you can't supply them on the ground because Syria, as you said earlier, Peter, that's a crucial transit route to supply Hezbollah that Iran used for 20 years. So access to resistance is gone. Rearming Hezbollah now, it's going to be extraordinarily difficult. So the whole Iranian investment, there is no Iranian, the easiest way to put this, there is no longer a meaningful Iranian presence anywhere on Israel's borders.

So you're Jelani, you're al-Jelani here for a moment, and the two allies of your country, at least for the last 10 or 20 years, Iran and Russia, abandoned the person they were allied to. You don't have any deep-seated thinking towards being allied with them because they've been your enemy, basically, for the last little while. So who do you turn to if you're al-Jilani? Because his country's a mess. Well, the first call will be Erdogan and Istanbul. There's no question about it. You know, Jelani lived next door. They were close neighbors to those Turkish-backed militias

that Erdogan pushed across the border to secure that border. That's one for sure. Really bizarre politics going on here. It was a message that allegedly, allegedly, I just saw the tape, allegedly,

that's why I'm saying allegedly four times here, Peter. One of the militants taped in which he said to the Israelis, we are not your enemies and we don't want to fight with you. Now, could it be a deep fight? Of course it could. So that's why I'm very careful. But that really says they're going to be focused on securing their position in

Syria. They have to. It is so factionalized and so embittered by what happened. Russia doesn't have the resources to meet the financial demands that they will require. That money is all in the Gulf. It's in Saudi Arabia. It's in Abu Dhabi. But the Gulf and Egypt are the three countries

that worry most about the Muslim Brotherhood and Islamic Jihad, especially the Gulf, because they feel that is their security nightmare. So they are going to be very, very, very careful about providing financial resources. I don't think with under President Donald Trump, the United States is going to get involved.

So this is going to be very, very tough to get the financial support to do this. If Turkey moves in there as a, you know, increased area of influence for them, does that make Israel more nervous, less nervous, or about the same as it's been? I think it makes them more nervous. There is a very, very tense relationship between Netanyahu and Erdogan. Rhetoric at times has escalated through the roof. But we've also, underneath that rhetoric, and Erdogan appeals to the domestic audience too, you know, Turkey is still somewhat divided between a secular minority that comes,

that's part of Turkish history for 100 years, and a Muslim majority right now in the big cities that Erdogan has been able to mobilize. So part of what you hear from Erdogan is a response to domestic politics. I will say this about Erdogan. He's surrounded by very professional, experienced group of political advisors who, to put it really elegantly, make deals. He's probably, I think, the most sophisticated in tailoring his rhetoric when he needs to in order to get what he wants. And I think the most interesting thing to watch over the next three or four weeks

as this group struggles to consolidate is Erdogan in public. And then the conversations that Erdogan has with Israelis, because that channel is always open. And let's not forget, Erdogan managed to beat back a coup. And it wasn't that long ago. It was three or four years ago. And it looked like he was done.

That's right. And within a matter of hours, he turned the whole situation around. Right. Which he blamed the United States for, let's not forget. Right. That's right. And I'm sure he has a long memory on that. Very long.

Okay, we're going to take a break, and then I'm going to bring it to Canada, because we have something to be thinking about on this story as well. Rather, not just the global picture of it, not just the geopolitics, but the question of refugees. And we'll bring that to the front right after this. And welcome back. You're listening to the Monday episode of The Bridge. That means Dr. Janice Stein from the Munk School, the University of Toronto. And we're talking about Syria and how what's happened in the last few days has kind of changed our look, certainly at that part of the world, but there are greater ramifications as well.

If you recall when the Syrian civil war took place, roughly 10 years ago, there was a huge movement of people refugees and they and it was basically the refugee story uh that enveloped a good chunk of europe literally millions of people uh moving away from the civil war in syria six million people. Pardon me? Six million. Six million. A third of the country. Tens of thousands ended up coming to Canada. And as so many of the refugee stories over our history have proven to be, in so many cases, great success stories. And you hear wonderful stories of community involvement and people, you and people opening restaurants and what have you in different parts of the country and how welcoming they have been received in many different communities. But this will now become an issue for Syrians who fled their country around the world about whether or not they want to go back.

Now, this is not the weekend to go back, really. There are problems there. But this becomes an issue, too, about, once again, the movement of people, this time going back, perhaps more so in Europe than it does here, certainly in numbers, but also in terms of feeling. When you say you fled to Greece or Germany or France or wherever it may be, it's a lot easier to consider going back from there. But it becomes part of the story too.

It's a huge story, Peter. It's a huge story. And I think all our listeners will remember Angela Merkel's taking in a million refugees, mainly from Syria and from Afghanistan at the time, and saying, we can do this. And looking back, that is probably what started the polarization in Germany, because it was a part of it, and she thought to do it. You know, we have, there are great stories of Syrian refugees, as always, in this country. You know, we have some that have gone through the monk school and are just extraordinary successes.

Here's an interesting thing, a fact about Canada, that when you're a refugee, you come to this country and you claim asylum. The average time that it takes for a refugee board to hear your claim and grant you Syrian refugees in Canada, to give them citizenship, to allow asylum claims. community has started to go through our official institutions. It would be inconceivable for any Syrian to leave without having some status because it would be such a risky thing to do. That's one part of the story. But here's the other part of the story.

What about those Syrian refugees who have not yet had a hearing before our refugee boards, and their whole claim for asylum rested on the fact that they were going to be prosecuted by the Assad regime. Right. And it leaves them without an argument, right? Leaves them without an argument, right? Leaves them without an argument. There's no documented record of Tayyar al-Hasham persecuting anyone because they were in that small corner.

So it will be much harder for any Syrian refugees. And there are many who have not yet had their claims heard because our refugee system is so, I'm going to put it this way, because our refugee system doesn't have enough officers to process the volume of claims that we have in this country. So we're very slow. Will the argument that some have spent, you know, five, six, seven years in this country and have planted roots here, not just family roots, but employment roots, will that mean something, quite apart from what may have happened in their old country?

A refugee board as opposed to, let's distinguish immigrants from refugees. Immigrants who go through our regular system. Refugees, which virtually everybody from the Syrian community was, as they streamed out, given the brutality of the violence of the al-Assad regime, came in as refugees. And for a refugee board, only one thing matters. You have to be able to show a well-founded claim that you will be persecuted if you return to your country of origin. So, you know, there's joyous celebrations in Damascus and in other parts of Syria. I imagine there are families, Syrian families

in Canada where it's finished with some alarm, too. Yeah. Your point about Germany is a good one because, you know, I was in Germany working on actually on this story about five years ago. And you could see the very clear roots of the polarization that you talk about and the rise of the right yeah uh again and it was all centered around this you know immigration issue but specifically about the syrian refugee problem and merkel's decision to allow in a million um which was lauded by the rest of the world

but at home it's not a popular move. I should add one other thing, Peter, for any Syrian families that are listening. Our Minister of Immigration has jurisdiction to override procedures and to unilaterally grant status. It's been used in the past, not with large numbers, but in individual cases. This is such an extraordinary story that is happening in real time. And so many, as you say, are such wonderful citizens of Canada with families here and kids in school

and contributors to Canadian society, it would not, I think, it would not be unheard of for a minister to step up under those circumstances and recognize that things shifted on the ground, but these people came here seven or eight years ago and have not had their claims heard. That's on us. You know, we've seen, perhaps not in these kind of numbers, but we've seen similar situations. You know, we saw it in Hungary in the 50s,

we saw it in Czechoslovakia in the 60s, we saw it with the boat people in the 70s. Did governments at that time? Well, you see, what's different here is that in hungary in the 50s and slovakia and even ukraine there's no change at home which makes it possible for them to go home the game changer here is that there is a new regime that has displaced the oppressor that these people fled that's what makes this unique so we'll have to see what the minister does when these first cases come through. What will probably happen here, Peter?

There might be one Syrian family whose hearing is two months from now, and some board follows the rules and says, well, we can't affirm your well-documented fear of persecution because there's a different government, and deny somebody's status, then they will appeal. Here's the last question, and you've been generous with your time today. We've gone well over where we usually go, but here's the last

question. What are you looking for in the next hours or days as to where this story is going to point? Is there, first of all, does that meeting with Assad's prime minister take place? And is there an orderly transition of power? Is there a handshake? Secondly, does Jelani reassure all the civil servants who are not in the army that their jobs are safe?

And thirdly, does he move as aggressively as he can to provide financial assistance and food to the big cities where the army has likely melted away. If he can do those three things and reassure the minorities that he has learned from the mistakes of others, yes, this will be a Muslim regime, an Islamic regime, but it will welcome Christians, it will welcome Jews, and he has no interest in any war with his neighbors.

As Syria rebuilds itself, if he can strike that tone, I think he will have accomplished a great deal. It's also an opportunity for some countries outside to help him out on that war. Yes, yes. It's tricky, given his past and his associations. It's a bit of a dilemma, too, for other governments. Well, you know, I can just imagine our own.

I'm sure there's some people inside our government who say, this is a moment to support. We've broken the old pattern, so they're gone, right? And when you do that, Peter, when you break apart very, very entrenched 25 year patterns, of course there's an opportunity, but are you going to take

the political risk? Because there's political risk, we both know. There sure is. Okay, we're going to leave it at that for this week. It keeps keeps happening who knows where we'll be seven days from now are you hoping for a quiet christmas yeah i don't think that's gonna happen um janice thanks so much we'll talk to you in seven days dr janice stein with another amazing week of conversation on our ever-changing world.

It just seems, I don't know, I guess it's always been like this to some degree, but it just seems that what we've witnessed in the last year, two years, three years, especially in that kind of corner of the world, Middle East plus Ukraine, Russia, what we're witnessing in the Pacific Rim, Taiwan Straits. Oh, this is a dicey time. Very, very difficult. Well, thanks for that.

Our Encore episode, just going back two days to Monday's episode with Dr. Janice Stein on the situation in Syria. Hope you enjoyed it. Hope you learned from it. We'll be back tomorrow with Thursday's new edition. That, of course, being your turn and the Random Ranter. Bye for now.