BEIRUT: With the fall of the Daesh group’s last significant stronghold in Syria, Iranian and Russian-backed Syrian troops now turn to face off with their main rival, the US-backed forces holding large oil fields and strategic territory in the country’s north and east.
The complicated map puts US and Iranian forces at close proximity, just across the Euphrates River from each other, amid multiple hotspots that could turn violent, particularly in the absence of a clear American policy.
There are already signs.
Iran threatened last week that Syrian troops will advance toward Raqqa, the former Daesh capital, which fell to the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces in October, raising the potential for a clash there. The Kurdish-led SDF also controls some of Syria’s largest oil fields, in the oil-rich eastern Deir Ezzor province, an essential resource that the Syrian government also says it will take back.
The question now is whether the United States is willing to confront the troops of Syrian President Bashar Assad and Iranian-backed militiamen. The Kurds are seeking a clear American commitment to help them defend their gains. American officials have said little of their plans and objectives in Syria beyond general statements about continuing to deny Daesh safe havens and continuing to train and equip allies.
Washington seems to be hoping to negotiate a deal for Syria that would protect the Kurds’ ambitions for autonomy while limiting Iran’s ambitions for a presence in Syria. Four US officials said Presidents Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin could announce a Russian-US deal on how they hope to Syria’s war after Daesh’s defeat if they meet Friday at a conference in Vietnam. However, prospect of such a meeting uncertain, it was not clear if such a deal had been reached.
But Assad underlined that his government plans to regain all of Syria and will now fight against plans to “partition” Syria, a reference to Kurdish aspirations for a recognized autonomous zone in the north.
Government victories “have foiled all partition plans and the goals of terrorism and the countries sponsoring it,” Assad said during a meeting this week with Ali Akbar Velayati, the adviser of Iran’s supreme leader.
With its collapse in Boukamal on Thursday, the Daesh group has no major territory left in Syria or Iraq. Its militants are believed to have pulled back into the desert, east and west of the Euphrates River. The group has a small presence near the capital, Damascus. Late Thursday, the extremist group carried out a counteroffensive in Boukamal, regaining control of more than 40 percent of the border town.
The Euphrates now stands as the dividing line between Syrian government troops and the SDF in much of Deir Ezzor province.
Government forces and their allies, including Iranian troops and fighters from the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, control the western bank. They hold the provincial capital and several small oil fields.
The Kurdish-led force, along with American troops advising them, is on the eastern bank. They hold two of Syria’s largest oil fields, nearly a dozen smaller ones, one of the largest gas fields and large parts of the border with Iraq. They say they are determined to keep the government from crossing the river.
The coalition had said for weeks that the SDF was pushing toward Boukamal. With Assad’s forces taking the town, the coalition said in a statement to the AP on Friday that the SDF is now moving on Baghuz, a village also on the border near Boukamal but on the eastern bank of the Euphrates.
Iran’s Velayati said the US presence aims to divide Syria. “They have not and will not succeed in Iraq and they will also not succeed in Syria,” he said during a visit to Lebanon last weekend. “We will soon see the Syrian government and popular forces in Syria east of the Euphrates and they will liberate the city of Raqqa.”
The US coalition declined to comment on Velayati’s remarks, saying “it would not be appropriate to comment on speculation or rumor by any third party.”
Washington has been wary of Iran’s increasing influence in the area and its attempts to establish a land corridor from Iran across Iraq and Syria to Lebanon.
Defense Secretary Jim Mattis acknowledged this week that allies have pressed for a clearer US policy in Syria. The priority was to get the UN-sponsored peace talks back on track, he said, offering few details.
“We’re trying to get this into the diplomatic mode so we can get things sorted out ... and make certain (that) minorities — whoever they are — are not just subject to more of what we’ve seen” under Assad, he said, apparently referring to ensuring some sort of accommodation to Kurdish ambitions.
The talks, scheduled for Nov. 28, have already been challenged by Russia, which seeks a bigger role. Moscow called for intra-Syrian talks to chart a political process and invited the dominant Kurdish party that forms the backbone of the SDF, the first such international invitation. A date for the Russia talks has not been set.
Yezid Sayigh, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut, predicted the Syrian government will use military pressure to reach a negotiated solution with the Kurds amid lack of evidence that the US has any “commitment to engineering political change in Syria or indeed has a Syria policy at all.” In an article last week in the Al-Hayat newspaper, Sayigh said Russia is the likely arbiter between Kurds and the government.
Ilham Ahmed, a senior politician with the political arm of the SDF, said indirect talks with the government have taken place but there are no signs of a change in their position.
“A clear position from the coalition can prevent confrontation,” she said.
Meanwhile, the Kurdish-led SDF faces the complications of trying to run Arab-dominated areas. With US-backing, the force sought to allay any Arab residents’ fears of Kurdish domination by forming joint local councils and electing Arab and Kurdish officials.
But this week, the SDF-held town of Manbij saw protests by Arab residents against compulsory military conscription imposed by the SDF. Hundreds were briefly detained, according to Mohammed Khaled, with activist-operated Aleppo 24.
Ahmed described the protests as “fabricated” by the government and Turkey, which sees Kurdish aspirations as a threat.
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Associated Press writers Josh Lederman and Matthew Lee in Washington contributed to this report.
After Daesh collapse, Syria government faces US-backed Kurds
After Daesh collapse, Syria government faces US-backed Kurds
What to know about aid entering Gaza, the other battle between Israel and Hamas
- Rights groups and others point out that Israel controls the crossings into Gaza and has sole access to track how much aid and how many commercial goods are entering
JERUSALEM: Two and a half months have passed since Gaza‘s latest ceasefire took effect, and the supplies being delivered to war-battered Palestinians are again the subject of fierce debate.
The underlying question is whether Israel is upholding a key commitment under the US-backed ceasefire by allowing enough humanitarian aid into the territory. Israel says it is, but that claim is disputed by data from humanitarian organizations and Hamas-linked Gaza authorities.
The debate plays out in numbers of trucks said to be entering Gaza. But that tells only part of the story. Most trucks are operated by the private sector and carry commercial goods that are unaffordable to many Palestinians.
Here’s what to know about the dispute.
Israel’s claims about trucks
The ceasefire calls for a minimum of 600 trucks a day, though it’s not clear whether that figure refers specifically to aid trucks. Israel says it has met that stipulation since the ceasefire took effect on Oct. 10. Its closest ally, the United States, which coordinates aid deliveries from a hub in southern Israel, says Israel has met it for the last five weeks.
But about 80 percent of those trucks are private-sector vehicles, according to the Israeli military agency in charge of coordinating aid to Gaza, known as COGAT.
The effects are mixed. Markets in Gaza are now better stocked, and high prices for essentials such as flour and meat have begun to ease, but most people cannot afford the goods after two years of war. And many commercial items like cigarettes, cellphones and snacks don’t address widespread malnutrition.
Commercial supplies “are often prioritized ahead of aid deliveries yet do not address humanitarian needs,” the nonprofit Refugees International said in a statement last week.
COGAT says about 70 percent of the trucks are carrying food, and “the remainder carry medical equipment, shelter supplies, tents, clothing and other essential humanitarian assistance.”
The agency would not give a breakdown of raw data, saying that sharing such details would benefit Hamas. A COGAT-run data dashboard on Gaza aid stopped updating after the ceasefire began.
Other measures of trucks
Rights groups and others point out that Israel controls the crossings into Gaza and has sole access to track how much aid and how many commercial goods are entering.
“There is little transparency about how much and what exactly is getting in,” said Shaina Low, communications adviser for the Norwegian Refugee Council.
Global food security experts last week said all of Gaza is in danger of starvation, but that the spread of famine beyond Gaza City, where it was declared in August, had been averted. Israel disputed the report, calling it “distorted” and “biased.”
Last week’s report undercut Israel’s claims. The authors, citing data they said was provided by Israel, said an average of 540 trucks — both aid and commercial ones — entered Gaza daily in October since the ceasefire and that the November average was 581. Both numbers fall below the 600-truck requirement.
Meanwhile, entities inside Gaza assert that the number of trucks is even smaller.
A report issued this week by the World Food Program said an average of 256 trucks carrying both aid and commercial goods entered daily in the first two weeks of December. The report cited the Gaza Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Hamas-affiliated Palestinian Ministry of State for Relief Affairs.
It was not clear why those numbers differ so much from Israel’s.
The WFP report also noted that even the entry of commercial goods often faces “a complex system of approvals” and “exorbitant fees” reaching several thousand dollars per truck entering through the Rafah crossing with Egypt and from the occupied West Bank. That drives up prices of essential items such as eggs and vegetables.
Beyond the private sector
The noncommercial trucks entering Gaza, or about 20 percent of the traffic, carry out deliveries for the United Nations and aid groups, or for various countries. Israel’s government does not provide aid to Gaza.
The UN’s data dashboard tracks how much aid from its agencies and partners is unloaded at Gaza border crossings and how much reaches intended destinations. No independent entity tracks aid donated by international governments.
From Oct. 10, when the ceasefire began, through Dec. 21, 9,379 trucks reached intended destinations in Gaza, and food made up over 80 percent of that aid by weight.
That means about 130 trucks a day on average reached their destinations during that period. The dashboard shows that 156 other trucks during that time were intercepted by hungry crowds or armed gangs.
But the amounts inside the trucks can vary sharply because of Israeli restrictions, which include the denial of items Israel believes could be used for military purposes, such as tents with aluminum frames.
Such inconsistencies led to reduced food rations earlier this month, with some households in Gaza receiving rations covering 75 percent of minimum caloric needs to “reach as many people as possible,” according to the World Food Program.
The effect on hunger
Last week’s report by the world’s leading authority on food crises said there have been “notable improvements” in food security in Gaza since the ceasefire. But the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, or IPC, said the situation remains “highly fragile.”
The report said Gaza’s needs remain immense and unhindered aid is required.
Palestinians have told The Associated Press that even though Gaza’s markets have more products these days, most people can’t afford them.
Access is “deeply unequal,” the International Rescue Committee’s vice president for emergencies, Bob Kitchen, said after the IPC report. He added: “Much of the food entering Gaza is also low in nutritional value, such as sweets and sugary drinks, which does little to support recovery from malnutrition.”
