Syrian Strife Draws In Neighbors, Global Players
The conflict in Syria may be first and foremost a civil war, pitting the Shiite-dominated regime of President Bashar Assad against mostly Sunni insurgents. But the region's turbulent geopolitics have turned it into a proxy fight that has drawn in the rest of the region as well as the U.S and other global powers.
"This has become not just a war within Syria," Robert Malley, the program director for Middle East and North Africa for the International Crisis Group, told NPR's Fresh Air earlier this month. "It has become a regional, sectarian civil war. Perhaps the best way to put it is to say that what was a war in Syria with regional spillover has now become a regional war with a Syrian focus."
On the ground in Syria, the military and pro-regime militiamen called Shabiha are arrayed against the main rebel groups, known collectively as the Free Syrian Army and organized under the umbrella of the Supreme Military Council. Smaller rebel groups — including the Islamic extremist group Jabhat al-Nusra (deemed a terrorist organization by the U.S.) — and foreign fighters and jihadist veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan are also battling the Assad regime.
Now, with Washington's assertion that the Syrian regime has crossed a "red line" by using chemical weapons against the rebels, the U.S. is prepared to give military support to the insurgents. But competing outside interests — notably Russia and Iran — could complicate any American effort to step up aid to the rebels.
Below, we outline some of the stakeholders and what's at stake for them:
IRAN:
Iran and Syria have been allied since 1979, and since the start of the Syrian civil war, Tehran and Iranian-backed Hezbollah militants have actively supported the Assad regime and helped it regain ground against rebels.
Jubin Goodarzi of the United States Institute of Peace writes:
"The two regimes share common traits. They are both authoritarian and defiantly independent, even at a political or economic cost. Iran is predominantly Shiite. Although Syria is predominantly Sunni Muslim, its ruling family is Alawite, a Shiite sect."