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In the rooms where war, peace, and power are decided, words matter most. The Diplomat brings you raw conversations with ambassadors, envoys, and negotiators who shaped the hardest decisions in U.S. foreign policy and Middle East diplomacy. Hosted by Joe Kawly. Recorded from Washington. Produced by Middle East Broadcasting Networks (MBN).
Joe Kawly brings extensive experience from conflict zones in the Middle East to the power corridors of Washington. As a journalist, he’s seen how words can escalate a crisis or open the door to peace. A Georgetown graduate and former CNN Journalism Fellow, he’s known for connecting the dots others miss, so people don’t just hear what happened, they understand why it matters. As producer and host of The Diplomat, Joe brings clarity to diplomacy and politics, one conversation at a time.
On this new episode of the Diplomat, we
have the Chief of Staff of the CSIS, the
think tank in Washington, DC, Will Todman.
Thank you for being with us.
Will, you were visiting Syria.
You were in Syria on the ground.
We would like to see how with the new NSS,
the new NDAA,
and the new policy in terms of Syria, how
Washington is rewriting how it sees Syria
and how the new policy towards Syria,
towards the new President, and how
does that affect also the wider region.
So thank you for being with us.
Thank you so much.
Let's start from your last visit.
How did you see that in terms of policy,
how Washington is rewriting the policy for
Syria really matches what's happening
on the ground, or maybe it does not?
Yeah.
So thank you so much for having me, Joe.
It's a pleasure to be with you.
I think if in the last year,
US policy on Syria has transformed in ways
that would have been really
difficult to imagine.
And I think President Trump has made a
huge bet on Ahmed Al-Shara to succeed.
He is giving him the chance
to breathe, to try to seize advantage
of this window of opportunity.
But things are still very, very fragile.
So I think there are certain ways in which
conditions for Syrians
have really improved.
And this was my first trip to Damascus
since the start of the conflict.
I was there in 2011 when things were
starting, but this was my first
time since the overthrow ofAssad.
And there are some things which
are remarkable achievements.
There is a freedom of
speech, which is undeniable.
I mean, to sit in cafés and to speak with
Syrians and to hear them openly talking
about their hopes their concerns, their
criticisms of their new president, is
something that would have been
really impossible under BushalAssad.
And so I think that is a real achievement.
And then there is an energy
in the civil society.
A lot of Syrians who have returned to the
country from the diaspora, perhaps from
neighboring countries, who are really
determined to contribute to their new
country or to this new
phase in their country.
And to contribute to its recovery, to
shape its trajectory going forward.
I think that energy is palpable, and
there is certainly a lot of optimism.
But at the same time,
the challenges are huge.
I mean, economically, Syria is still
undergoing a massive economic crisis.
Certain aspects of daily life
have got a little bit better.
Electric provision has got better.
But there is still widespread unemployment
unemployment, severe poverty.
And I think one of the real dangers in
giving so much
hope to Syrians through the lifting of
sanctions, I think we'll talk about that,
but is that they have extremely high
expectations for how their
lives are going to change.
And I think it's going to be very, very
difficult for the new government, for the
transitioned government, to
live up to those expectations.
And so I think it probably won't be long,
unfortunately, until we see real cracks
widening in Syrian society and some of
that optimism dissipating and paving way
for real fears about what
direction the country is going in.
So how far can we say that Syria's
challenges really are far away
from the optimistic policy
narrative in Washington, DC.
Yeah.
I do think there is probably an
over-optimism in Washington, DC.
I think that President Trump keeps saying
how much faith he has
in the new government.
And in some ways, that's important because
I think
Ahmed Al-Shara needs that international
backing to stand any chance of pulling
Syria back together and of beginning to
rebuild and drive the recovery that
is so desperately needed in Syria.
But I think there is Perhaps
I have not seen a true appreciation of the
scale of the challenges
that Syrians are facing.
And again, I think if
we zoom out a bit and think about how
global politics are shifting at the same
time, we've seen a collapse of
humanitarian aid and foreign assistance
from not just the United States, but
from most major donors in Europe as well.
In many ways, this transitioning is
happening at the worst time because there
isn't that support that is
going to be so vitally needed.
So then I think we see the Trump
administration saying, Okay, well, for
Syria, we're going to advance a investment
led stabilization strategy, which in some
ways is what's necessary because that aid
is not going to be coming, and so there
needs to be support from somewhere.
But it's going to take a long time, I
think, for investors to really have faith
in the new Syria, in the government, in
the ability of the government to create
a appropriate environment for investors.
And so what that means then is that it's
going to be probably a long time until
most Syrians start feeling the positive
benefits of this opening up of the
country to international engagement.
So I think, yes, it is very important that
the US government is lifting sanctions on
Syria and facilitating that
international engagement.
But again, I think this comes back to the
gap between the expectations and then the
hard reality that it's going to be a long
time until there is a thriving economy
that can support a job creation for
Syrians that can facilitate return for all
of those millions of Syrians that still
remain displaced in Lebanon, in Jordan,
in Turkey, and further afield as well.
So this is a really, really
challenging period ahead.
And my fear is that the US government
might say, Okay, we've done our part.
We lifted sanctions.
We're giving you the space to succeed.
And then they take a step back when
actually, I think it's important that they
remain deeply engaged in trying to
shape the trajectory of this transition.
You are as well seeing
how extra optimistic
the narrative also in think tanks when
they talk about the future of Syria Syria
after a year, after Assad's fall, right?
Yes.
I think there is a lot of optimism from
some parts, and some of that is founded.
As I said, there are real achievements
that have been made, and we
shouldn't overlook those.
But When my colleague, Monia Yacoubian and
I visited Syria, we were left with a
really daunting feeling of just or some of
the trends that I think are not
moving in such a positive direction.
There is...
In that point,
on the ground, the mood of the people,
how far it's disconnected from
the monolith policymaking that's
been made regarding Syria.
For instance, how much do you think
Washington is disregarding the factions
that are or used to be
HDS or former Al Qaeda, Islamist groups.
Some of these people right now are either
in government or in the Syrian army.
They are expressing their
discontent from Al-Shara.
They think that he is
too moderate right now.
How much do you think this is not
being tackled in Washington, DC, and
how much you've seen that on the ground?
I think the general trend that we heard is
that President Shah has put so much effort
into external legitimacy that he has not
focused sufficiently on the internal
legitimacy and building this vision and
articulating a vision for Syria that
will hopefully bring Syrians together.
When we were there, it was the exact same
time that he was actually
here in Washington, DC.
So we saw the videos of him playing
basketball with the SENTCOM Commander.
We saw the oval office meeting with
President Trump being
sprayed with perfume.
And I think that had a mixed reaction.
Back in Syria, there were some people who
were delighted to see the first Syrian
President since Independence
visiting the White House.
That's a huge deal.
But at the same time, there are serious
and major factions within now the Syrian
government that do not want to seek this
engagement and think
that he's going too far.
Too far where?
Too far in terms of being accommodating to
the West, being accommodating
to Israel as well.
Of course, there have been no retaliations
from the Syrian government to the Israeli
incursion into the south from the strikes
that we saw, even on the Ministry
of Defense back in the summer.
And so I think there is this
feeling Don't forget your roots.
For some people, they might think this is
not the revolution that they fought for.
They had a different vision for what
they thought Syria would look like.
Now, I think what Ahmad Shah is doing is
necessary because he needs that external
support before he can begin to try
and bring the country back together.
But he has really not spoken
very often to Syrians.
He's not given very many public addresses.
We see nothing of the Zelensky-style
evening addresses that
the Ukrainian President has done
throughout the conflict that have been
trying to update Ukrainians
and keep them all on board.
Instead, I think, Shahar has been nervous
that if he starts weighing in too much on
domestic issues in Syria,
he He risks alienating some of those
factions that have been supportive of him
because he will start to make
compromises that they don't want to see.
I think that is a major
challenge going forward.
For him?
For him, definitely for him.
And we heard fears that someone might try
to assassinate him and
what that could look like.
I think he's done a decent job so far of
trying to bring together the
different armed factions.
But just this last weekend, we saw the
attack by someone who was a member of the
Syrian General Security Forces on
US troops, killing two US troops and
a US interpreter as well in Palmera.
It was interesting.
The White House was very quick to say this
is ISIS, and of course, the Syrian
government was quite quick
to say this is ISIS as well.
But I think there is a
bit of a gray line there.
Was this someone who was
truly a member of ISIS?
Was this someone who was
inspired by ISIS ideology?
Or was this someone who was really
dissatisfied by the growing US-Syrian
coordination when it comes to countering
ISIS, someone, perhaps a
previous member of HDS or a member of
another group who is really dissatisfied.
That would be much more worrying if that
was the latter, because I think it gets to
the idea that there are a lot of people
who have been absorbed into the armed
forces in Syria, the internal forces,
who do harbor some much more extreme
positions and ideologies.
Dealing with those threats from within is
going to be in some ways much harder than
dealing with the threat of
Isis, which is very real.
You mentioned earlier the gap between the
scale of destruction and the
funding that is available, or the limited
funding and the capacity
for reconstruction.
How do you think the National Defense Act,
the NDAA, the
move for the National Security Strategy
for the NDAA
to unwind or suspend the Caesar Act
sanctions, change
some of the incentives for investors,
regional governments, and
the new Syrian leadership?
And what risks come with that?
So repealing the Caesar sanctions is is
critical for any international
engagement in Syria's reconstruction.
Financial institutions
were just not prepared to go into Syria
and to engage on a major level while the
sanctions under Caesar and
others as well were in place.
And so this, in theory, facilitates an
international engagement and reintegration
into global financial systems that could
facilitate a lot of reconstruction.
The challenge is going to be that for a
lot of financial institutions, banks,
Syria still has a huge amount
of stigma associated with it.
They still think of Syria
as a deeply unstable place.
They are concerned about attacks
like we saw this past weekend.
They're concerned about the fact that
large parts of Syria are still outside of
the control of the government, the
Northeast, of course, with the SDF, the
Kurdish-led forces, and then in the south,
in Suwaita, with It brews majority forces.
I think for some investors, they look and
they say, This is still
not ready for us to invest.
I think building that faith in Syria's
trajectory and in its trajectory towards
stability is going to take a long time.
I think it's going to be a while until we
really start feeling the effects
of repealing those sanctions.
And again, I keep going back to this gap
between the expectations and the reality.
But there is a bit of a danger for the
Syrian government that by focusing so much
on the repeal of sanctions, they create an
expectation that suddenly Syria will
be open for business, international...
Some of these huge deals will start
playing out, building a Metro,
rehabilitating energy
networks and infrastructure.
And I think in reality, it's going to
take a long for that to start happening.
How much would that be
a recipe for a disaster?
I think this is a limited window of
opportunity that they have where people
are still feeling quite optimistic
that they can contribute.
But I, I mean, this is an anecdote, but I
spoke to one Syrian, a friend of mine who
I've known for more than a decade, and he
lived in Lebanon throughout the conflict.
He had returned with his family to
Damascus, and he's already losing hope
in the ability to find a job
where he can support his family.
And so he's now talking
about going back to Lebanon.
And I think that is something that we
should really watch out for is, are there
people who previously had the hope and
they were enticed to come back to Syria?
But if they are now losing hope and going
back, then I think that indicates that
Syria will continue to be a regional
crisis, not just a national
crisis within the region.
Since we've talked about
the gap between the reality on the ground
and the optimistic policy narrative in
Washington, DC,
what do you think policymakers in
Washington or the US administration
under Trump should do and shouldn't do?
I think there is an enormous amount of
leverage that the United States has, not
just through sanctions, but so much of the
new Syrian government's legitimacy comes
from its relationship with the United
I think there is more ability for the US
to try to push for smaller, more tangible
reforms in Syria that could help prevent
some of the worst-case
scenarios from playing out.
So for example, The
Syrian foreign minister talks about how he
would like to see a more pluralistic
political environment
and talked about having political parties.
That's not currently the case.
There is no law for political parties.
And I I think this is something small that
actually, some people in the Trump
administration might say, We don't care
about shaping the government and
political system that Syria has.
But for that investment-led strategy to
work, there needs to be stability And I
think having a
system in place for political parties
would contribute to greater stability,
because then you can allow people to have
a voice, to put pressure on the
government, to meet their needs.
And that's one One thing that I think
would be very helpful,
having an investment law as well.
I think so far there's chaos, and I heard
that the government, to some degree, is
bending the regulations to fit certain
deals just so that they
can bring in more money.
That makes It makes sense.
They're really cash-strapped.
They're trying to bring it in.
But there needs to be a more transparent
set of regulations in place to
facilitate international investment.
That will give investors more
confidence in Syria's future.
And so, again, allow this
strategy to actually succeed.
There is no permanent
US presence in Damascus.
I think that's a mistake as well.
Given just how critical the relationship
is between the US and Syria, I think it
would make a lot of sense to have some
representation, perhaps not the full
reopening of the embassy just yet.
I understand that US officials
feel they're not ready for that.
But having more regular exchanges between
Syrian and US officials,
I think in Syria, It would be helpful.
These are not huge things, but they're
things that I think the US has
a unique ability to do now.
I do believe that would help set Syria
on a pathway towards greater stability.
Let's talk about the tightrope of the
new President, Ahmad Al-Shara, political
security and economic challenges, and also
regional challenges that he is facing.
How external constraints, Turkish pressure
in the north, Israeli red lines in the
south, and the United States
conditionality, all that shape what
the new president can and cannot do.
How can he face all these things, all
these challenges in terms of political
agreements with these regional powers,
but also delivering to his people?
At the same time.
Yeah.
So he has adopted a strategy of no
problems with neighbors, which, again,
I think is a necessary strategy for now.
It is quite remarkable the restraint that
he has shown towards Israel, for example.
But there are real opportunities to build
ties with other key regional actors.
Lebanon, as you know very well,
is so critical to Syria's future.
And I think Lebanon is also going through
a moment of great change and efforts to
build ties rise and trust between the
Lebanese and the Syrian government should
really be accelerated and
seised as much as possible.
I think for now, there is a really
positive feeling that Gulf states
are not pursuing their own parochial
interests in Syria to the extent
that they were during the war.
Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the UAE, they were
pulling different factions in
Syria in different directions.
Now, from speaking to senior Gulf
officials in Damas and elsewhere in the
region, I've heard, actually, they all
agree they want Syria to be stable.
They want it to now be this linchpin of
stability in a more
integrated Middle East.
And so I think this is a real opportunity.
But for how long will that remain?
Especially as these security
concerns emerge.
Countries like the UAE, I think, will be
very nervous about the Islamist
influences on the new government.
So I hope that the government will take
advantage of this to
to build on this shared strategy.
But I also hear, or I heard when I was in
Syria, that it's not completely clear from
international actors, really,
what they want from Syria.
There are between the US,
European actors, the Gulf.
They are all engaging to some degree,
but it's not strategically focused.
No one really knows what Syria these
countries actually want to
see apart from a stable one.
And so I think there is an opportunity for
for these donors and these external actors
to come together and try to hash out
what is it that they really want to see.
But nothing would be able to happen to
move forward without stability
in terms of security.
There's emerging security order in Eastern
Syria, reduced US footprint,
SDF cohesion, and ISIS detention, and
protecting key infrastructure and routes.
How all that plays out in the new national
security strategy when
it's seen, as I understood from many key
generals that I spoke with,
that it's not retreating or the US is not
removing itself from the Middle East
under the new NSS or the
National Security Strategy.
It's only reducing military footprint.
But all these military and security
tensions, how would all that fall when
things are going to be very risky with the
new factions dissatisfaction
with Al-Shara?
I think it's a common theme that US
presidents come in and they say they want
to deemphasize the Middle East, and then
somehow that doesn't work out, and the
challenges that emerge end
up sucking the US back in.
I think the way that this new NSS was
portrayed, it was saying the
Middle East is in a new phase now.
Security challenges are less,
conflicts are less important.
To a degree that is true.
But I think the challenges, as you have
laid them out, remain very much there.
And so I think it will be really difficult
for the US to focus so much on a political
strategy or on an economic strategy for
Syria while those security
challenges remain.
And again, I keep talking about this event
from this last weekend, but I think that's
a taste of some of the
challenges that are ahead.
And there are still huge gaps between the
SDF and the Syrian government in terms of
what reintegration
process would look like.
And the US has a really
key role to play here.
I think the presence it has, roughly
1,000 troops, is actually very effective.
It is holding or maintaining
broad stability in a large part of Syria
in a way that doesn't cost that much, that
doesn't involve very many US troops,
although, of course, they are
putting themselves at risk.
But I think, again, to see the US
wield a bit more leverage
to help force these two partners to come
together would be helpful because there's
a huge amount of distrust between them,
and that's critical to
stabilizing the country.
But where does Syria
fit in the new Trump 2.
0 national security strategy
when it's going to be, as we are
displaying it, as a test
for the ending endless wars in the Middle
East or in the world while
still deterring ISIS and Iran?
Yeah.
I think this gets the idea that you can't
just will new conditions
to manifest on the ground.
There needs to be the work
put in to create them.
I do think it makes sense to talk about
economic integration in the region and to
seize on the opportunity
for a more stable region.
Yes, I agree with all of from the
strategy, but I just hope that it is
followed up with sufficient
pressure to create those conditions.
Syria could be the new linchpin of a
regional order that is more economically
integrated in terms of energy, in terms of
transportation, in terms
of even AI infrastructure.
I think that's what the Trump
administration would like to see.
But they can't ignore the fact that
ISIS remains a very real threat.
A large part of Syria remains out of
the control of the Syrian government.
As we were saying before, this Syrian
government is holding together a really
fragile coalition of factions, some of
which have a very different vision for
what Syria should look like going forward.
But both, whether we're talking about the
NSS, which is the guideline for all the
policy for Congress, for the
defense military actions,
or defense and military policy,
how do they treat Syria
when there is economic and other
conditionality putting first,
then moving to large packaging for AIDS?
Because there are these conditions before
moving to helping in terms of
large aid and reconstruction.
When there are these conditions, how Do
these factions or people, Syrians, on the
ground who disagree with this, if you're
put in condition to do things your way,
how would that is going to create
instability in Syria, you think?
Just to go back a sec, I don't think
Large-Scale USAID is coming for Syria.
I don't think USAID, foreign assistance,
is coming in a big way to any
of the Middle East, really.
And that is based on what?
Based on the dismantling of USAID, the
idea that going forward, the Trump
administration administration has said
they want a trade, not an aid strategy.
That's true of Africa.
I think that's true of
much of the Middle East.
I didn't speak to really anyone in Syria
who felt large-scale reconstruction
assistance is coming
from the United States.
Investment opportunities may be seized by
US companies, but I think the idea is more
that the US is creating the space for
others to come in and play that role.
Now, to some degree, the Gulf is going to
come in with aid because it's
Syrian is so important for them.
But again, it's not going to be on
anything like the scale
that we've seen before.
There is no major reconstruction
package coming for Syria.
But why is that the idea that because we
have conditions and conditionality,
economics, and troops, reducing troops and
military, then later on, if we see the
security proved on the ground,
then we have large aids coming?
Why Why is this
an expected, an expectation from a lot of
Syrians who are in DC attending
discussions, attending think tanks
discussions and policy discussions?
Why?
There may be some hope there
that the Trump administration has put so
much emphasis on Syria that it would
be humiliating for Syria to fail in a
way because, again, they put a huge amount
of political capital into
transforming conditions in Syria.
But again, I don't see it coming.
I don't think we're going to see that.
I think we might see some
investment from the DFC.
I think we'll see certainly a lot of the
Syrian diaspora stepping up to
support recovery bits from Europeans.
But that's largely going to be focused on
preventing new outflows of irregular
migration from Syria and
on the security piece.
But I think traditional economic
aid, I don't think is coming.
Regional actors and
the new security order.
How Turkey, Israel, and Iran, and Russia
and Gulf States are recalibrating now that
Asad is gone because policy was something
different when Asad was in power.
Now it's changing.
How is it recalibrating
and sanctioned sanctions are softening.
Yeah.
I think Turkey is probably the
big winner of these changes.
I was at the Doha Forum
last year in 2024, just as Asad fell, the
Turkish foreign minister really
went on a victory lap around.
They're taking a lot of questions,
thrilled thatAssad was gone.
And Turkey has a really important
relationship with Syria, an
important security relationship.
But also there are all these Turkish
businesses that are now seizing on
opportunities to invest across Syria, and
a large number of Syrians have returned,
voluntarily or through enticements
from the Turkish government.
So I think Turkey is feeling very good
about where things are going, but it
doesn't have the financial resources to be
able to fund large-scale
reconstruction or recovery.
I think the Gulf, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar
are very happy to see these changes.
Again, they see Syria as critical to their
vision of a more stable and
more integrated Middle East.
I think the UAE is the most reticent
because of the links between
Islamists and the new government.
Israel is the real
wild card here, where the Netanyahu
government was actually relatively
happy with Bushal Assad, I think.
They thought he was
able largely to prevent threats emanating
from Syria that would threaten Israel.
Or Israelis.
And now I think they're very concerned.
And so we're seeing them pushing
and pushing into Southern Syria.
Clearly, they have taken key strategic
sites and have given no indication that
they want to step back,
that their presence, that
they're willing to withdraw.
And from what I understand from talking to
US officials, the talks between
Syria and Israel have broken down.
There was a hope that they would come
to an interim security agreement.
I think normalization is a long way off.
But even that, the Syrians
seemed more optimistic about it.
And then I think the
Israelis have pulled back.
What broke that?
I think this is Israeli concerns
about Syria's trajectory.
I think they don't believe that Shahra is
this reformed pragmatic politician
that he is making himself out to be.
But I also think Israel has taken such a
more
proactive and aggressive stance to dealing
with threats that it sees in the region.
You don't need me to tell you this, but
striking Lebanon, Iran, Yemen, Qatar,
Tunisia, perhaps as well,
and of course, Syria.
I think they want to maintain a freedom of
operations to be able to strike
when they see threats emerge.
I think they probably feel they actually
don't need this mutual defense agreement
yet, that they would rather wait it out,
see how things go, see is there going to
be another bout of wide-scale violence in
Syria, as we saw against Al-Owait or
Al-Owait majority areas on the Coast, as
we saw in Sueda with the Druze,
as we could well see, unfortunately,
in the North East with the SDF as well.
So I think Israel is biding its time,
and they are, I think, very
concerned about the future of it.
Iran is actually really out of the
picture when it comes to Syria.
I think Iran is the real loser.
And then Russia is playing an interesting
role because they have, again, been quite
pragmatic and have maintained
at their foothold in Syria.
They have a reduced military presence, but
they maintain one at their key bases
on the Coast at Hamamim,
the airport in Homs, and then
also in Qamishli in the northeast.
So I think that the reporting just came
out a few weeks ago that there were these
negotiations between the Russians and HTS
as HTS were advancing on Damascus, and
they came to this agreement, you can
maintain your presence
if you don't stop this.
To end this conversation with the risks
and the red lines and the next phase
scenarios, what are the flashpoints or the
main points that could derail Syria's
fragile transition, ISIS resurgence,
militia competitions, economic
shock, and external intervention?
All of the above.
I think the really big challenge going
forward is going to be the Northeast.
What happens to the SDF and negotiations
between the SDF and Damascus?
Does Turkey lose faith that those
negotiations are going to
go in a good direction?
And did they start putting more pressure,
even a new military
incursion into the Northeast?
Do tensions break out into armed fighting?
Does ISIS to try to
seize advantage of that?
I think there are real concerns about
the northeast.
Sueda is also something that
I'm watching very, very closely.
Israel seems to have developed
quite strong ties and support for some of
these Druh's groups in Sueda who are very
unwilling to engage with the government.
I think that will continue to be a
thorn in the side of Ahmed Al-Shara.
Then he has all of these challenges that
we've been talking about, that, again, the
between the expectations that now
sanctions are lifted, there will be a
reopening, a start of economic reopening,
a start-Economic opportunities.
Economic opportunities.
It's going to be a long time until those
actually start to manifest
and people feel the positives.
Then going back to what we talked about at
the start, within his own coalition, then
do they start to lose faith
in his ability to steer that?
To deliver the way they
want things to be delivered.
Exactly.
Last question, based on everything that
you've seen on the ground in Syria in your
last visit, which we met before you
traveled, and also your discussions with
policymakers and decision makers in
Washington, DC, in terms of foreign policy
in the Middle East, your best
guesses and worst guesses or maybe worst
or best case scenarios for Syria over the
next few months or two, three years, and
what concrete choice the United States
policymakers are facing in the next phase?
I think my best case scenario is that the
US remains really engaged after sanctions
are lifted, that it continues to play the
critical security role it has been playing
in the Northeast, that the collaboration
between the Syrian government and the US
deepens, that there is a real serious
vetting process of just who is now inside
the Syrian government, and that the more
radical factions are dealt with
appropriately,
and that the US puts pressure on the
political trajectory of the country that
creates some of these channels in which
Syrians can start having a
bigger voice in their future.
So I think that is the positive.
It's still going to take a very long time
for the economic piece to fall into place.
The worst case scenario, I think, is that
all of this starts to fall apart, that
Syria disintegrates once again, that we
have the Northeast that completely refuses
to engage, that we have a new flare up of
violence in the South, that Israel
continues to support certain factions and
encourage inter-Syrian fighting, that
Ahmad Al-Shara'h loses control of his
coalition, that Syrians begin to lose
faith in his ability to lead them through
this turbulent transition,
and then that the US loses interest
and that others lose interest.
And they say, This is too difficult.
We tried, we did what we could.
We're done with it.
Try and seal off the borders, protect
Jordan, protect Turkey, but
ultimately say, This is hopeless.
And so I think it's that disengagement
that is a real fear of mine.
I hope that the Trump administration, that
European, that Gulf states, continue to
see the potential promise, but that
they're really serious about the
challenges and that they are working day
by day to try to chip away at those
challenges, to build trust
between Syrians once again.
I think that could happen, but I think
it's too early to know
which way Syria goes.
Will Todman, Chief of Staff at CSIS.
Thank you for having this conversation.
I think it showed a bigger picture and the
gaps that are not being seen or discussed
or tackled in terms of foreign policy and
how the risks can play out in the next few
months if more incidents like
the Palmera incident would occur.
Thank you for being with us.
Thank you so much, Joe.
Happy holidays.
Thank you for having me.
Happy holidays.
It was a pleasure.