Trump was too quick to trust al-Julani, and Israel will pay

PHOTO: MICHAEL GILADI/FLASH90

Q

atar has used its oil wealth for decades to gain influence over politicians, media, academia, and Fortune 500 companies, while masking its malicious intentions.

Syria now proves that a savvy lobbyist, skilled at deceiving Westerners, can get what he wants without spending much money.

We will explore that topic in detail soon to explain how the new regime gets away with murder, terrorizing Druze tribes in southeast Syria, using barbaric and sadistic methods to kill, maim, and humiliate tribal members, many of whom sympathize with Israel. Videos of Syrian forces humiliating the Druze by shaving their moustaches and beards echo a dark era when Nazis humiliated Jewish boys and men during the Holocaust.

Whether or not the Trump administration and other regional actors can negotiate a ceasefire between warring factions, it’s painfully obvious the US and Europe were too quick to lift sanctions on Syria and its new leader, Ahmed al-Sharaa (a.k.a. Abu Mohammad al-Julani). Offering unilateral concessions to bad actors, hoping they will reciprocate, is dangerous and reckless.

Hasty decision-making is a poor trait of the Trump administration, which also stopped military strikes against the Houthis before reaching any tactical or strategic goals and prematurely ended Israel’s conflict with Iran. We have come to expect that from Trump, but the initial and late responses from Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Syria were confusing.

Rubio tweeted on X: “If authorities in Damascus want to preserve any chance of achieving a unified, inclusive, and peaceful Syria free of ISIS and Iranian control, they must help end this calamity by using their security forces to prevent ISIS and other violent jihadists from entering the area and carrying out massacres.”

Rubio should know better than to differentiate between “authorities in Damascus,” meaning al-Julani, and his operatives on the ground, which include “ISIS and other violent jihadists.” By doing so, Rubio plays into the hands of the terrorist leaders who absolve themselves of responsibility for the violence they incite.

If al-Julani is controlling the situation, either directly or indirectly, it indicates that his earlier career ties to ISIS and Al-Qaeda are still active. Conversely, if he is disconnected, it suggests he is not in charge of Syria, and the US should not accommodate or excuse him.

As of Sunday, Israeli media reported that America’s ambassador to Syria, Tom Barrack, tweeted that the Trump administration might reinstate sanctions. However, after closer examination, Barrack’s tweet only states that the US lifted sanctions as a “principled step” to help Syrians move beyond years of unimaginable suffering and described that step as a “fragile ambition now overshadowed by profound shock.” His call for factions to cease hostilities and lay down arms could also apply to the Druze defending their lives against their jihadist attackers.

Lobbying Pays Dividends

Treating Syria’s new regime with kid gloves doesn’t happen in a vacuum. The story begins a month after the Syrian civil war started in April 2011. Mouaz Moustafa, a Palestinian American, founded the Syrian Emergency Task Force (SETF) in Washington, D.C., to raise awareness of the evil of Syria’s former regime under Bashar al-Assad, who is now in self-exile, and to raise funds for humanitarian aid to Syria.

“The Syrian Emergency Task Force and Mouaz Moustafa are running what amounts to a coordinated campaign to align US interests with Islamist objectives, even as they masquerade as democratic reformers,” wrote Greg Roman, executive director of the Middle East Forum, in a blog he published last week for the Forum’s Focus on Western Islamism.

According to the SETF’s latest IRS Form 990, which nonprofits must file annually, the SETF raises just over $1 million a year but certainly gets the most bang for its buck. Roman detailed nine instances where the SETF achieved significant lobbying victories for Al-Julani since last December, beginning with Moustafa’s December 9 meeting with Jake Sullivan, President Biden’s national security advisor.

The lobbying flurry continued in February, weeks after HTS militants announced their plans to wage war on Israel. Moustafa facilitated meetings between a delegation of Syrian-American Jews and prominent Syrians, which promoted the “al Julani has changed for the better” narrative.

In mid-April, Moustafa arranged the first official American visit to Damascus by Rep. Cory Mills (R-FL) following al-Julani’s takeover. Mills brought back a personal message from al-Julani to Trump.

In early May, Moustafa arranged a meeting between US natural gas executive Jonathan Bass and al-Julani to discuss US investment in Syria’s energy sector in exchange for sanctions relief.

Two weeks later, Trump met with al-Julani for 33 minutes in Saudi Arabia, praising him as a “tough, strong guy,” telling two left-leaning media outlets (PBS and CBS), whom Trump would usually not give the time of day to, that al-Julani is “100 percent a changed man.”

He certainly was a changed man once the Trump administration gifted him another unilateral concession, removing the $10 million bounty on his head for his arrest and capture. The Druze would also dispute the idea that al-Julani has changed even one percent after last week’s slaughter in south Syria.

Reality Check

Ruth Michaelson, a seasoned Middle East journalist based in Istanbul since 2012, extensively corroborated Greg Roman’s research. Michaelson covered Trump’s trip to Saudi Arabia for the Observer, a British publication. She credited the SETF lobby with feeding Trump’s penchant for checkbook diplomacy.

Rumors circulated that American telecom companies needed to quickly enter the Syrian market to outpace Chinese competitors like Huawei, while another American businessman on the tour suggested constructing a Trump Tower in Damascus. Michaelson described a months-long internal conflict at the Trump White House between “pragmatic” bureaucrats, eager to lift sanctions in post-Assad Syria, and ideologues led by Sebastian Gorka, the National Security Council’s director of counter-terrorism, who remained suspicious of al-Julani’s jihadist past. Gorka created a list of “poison pill” conditions to block sanctions waivers, but Trump overruled them.

Mouaz Moustafa chalked up another lobbying victory, but he is not complacent. Michaelson quoted him saying, “The president’s policy must be defended from detractors within his administration.”

The Druze have taken the brunt of the punishment from Trump’s about-face on Syria, but Israel has been forced to take action to protect them because of their proximity to the Syrian border. Trump contends that Prime Minister Netanyahu didn’t object to dropping sanctions on Syria, and Netanyahu apparently authorized the head of Israel’s National Security Council, Tzachi Hanegbi, to meet with al-Julani in Abu Dhabi to discuss normalizing relations.

They would also be wise to reconsider the rapprochement after last week’s massacres in the Druze communities, especially in light of Turkey’s efforts under President Erdogan to cement al-Julani’s regime in power and use Syria as its forward base to keep alive his fantasy of restoring the Ottoman Empire.

As Turkey works to regain favor with Trump, hoping to use its NATO membership to secure American F-35 jets that could challenge Israel’s qualitative military edge, one can only hope that both the Trump administration and the Netanyahu government will wake up before it’s too late and stop coddling the Syrian government.

Trump won’t make America great again by carving out deals with Arab despots, and Israel won’t benefit one whit by subordinating its security needs to American interests, which ultimately undermines its sovereignty and long-term stability.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1071)