Syrian President Al-Assad Plays a Strong Hand in Diplomatic Poker.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has put restoration of control of all of Syria at the core of efforts to manage multiple Middle Eastern rivalries that often play out in his war-ravaged country.
Mr. Al-Assad’s demand means different things to different parties.
For a group of Arab countries led by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, it means returning Syria to the Arab fold as part of a bid to dial back Iranian influence, reduce drug smuggling, and return Syrian refugees and internally displaced persons to their homes.
At least seven million people have fled Syria or been internally displaced since Mr. Al-Assad sparked a civil war with his brutal crackdown in 2011 on anti-government protesters.
In response, the 22-member Arab League suspended Syrian membership.
Mr. Al-Assad's unwillingness to compromise on restoring his control has convinced some Arab countries that treating him as a pariah has failed to produce the desired results.
As a result, countries like Jordan, Egypt, and Iraq joined the UAE and Saudi Arabia in engaging with Mr. Al-Assad without holding him accountable for his conduct in the civil war.
Meeting in Amman this week, the foreign ministers of Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt, and Iraq joined their Syrian counterpart in demanding the restoration of the Al-Assad government's sovereignty in all of Syria, strengthening Syrian government institutions, and ending operations by armed groups and militant organizations on Syrian soil.
The ministers also called for an end to foreign interference in Syria.
For Mr. Al-Assad, that means US-backed armed Kurdish groups, jihadists, Turkish-backed militants in northern Syria, and Turkish and US forces.
The Gulf states would also include Iranian forces and aligned groups, which Mr. Al-Assad views, alongside the Russian military, as invited by the government.
Russian-mediated talks between senior Turkish and Syrian officials that also involve Iranian representatives have so far failed to lead to a meeting between Mr. Al-Assad and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
The deputy foreign ministers of the four countries met in Moscow last week to draft a roadmap for a meeting between the Syrian and Turkish leaders.
A Turkish-Syrian summit figure prominently during Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi’s visit to Damascus this week even though economic cooperation dominated his discussions with Mr. Al-Assad.
Until recently, Mr. Erdogan demanded the removal of Mr. Al-Assad, supported Syrian opposition groups, and sought to prevent Syrian Kurds from carving out an autonomous region on Turkey’s border.
Mr. Al-Assad has made a meeting with the Turkish leader conditional on Turkey’s willingness to withdraw its military from northern Syria and restore the situation that prevailed before the Syrian war…
