Can anyone help me undestand who we want to win in Syria?

[MeJuly]

Obviously what I really want is for all the killing to stop. But I can't work out which of the sides would be better for us here in the UK if they won. Can anyone who understands what the hell is going on help?

For people who are just waking up to the news that Assad is finally gone and wondering who the rebel groups are:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ce313jn453zo

They should perhaps thank Israel for decimating hezbollah terrorists.

Hopefully some free elections in Syria. I hope the country takes a moderate route. What we haven't seen is raping and torture of women and children during this take down of assad. Those types of approaches never work, especially when attacks are on or in another country.

Russia and Iran quickly left assad to it. One had its proxies weakened dramatically by Israel and the other busy fighting in Ukraine. The timing for Syria seems the best for taking on assad

One of the next questions is how whomever takes power treats minority groups whether they are non Muslim, gay, etc or how women are treated. Iran and Afghanistan aren't great role models for treatment of women.

No, an Afghan model would be worst case scenario but I am going to dare to hope for something better. Syria, despite being led by a despotic and ruthless regime, has by the standards of the Middle East been culturally and socially advanced in terms of respect for minorities, and a certain level of freedom and physical safety for women in public spaces. How much those freedoms existed because they were underpinned by Assad’s repression ( ie he kept the fundamentalists down) and how much they were due to inherent Syrian cultural traits remains to be seen.

I think a few of us have an idea of what Iran and Afghanistan were before Islamism took over and are pessimistic, though possibly not as worried as Turkey.

Which Muslim country in the world would be the best example to follow? One that is properly democratic, and protects the rights and freedoms of minority groups?

Turkey?

@TheGander

"No, an Afghan model would be worst case scenario but I am going to dare to hope for something better"

I fear the worst case scenario is much worse than the Afghan model. At least in Afghanistan the repression and persecution was being done by one dominant party - the Taliban.

The opposition in Syria is much more fragmented, more so than even Libya.

So in my mind the worst case scenario is all the extreme Islamist persecution and repression of Afghanistan combined with the fragmented civil war of Libya in a failed state / lack of any order such as Somalia. All the while with Russian and Iranian interference.

It really isn't a hopeful picture and the fall of the Assad dictatorship is nothing to celebrate imo.

@quantumbutterfly

"I think a few of us have an idea of what Iran and Afghanistan were before Islamism took over and are pessimistic, though possibly not as worried as Turkey."

The problem Turkey has just found out is that if you choose to back your enemy's enemy as your friend you then discover that once your enemy has been defeated the side you chose to back turns out to be an even greater enemy and so on.

I wonder if there's any hope that Assad will be brought to justice?

Almost none I would say, unless reports he's had a myseterious plane crash are true, which would be some kind of justice. Too many regimes implicated in his regime who will give him cover.

Turkey has a moderated version of Islam, so yes, can be/is an example.
It is a democratic and secular state by its constitution. Actually, the constitution states laicism rather than secularism, we can object and criticize many things related to this issue but let's accept it on principle. Also, worthy to note, under current government, the country moved to a more centralized type of governance in recent years which is criticized heavily by the opposition.
Turkey has its faults but still is a decent and functional country.

I think any thought of complete control and elections/step forward is too much wishful thinking at the moment.

The worry (hopefully just that and not reality) is whether the fall of Assad will take that area back to a 2014-esque issue just in reverse.

The power vacuum caused by the topple of Assad and how the Syrian military pretty much "downed tools and ran" is eerily similar to the fall of Iraq to Daesh which resulted in the group taking over a large portion of Iraq before capturing and holding territory in Syria.

HTS will have a battle on their hands to take over the SDF/Kurdish controlled regions of Syria... which could see the need for Coalition Forces to increase in the region and increase the risk of spillover into a not very stable Iraq.

There are no democracies in the Arab world. Only monarchies ( without democratic government) , or dictatorships of varying degrees of viciousness. Syria has been one of the worst. I grew up in an Arab country; and here in the U.K. I have or have had Arab colleagues tell me openly that Arabs are not suited to democracy. What they want is a dictatorship that runs mostly for the benefit of the people, not a small clique and then represses everyone else.

I agree with you @1dayatatime and what you said occurred to me after I’d posted. The situation in Afghanistan is simple compared to Syria, which has greater religious and ethnic diversity and possibly several groups vying for power whereas in Afghanistan only the Taliban were real contenders.

Often people from western countries try to impose their way of doing things on countries that don't want that, just because they think that's best. It's not always the case and certainly not always best suited to some countries.

Hopefully we have learnt from some of our mistakes.

Democratic countries do seem much more stable generally though and the people living in them much less oppressed. That's certainly the impression I get anyway, happy to be corrected if wrong.
Not just thinking of Western countries either, including places like Japan.

I fear a new Syrian leadership might just be the Syrian Taliban.

Like Afghanistan, for example? If only westerners realised that their way isn't always best and it's much more suited to Afghan women not to speak to each other, be allowed out without men, or get educated and have jobs.

It doesn't have to be one extreme or the other. I'm thinking more along the lines of what happened in Libya after the toppling of Gaddafi.

Of course people are less oppressed in democracies. Those of us who live in democracies shouldn't be so defensive about it. I'm sure we'd be delighted if there was a non-western-democratic model in the Arab world where people lived fulfilled lives and I know the many refugees from the region would like it too.

I'm quite content living in a western democracy myself and it wasn't a criticism. My point merely was that imposing a western style democracy on a people who don't necessarily want that is not the best way to go about things. There needs to be considerations on what the people want. What do most of the Syrians want? I don't know the answer to that myself but that Is what should be asked.

Anyway, with regard blasphemy, just settling down to watch Mary on Netflix.

There are no democracies in the Arab world. Only monarchies ( without democratic government) , or dictatorships of varying degrees of viciousness. Syria has been one of the worst. I grew up in an Arab country; and here in the U.K. I have or have had Arab colleagues tell me openly that Arabs are not suited to democracy. What they want is a dictatorship that runs mostly for the benefit of the people, not a small clique and then represses everyone else.

This makes sense tbh. I'm thinking UAE, Qatar, Bahrain etc, where most of the population are happy and of course very prosperous. Saudi to some extent too.

I've lived in Dubai and Qatar and the rulers are definitely far more loved and held in much greater esteem than any British politician (admittedly people are also far less free to critisise them, but most of the sentiment seems genuine).