By Megan Anderson

In the realm of International Relations, masculinity is not a gender, it is the norm. As a result, hegemonic masculinities have dictated the gender constructions that largely shape contemporary discourses on terrorism. Women’s support for extremist politics and the resort to violence in achieving political objects are complex phenomena. For many scholars and analysts, it is difficult to acknowledge that women can rationally support extremism or carry out acts of violence. Notions of women as violent actors defy the conventional understandings of women as either passive victims or peacemakers. Many of the theories that attempt to explain political violence are based on the assumption that those who perpetrate it are men. Sex-specific theories that aim to explain violent women tend to use gendered assumptions about what women are to account for their violence as women’s violence.

By failing to recognize the inherent masculinities that have come to dominate world politics and international security, we have overlooked the threats that women pose when they participate in political violence. Although a small number of policymakers and counterterrorism officials have begun to explore the roles of women as they relate to terrorism and violent extremism, little has been done to integrate a gender dimension into policies that deal with countering them. To effectively address the threats associated with terrorism and violent extremism, it is necessary to institutionally counter stereotypical perceptions about terrorists only being men and counterterrorism as a quintessentially male concern. 

The lack of serious attention paid to women as perpetrators of violence has led to the creation of counterterrorism policies that largely fail to account for the participation of women in extremist movements or terrorist organizations. By neglecting to address the very real and credible threat of women as violent political actors, we have contributed to a gender gap in counterterrorism policy that has left us incredibly vulnerable.

Security Studies & Inherent Masculinities 

Whether we like to admit it or not, the nature of world politics is inherently gendered. The international system is heavily dictated by a set of culturally shaped and defined characteristics associated with masculinity and femininity (although they can and do vary across time and place). In the conceptual sense, masculinity refers to the socially constructed, culturally and historically bounded practices, processes, and relations associated with manhood and being a man. As an ideology, masculinism justifies and naturalizes gender hierarchy by failing to question the elevation of ways of being and knowing associated with men and masculinity over those associated with women and femininity.

Throughout the international system, masculinities are structured against femininities in ways that act to guarantee the continued and asymmetrical “global subordination of women to men. Since an unequal weight is awarded to the values socially associated with masculinity over femininity, inequality is perpetuated in perceived gender differences. As a result, social processes select for values and behaviors that can be associated with an idealized, or hegemonic, masculinity. This ultimately creates what sociologist R.W. Connell calls “hegemonic masculinity.” According to Connell, masculinities become normative and hegemonic because they are the permutations most associated with authority and power in a given historical, political, economic, and social context.

Feminist approaches to Security Studies can help us explain how hegemonic masculinities have encouraged gender biases in security’s core concepts. Through this lens, feminist security scholars have critiqued the gendered logic and masculinities that have formed the constructions of international relations and world politics. The gendered nature of security is evident in even the most basic of concepts, such as the state, violence, war, peace, peacekeeping, militarization, and soldiering. These ideal types of masculinities are often reflected in titles such as ’citizen warrior,’ ‘rational economic hit man,’ ‘warrior,’ ‘civilian strategist,’ ‘good soldier,’ ‘Protestant bourgeois rationalist,’ ‘breadwinner,’ and ‘financial risk-taker.’ Feminist security scholars have also drawn attention to gender-based language and assumptions that lay at the foundation of debates concerning issues like nuclear strategy, the noncombatant immunity principle, peacekeeping, and various aspects of militarization and soldiering. These valid critiques point out the ways in which “gender” and “women” have been used interchangeably throughout international security discourse, most prominently within U.N. documents.

In addition to critiquing the hegemonic masculinities that have come to dominate the ways in which we approach security, feminist security scholars have also questioned the essentialist links that are so often drawn between women and peace, bringing explicit attention to the roles of women in the promotion and participation of war. Feminist approaches to security examine the relationship between masculinity and war, focusing largely on how socially constructed ideas about the roles and place of women and men during war shape how we perceive security and attempt to end conflict. Despite a lack of evidence to suggest that women’s capacity for violence is any less than or different from men’s, hegemonic masculinities have perpetuated underlying assumptions that men experience conflict as active participants, or combatants, while women experience it as either victims or noncombatants.

Women’s Violence: Assumptions, Realities, & Current Security Threats

Traditional perspectives about gender roles and violence reflect the widely held belief that by nature, women are more pure, maternal, emotional, innocent, and peace-loving than men. When women engage in political violence, they are often characterized as lacking humanity, sanity, or femininity, because the image of a female ’terrorist’ or war criminal is incompatible with traditional understandings of all women as ‘peaceful people’ that ‘war protects’ and who ‘should be protected from war.’ Rather than attributing women’s violence to grievances that exist within a broader socio-political context, scholars and analysts are quick to employ maternalism, mental instability, or deviant sexuality as legitimate explanations. 

Many of the theories that attempt to explain political violence are based on the assumption that those who perpetrate it are men. Sex-specific theories that aim to explain women’s violence tend to use gendered assumptions about what women are to account for their violence as women’s violence. There is no denying that men and women commit violence in a gendered world that consists of gendered influences and gendered implications, but separating theories of men’s and women’s violence results in explanations of violence that are based on perceived gender norms and gendered expectations of behavior. This is exemplified by the number of terrorism scholars that have credited female suicide bombers with motivations that they view as entirely unique from male suicide bombers.  

In reality, “women’s issues” are not the sole reason why women choose to join extremist movements or terrorist organizations. Most women are motivated by reasons that have little to nothing to do with their gender. A number of studies suggest that the factors or motivations that prompt men to become terrorists drive women in the same way. These motivations include grievance about sociopolitical conditions; grief about the death of a loved one; real or perceived humiliation on a physical, psychological, or political level; a fanatical commitment to religious or ideological beliefs; an intention to derive economic benefits; or a desire to effect radical societal change.

Still, there are a number of women who fulfill the gendered assumptions that try to explain why women participate in political violence. Some women appear to need respect or redemption for past sins. By engaging in violence, women can demonstrate that they are just as dedicated and committed to the cause as men. Female suicide bombers are projected as symbols of nationalism in some communities, with little girls wanting to grow up to be just like them. After their deaths, schools, parks, streets, even Girl Scout troops are named after particularly successful bombers. Most female jihadists are convinced that martyrdom will wipe away all of their sins and stigmas. It is generally believed that once a woman becomes a shahida (female martyr), she erases any embarrassment brought to her family and instead becomes a source of great pride.

Several jihadist organizations have started to redirect their recruiting efforts towards women in order to regain a strategic advantage. With increasingly tightened security, the perception that women are less prone to violence, the Islamic dress code, and the reluctance to carry out body searches on Muslim women make them the perfect demographic for terrorists. A study on suicide bombers by Lindsay O’Rourke looks at the strategic advantages that female terrorists can offer and the effectiveness of women overall as bombers. The analysis found that women are more lethal compared to their male counterparts, as demonstrated by their lethality in attacks across multiple jurisdictions and deployments. Women not only claimed a higher number of victims in individual attacks (8.4 for women compared to 5.3 for men), but they were also more likely than men to be successful in carrying out suicide attacks.

As agencies of violence, women pose unique threats to security because they provide the support roles that allow terrorist organizations to survive. In the case of the Islamic State, female migrants provide the human capital that ISIS needs to operate, expand, and legitimize itself. Domestically, women are sources of comfort and moral support for male fighters, and they ensure that the caliphate’s next generation will be born. Professionally, either as nurses or teachers, women provide medical care as well as educational instruction. Although women living under the Islamic State are forbidden from fulfilling formal combat roles, the manifesto published by the Al-Khansaa Brigade states that women can wage jihad under necessary conditions, and many females joining ISIS express a willingness to fight.  

Women who decide to return from jihadist battlefields are likely to come back with the training to conduct attacks as well as the extremist connections necessary to build terrorist networks at home. However, even if these women choose not to return home, they still pose a significant threat by the presence they maintain online. Many female members of jihadist organizations use social-media websites like Twitter and Tumblr to actively encourage others to carry out attacks in Western countries or to travel abroad and join them. After failing to reach Syria, one French teenager was urged by her recruiters to carry out attacks at home. Although the need for urgency seems minor, terrorist attacks carried out by women are in fact an imminent security threat, as recently witnessed in San Bernardino, California.

Assessing Current Policy Approaches: Where Are the Women?

International relations scholarship is largely dominated by male voices and/or masculine values while claiming gender neutrality. This leads to counterterrorism policy based on knowledge that is deeply embedded in the gendered power structures of society, excluding a large population (women) from being considered or assessed as credible security threats. Even when counterterrorism policies are not explicitly about men only or gendered in their appraisal, a vast majority of them are still based on stereotypes dealing with male actors and masculinized understandings of knowledge, values, and actions.

The hegemonic masculinities that have come to dominate the current policy discourse on terrorism are also present in the academic studies that attempt to explain terrorism. Sex-specific theories that aim to explain women’s violence are largely based on gendered assumptions that apply to the behavior of men. As a result, the majority of academic work dealing with women as terrorists still heavily reflects the gender stereotypes that see men as the optimal group most likely to be terrorists or combatants in any particular cultural setting. The outcome is that very few studies have sought to empirically measure the strategies deployed by nonstate groups, especially those operating in highly patriarchal settings, to calculate the effectiveness of women as terrorist operatives and to assess the factors that bring about women’s mobilization.

The number of female practitioners that are involved in counterterrorism efforts and law enforcement remains relatively low. As such, the absence of women as practitioners has led to major operational challenges when it comes to incorporating a gender perspective into counterterrorism programming. Female law enforcement personnel can serve as valuable assets in counterterrorism efforts because they understand gender sensitivities and may be better suited to elicit intelligence and achieve information-driven results. For these reasons, it is necessary to increase the participation of women in the formulation and implementation of counterterrorism policy.

There are very few countries that have taken into consideration the security threats that are posed by women who choose to join extremist movements or terrorist organizations. Even after 9/11, updated training manuals provided to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security failed to include women on the list of potential attackers. The general assumption that men are more likely to carry out terrorist attacks means that women are less likely than their male counterparts to be identified by domestic intelligence agencies, detected when traveling abroad, or viewed as legitimate security threats. Several reports of women crossing into ISIS-controlled territory after being previously detained by the Turkish military illustrate this.

Policy Recommendations: Minding the Gap Between Gender & Threat

Practitioners and policymakers working on terrorism prevention or countering violent extremism (CVE) efforts must develop a better understanding of the multiple roles that women play in perpetuating violence. The diversity of roles that women clearly play in terrorism—sympathizer, mobilizer, organizer, and perpetrator—should be reflected in the development of effective policies and programs that aim to address terrorism and violent extremism. 

It is important to recognize that women have an increasing role in the design and implementation of counterterrorism. Incorporating more women into practitioner roles dealing with security and law enforcement can help address the lack of gender sensitivity that takes place when counterterrorism policies are formulated. By bringing their personal convictions and experiences as women to the realms of security, female practitioners provide unique outlooks that help us inform, shape, and implement counterterrorism policies and programs more effectively. It is therefore necessary to ensure that women are able to participate and be represented in policy development discussions and that gender expertise is included at the very outset of program design. At the policy development and design level, the participation of women in counterterrorism efforts should be encouraged and enhanced. Where appropriate, a number of counterterrorism and CVE bodies can ultimately benefit from working with gender advisers that specialize in issues surrounding women and violence. 

The propaganda that terrorist organizations use to recruit women focuses significantly on narratives and grievances that are unique to women. There is a great need to develop counter-narratives that are aimed towards women and cater to these gender nuances. Targeted messaging that counters the appeal of jihadist organizations for women needs to be increased. These counter-narratives should highlight the brutal realities experienced by women who live under the control of groups like ISIS. Focusing on negative aspects of oppression, counter-narratives can serve to delegitimize the glorifying factors of martyrdom.

Conclusion

Socially constructed ideas about the roles and place of women and men during war impact policies, depictions, and our ability to accept and acknowledge violent female actors with agency. By failing to recognize the inherent masculinities that have come to dominate world politics and international security, we have overlooked the threats that women pose when they participate in political violence. The lack of serious attention paid to women as perpetrators of violence has resulted in a series of counterterrorism policies that largely fail to account for the participation of women in extremist movements or terrorist organizations. The continuation of counterterrorism policy that fails to address the present gaps between gender and credible threats ultimately makes the American public more vulnerable to terrorism and poses a serious issue for the security interests of the United States.

                                       By Megan Anderson

Since the initial protests against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad began, Turkey has been the main driver of support for the various rebel groups fighting for Assad’s overthrow.

In the early stages of the uprising, Turkey’s government carried out a unique “open border” policy that permitted foreign and opposition fighters to use its 565-mile southern border as a transit point to the Syrian battlefield. Supporting anyone willing to fight Assad’s regime, the Turkish government allowed arms and fighters to flow indiscriminately into Syria.

As Turkey became the main highway for rebels crossing into Syria, it became increasingly difficult for Erdogan’s government to distinguish between the moderate forces they claimed to be supporting and the jihadists that were exploiting the country’s “open border” policy. When Assad did not fall from power, the makeup of the Syrian opposition began to change dramatically.

With jihadist groups dominating the Syrian opposition, radical forces began to stream into the region, and some of them even established cells of operation within Turkey itself. Leading opponents of the Turkish government have accused Turkey of aiding the Islamic State as thousands of fighters from around the world are passing through the country’s porous border and into Syria. Some political analysts have even gone as far as accusing Turkey of being “The New Pakistan.” Thomas Heghammer, a Norwegian terrorism expert, best explains this recent analogy: “Turkey is to Syria now what Pakistan was to Afghanistan in the 1990s. Antakya is the Peshawar of Syria. Turkey is the main passageway for fighters from the West, and from the rest of the region.”

Turkey and Syria: A Historical Background

The relationship between Turkey and Syria has historically been hostile. Territorial disputes over Turkey’s Hatay province and subsequent dam projects that have threatened Syria’s water security remain to be some of the key issues producing tension between the two countries. “In 1939, land belonging to Syria in the northwest along the Mediterranean, then called the Sanjak of Alexandretta, was annexed by Turkey and became its southernmost province, Hatay.”

After acquiring Hatay Province, Turkey carried out a series of construction projects to govern the supply and distribution of water. A majority of Turkey’s water comes from the Euphrates and Tigris Rivers, which also run through Syria and Iraq. Since Turkey controls the flow of the Euphrates and Tigris Rivers, it has used this power to manipulate Syria’s water supplies, which has furthered animosity between the two neighbors. In response to Turkey’s acquisition of Hatay province, Damascus adopted an antagonizing policy that provided support to Kurdish separatists fighting the Turkish government.

When the Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK) began a guerilla war against Turkey in 1984, then-President Hafez al-Assad (the father of Bashar al-Assad) offered them a safe haven to organize and train in Syria. The top leader of the PKK, Abdullah Öcalan, lived in Damascus for nearly two decades between 1979 and 1998, despite being wanted by the Turkish government.

After coming to power in November of 2002, Turkey’s Justice and Development Party, or AKP, sought to establish close political and economic relations with its regional neighbors. The AKP’s “zero problems with neighbors” policy brought about a dramatic rapprochement between Turkey and Syria — a free-trade agreement was established in 2007, and President Erdogan even referred to Bashar al-Assad as his “brother” in 2009. When an Arab Spring-style uprising emerged in Syria against Assad in March of 2011, the strengthening ties between Turkey and Syria immediately dissolved. In the initial stages of the conflict, Turkey’s government called on Assad to implement democratic reforms and refrain from violently repressing the political opposition. After it became evident that Assad was neither interested in reform nor stepping down from power, the Turkish government decided to commit itself to regime change in Syria.

Arming the Opposition

Turkey’s anti-Assad campaign began in August 2011, shortly after it called on Assad to step down from power. The Arab Spring shifted Turkey’s focus toward expanding its regional leadership, and the country saw the uprising against Assad as an immediate opportunity to help install a Sunni regime in Syria.

Turkey’s government soon became the driving force behind efforts to supply the rebels aiming to oust Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. In the early stages of the Syrian uprising, the Turkish authorities maintained an open border policy in order to allow refugees out and support to the moderate Syrian opposition in. At the time, the Syrian opposition was part of the umbrella organization known as the Free Syrian Army, or FSA. Turkey’s main spy chief, Hakan Fidan, “started directing a secret effort to bolster rebel capabilities by allowing arms, money, and logistical support to funnel into northern Syria — including arms from Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and other Gulf allies.”

Syrian opposition leaders, American officials, and Middle Eastern diplomats who have worked with Turkey’s national-intelligence apparatus, the Milli Istihbarat Teskilati (MIT), say “the MIT acted like a ‘traffic cop’ that arranged weapons drops and let convoys through checkpoints along Turkey’s 565-mile border with Syria.” Some moderate Syrian opposition leaders claim they immediately saw arms shipments being distributed in favor of groups linked to the Muslim Brotherhood, a movement that is heavily supported by Turkey’s AKP.

Additionally, Syrian Kurdish leaders accuse Turkey’s government of allowing weapons to fall into the hands of radical fighters willing to take on Kurdish brigades. By mid-2012, a number of moderate rebel groups began to come under defeat from extremist groups. The flow of arms and fighters continued across the border as the fighters became more radicalized — extremists were able to grow in power partly by exploiting Turkey’s open-border policy. Turkey became a strategically vital supply route for groups such as al-Nusra (an affiliate of al-Qaeda), and an even more important entry point for their endless supply of foreign fighters. One senior commander for the Islamic State told the Washington Post that Turkey’s lack of border security contributed to his group’s success: “Most of the fighters who joined us in the beginning of the war came via Turkey, and so did our equipment and supplies.”

Threats to Turkish Security:

Turkish border towns such as Reyhanli have become pipelines for moving foreign fighters and arms across the border to Syria. “Locals talk of Islamist fighters openly stocking up on uniforms and the latest Samsung smartphones. Wounded jihadists from the Islamic State and the al-Nusra Front — an al-Qaeda offshoot also fighting the Syrian government — were treated at Turkish hospitals.”

In June 2014, Western aid workers reported the presence of foreign jihadists at the “humanitarian crossing” near the Syrian village of Atma. Carrying their weapons, two Turkish ISIS fighters told the aid workers “they had just returned from the battle to conquer Mosul and were heading to Istanbul for a bit of relaxation.”

Most of Turkey’s population of 77 million is adamantly opposed to the Islamic State, but a small minority within Turkey’s conservative elements remains sympathetic to its ideological cause. According to one poll conducted in October, 12 percent of Turks do not consider the Islamic State to be a “terrorist organization.” The number of Turks who have joined the fight in Syria is estimated to be in the thousands, but Turkey’s Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavušoglu has said only 500–700 Turkish nationals are fighting alongside the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq. Multiple reports coming from Turkey suggest that the Islamic State has established a sophisticated recruiting network within the country. Operating online and through religious study groups, the organization preys on young Sunni Muslim men living in poor and conservative neighborhoods. In one polluted and poverty-stricken town on the fringe of Istanbul, Dilovasi, local ISIS supporters openly display the Islamic State’s infamous black flag in the windows of their cars and homes.

While typical ISIS recruits are young men, there are several other instances where the organization is targeting women and children online. Hundreds of Turks are using social media websites to express their support for the Islamic State. Although the Turkish government has blocked access to Twitter and Facebook in the past for being “inappropriate,” websites openly praising the Islamic State are easily accessible to Turkish citizens.

Even if a majority of Turkish citizens are unwilling to join the fighting ranks of the Islamic State, many of them have started to smuggle gasoline for the jihadist group. Turkey has become one of the main markets for bootlegged gasoline coming from Islamic State-controlled zones in Syria and Iraq, where it is sold for a fraction of legal retail prices. Some people multiplied their wealth a thousand fold in a few months from smuggling; one waitress even claimed she earned twenty times her weekly salary in just one day from coordinating oil runs with ISIS members. Turkish members of the Islamic State have allegedly boasted that they are capable of devastating Turkey from the inside if they choose to do so. After capturing a prominent Turkish photojournalist in November of 2013, one ISIS fighter bragged, “We can set off bombs in all four corners of the country. If they close the borders we will cause civil and economic chaos.”

In March 2014, ISIS members murdered a Turkish soldier, a police officer, and another civilian when the militants were stopped at a checkpoint in their car en route to Istanbul. The three militants had reportedly entered Turkey from Hatay province, and their car was filled with AK-47 assault rifles and hand grenades. Had the men not been stopped, they would have eventually staged a deadly terrorist attack against Turkey’s financial capital and most densely populated metropolis. This past January, Islamic State signaled that its organization had the capability to cripple Turkey’s tourist industry (35 million tourists a year and roughly three percent of Turkey’s GDP) after a Russian widow of a Norwegian Islamic State fighter blew herself up in a police station in Istanbul’s tourist district of Sultanahmet, killing one officer.

Addressing the Issue

The Turkish government has slowly begun to turn around its approach to foreign fighters using the Turkish border in order to cross into Syria. Despite reluctance to join the U.S.-led coalition against the Islamic State, Turkey allowed American intelligence agencies to operate centers in southern Turkey to intercept extremist communications. In September of 2014, Turkey participated in a summit-level meeting of the U.N. Security Council to address the issue of foreign fighters flowing into Iraq and Syria. Chaired by U.S. President Barack Obama, the meeting produced Resolution 2178, which includes the threat of sanctions against those who assist foreign fighters in Syria. The resolution was unanimously adopted. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan spoke in favor of the resolution, claiming that it was because his country “had been the victim of terrorist attacks.”

Recognizing the potential national security threats posed by the presence of foreign fighters on its border, the Turkish government is now working with the United States and European governments to enact new safeguards against foreign fighters trying to get into Syria and the smuggling of weapons across the border. Cooperation with European Union member states includes tighter screening of passengers on flights into Turkey and the establishment of a “no-entry” list consisting of thousands of people suspected of seeking to join extremists in Syria.

Turkish officials claim to have barred more than 4,000 people from entering the country in 2014 as a result. In January, a Turkish intelligence report warned that up to 3,000 ISIS members from Iraq and Syria were residing in safe houses throughout Turkey and preparing to carry out attacks in Hatay, Adana, Ankara, and Istanbul. Shortly after, the Turkish government used its police forces to carry out raids across the country’s northwestern provinces, most notably Sakarya, in order to arrest suspected members of ISIS operating in Turkey. It was the very first time a Turkish citizen was arrested inside of Turkey for being a suspected member of the Islamic State.

Conclusion

As of May, the Turkish government claims to have deported roughly 1,350 foreigners suspected of seeking to join radical groups such as the Islamic State and holds a list containing up to 13,500 individuals who are barred from entering the country. Although Turkey has begun to cooperate with other countries in order to stem the flow of foreign fighters through its borders, British Prime Minister David Cameron recently stated that the Turkish government and Turkish commercial airlines need to do more to identify radicalized British citizens flying to or from the region. 

In June, President Obama openly criticized the Turkish government for not doing enough to stop foreign fighters from crossing the Turkish-Syria border. Besides taking obvious steps to either shut down or heavily monitor its border with Syria, the Turkish government should increase its effort towards preventing the recruitment and radicalization of Turkish youth, especially throughout impoverished areas.

Despite claims made by Turkey’s government that serious measures are being taken to prevent the flow of foreign fighters through its border, as long as Syrian President Bashar al-Assad remains in power, it is likely that the problem will continue to get worse.

By Megan Anderson

Introduction:

     When the American President Barack Obama began his first term, he made shifting away from the Middle East one of the top foreign policy priorities for the United States. Vowing to bring U.S. troops home after almost a decade of war, the President campaigned for reelection by promising a complete military withdrawal from Iraq. As the final combat troops departed in December of 2011, a civil war in neighboring Syria began to slowly destabilize the region and threaten the fragile security environment being left behind. Fearing that American involvement would reverse its intended retreat from the region, the Obama administration refused to arm the moderate rebel forces that emerged in the fight against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. As Syria deteriorated, remnants of Al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) exploited the power-vacuum and eventually evolved into what is now known as the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS).

     Serving as a de-facto capital for transnational jihad, the area controlled by the Islamic State has developed into a major security threat for the entire Middle East. The number of foreign fighters that have traveled to Syria to fight for the Islamic State or other jihadist groups now exceeds the rate of foreigners who went to fight in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Yemen, or Somalia. ISIS has succeeded in promoting disunity amongst Syria’s opposition and has defeated a majority of the rebel groups fighting against the Assad regime. If left unchecked, the Islamic State’s increasing power and territorial control will continue to establish local bases of operations and support, greatly raising the potential and likelihood of terrorist attacks throughout the region and beyond.

     Decreasing the American military role in Iraq and the initial refusal by the United States to arm Syria’s moderate rebels with weaponry helped create an environment that became increasingly favorable to the very conditions the Islamic State sought to manipulate. The absence of U.S. forces lessened the political pressure on Iraq’s government to achieve inclusiveness and deprived the Iraqi Security Forces of the dire support they needed to maintain stability. Lacking serious backing from the United States, opposition groups that could have weakened ISIS militarily were deeply disadvantaged. Taking too long to recognize the strategic importance of the Middle East, the Obama administration has made a series of wrong choices: Withdrawing too soon from Iraq, failing to intervene in Syria, and not preventing the rise of the Islamic State.

I. Abandoning Iraq at the Worst Possible Time

     The Obama administration’s decision to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq was a fatal mistake, because it helped foster two major conditions that were eventually exploited by the Islamic State. Without a significant American presence, the country fell into a state of complete chaos—political pressure for Iraq’s former Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki, to pursue policies of inclusiveness and to incorporate Sunnis into the Iraqi military suddenly disappeared. Deciding not to leave behind any residual forces, the Obama administration undermined both the confidence and effectiveness of the Iraqi military. Unprepared and poorly trained, the Iraqi Security Forces were barely capable of taking on a domestic insurgency—let alone the Islamic State. By choosing to prematurely depart from Iraq, the Obama administration contributed to the creation of disenfranchised Sunni communities that felt no remorse in sympathizing with the Islamic State, as well as an Iraqi army that felt no remorse in abandoning their American-supplied weaponry when confronting it. 

     Within days of U.S. forces leaving, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki set out to politically delegitimize Iraq’s Sunnis, unraveling the reconciliation efforts that had been pursued during the surge. Maliki cleansed his Shia-led government of Sunnis, arresting over 500 Sunni electoral candidates and high-ranking officials while issuing a death sentence for his Sunni Vice President. Further isolating the Sunni population, Maliki shunned the fighters from the Sunni Awakening, refusing to incorporate them into the Shia-dominated security forces. Instead of integrating the Awakening fighters that had helped subdue Al-Qaeda into the Iraqi army, Maliki arrested them. The decreased American presence in Iraq enabled former Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki to rebuild his government along sectarian lines and deliberately disenfranchise Iraq’s Sunni population.

     Despite being advised by American military officials to keep at least 20,000 U.S. troops in the country as a residual force, the Obama administration failed to leave behind any military forces to ease the burden on Iraq’s military. Without U.S. troops training and advising the Iraqi Security Forces as they began to assume control over a weakened security environment, the confidence in Iraq’s counterterrorism operations quickly diminished. Without the support and training that would have been provided by maintaining a presence of American troops in Iraq, the Iraqi Security Forces were ultimately disadvantaged when it came time to confront the Islamic State.

     Withdrawing American troops from Iraq led to increased sectarian tensions and left behind an Iraqi army that was unprepared to take on the security responsibilities that had, up until then, belonged to the United States. Taking advantage of the political infighting and sectarian tension, the Islamic State swept across the Syrian border and into western Iraq in June of 2014. Inflaming a wider Sunni uprising across the country, the group was able to capture Iraq’s second largest city, Mosul, within twenty-four hours. The political isolation of Sunnis by Iraq’s government came to benefit the Islamic State, because disenfranchised Sunnis either joined the insurgency, provided tangible support, or simply failed to resist and provided passive support. Overwhelmed and untrained, Iraq’s Shia-dominated military fled from defending the Sunnis in Mosul, feeling no obligation to protect a population that had so warmly received the Islamic State.

II. Too Little Too Late in Syria

     At the start of the Syrian conflict, the Obama administration missed a crucial opening to pull the opposition together into a political and military union dominated by moderates. Fearing involvement in a messy civil war that was quickly starting to destabilize the region, U.S. President Barack Obama was reluctant to provide military aid to Syrian rebel groups. Disagreements between the administration’s top officials over what to supply, and to whom, stalled American-led training and arming of any groups that may have been capable of militarily defeating the Islamic State. Failing “to help build up a credible fighting force…left a big vacuum” that allowed the Islamic State and other jihadist groups to aggressively expand their control, funds, fighters, and weapons.

     Although a Syrian opposition coalition formed in August of 2011, the Obama administration refrained from seriously supporting it against the government of Bashar Al-Assad. Established by Syrian dissidents, the Syrian National Council, or SNC, was meant to represent the concerns and demands of the Syrian people while reinforcing a united front against the Assad regime. The stated goals of the 260-member council included securing political support for a peaceful revolution; promoting national unity during the transitional phase; preventing any political vacuums; and developing a roadmap for democratic change in Syria. By not making an effort to bolster the legitimacy of the Syrian National Council, the Obama administration lost an opportunity to politically undermine the Assad regime. 

     After years of instability and civil war, Syria has lost most of its territorial sovereignty to the Islamic State and a number of other jihadist groups. Now the number one destination for foreign fighters, Syria has become a breeding ground for jihadist operations in the region and poses the threat of becoming an organizational base for terrorists to carry out attacks back home. Intelligence agencies believe that at least 20,000 foreign fighters are in Syria fighting for the Islamic State or other jihadist groups, and at least 3,400 of them come from Western nations. Even though the individuals that travel to Syria are likely to pose a security threat once they return home, the ideological appeal of the Islamic State also inspires those who have not gone to fight: In May of 2014 an ISIS supporter opened fire at a Jewish Museum killing four in Brussels, while another ISIS supporter ran down and killed a Canadian soldier in Quebec that October.

     President Obama’s initial refusal to militarily back Syria’s moderate rebels led to further instability and the consolidation of territory by the Islamic State and a number of other Al-Qaeda affiliated terrorist groups. Without any training or military aid from the United States, the moderate opposition in Syria could not counter ISIS or Jabhat al-Nusra. Currently, the Islamic State maintains hundreds of square miles and boasts a fighting force of roughly 30,000 militants. Had Syria’s rebels been armed to take on the Islamic State and other jihadist groups, the dynamic on the battlefield could have been changed enough to help negotiate a political settlement between Assad’s government and the Syrian National Council.

III. “We Don’t Have A Strategy.”

      Following the Islamic State’s advance on Mosul, the Obama administration authorized targeted airstrikes against its forces in Iraq. Disregarding his propensity to avoid military conflict, President Obama expanded the strikes that September, vowing, “to degrade and ultimately destroy” the group’s strongholds in Syria. Since then, progress has been slow and many have argued that more needs to be done in order to roll back the organization’s gains and intensifying terror threat. 

      The Obama administration should continue providing air power and hundreds of military advisers to back the Iraqi Security Forces in their offensive against the Islamic State. If President Obama insists on defeating ISIS without American combat troops, he must do everything in his power to construct a coalition comprised of fighters from all realms of Iraqi society; a winning offensive against the Islamic State would realistically include Sunni tribesmen, Shi’ite militiamen, and Kurdish Peshmerga. Once these forces break the Islamic State’s occupation in northern and western Iraq, the Iraqi government will only be able to hold and secure the territory by using local Sunni tribes. For Iraqi Sunnis to reject the Islamic State the government in Baghdad will have to reverse its sectarian orientation and become politically inclusive; they will have to “reawaken” the Sunnis and recreate the momentum that drove Al-Qaeda from Iraq in 2007. Without the reinforcement of American combat troops, it is important that the Obama administration makes an effort to encourage the reintegration of Sunnis into Iraq’s political system as well as the Iraqi Security Forces. 

     Limiting the United States’ military involvement in the fight against ISIS doesn’t mean that the President has to completely disregard all American boots on the ground—without committing major occupational forces, the administration can opt to send joint Special Operations task forces. Assigning a Navy SEAL team or Army Delta Force to help train or advise some of the Iraqi army’s missions could help change the situation on the ground dramatically. 

     In regards to Syria, the United States should immediately accelerate and expand its arming and training of the Syrian rebel groups that are capable of opposing the Islamic State on the ground. Through training, weaponry, and intelligence, the Obama administration can bolster opposition groups and help them reorganize against ISIS. When a viable Syrian opposition is formed, the U.S. and its coalition should provide air support for the military operations it conducts against the Islamic State. As long as Syria’s rebels lack sufficient military and financial assistance, the Islamic State will prosper—but with the proper training, weaponry, and air support, they might still have a chance. At this point, the Obama administration has nothing left to lose. 

     Despite increasing efforts by the Islamic State to branch out beyond Iraq and Syria, the Obama administration has failed to make a concerted effort to enlist Middle Eastern governments in a campaign that delegitimizes the Islamic State’s social and religious appeal. As an extremist organization, the Islamic State’s attraction is a worrying threat—so far, Saudi Arabia has arrested over fifty of its citizens for either attempting to join the organization or trying to carry out an attack in its name. In addition to working with the region’s governments to undermine the Islamic State’s influential propaganda, the United States should also cooperate with the governments that have a large number of citizens fighting in Iraq and Syria to prevent the future flow of more foreign fighters. By sharing information regarding the individuals who have already gone to fight or have expressed an interest in possibly going to fight with the Islamic State, the U.S. and other international actors can help deplete ISIS of the hundreds of foreign militants it receives each month. 

     American airpower alone will not be responsible for degrading and ultimately destroying the Islamic State. Even though the airstrikes being carried out by the Obama administration have halted the organization’s momentum in Iraq and degraded its bases of support in Syria, the larger, longer-term campaign to kill the organization’s ideological appeal remains untouched. The Islamic State has proven itself capable of taking and holding territory, controlling populations, and governing at the local level—yet the Obama administration has refused to commit any combat troops secure Iraq, and still hasn’t adequately backed a moderate group capable of challenging ISIS in Syria.

Conclusion:

      Taking advantage of the fragile security environment left behind by the American military withdrawal from Iraq, the Islamic State was able to expand from Syria and into Western Iraq. Before a small number of ISIS fighters were capable of seizing Iraq’s second largest city, the Obama administration had no interest in confronting the jihadist organization and refused to intervene in Syria’s civil war. Permitted to grow into an expansive, multi-layered organization, the Islamic State now presents itself as a superior alternative to Al-Qaeda in almost every way; not only does the group control more territory, but it has proven itself capable of governing populations and appealing to a much larger audience. Destroying the Islamic State means going after its bases of support and central headquarters in Syria, not just its strongholds in Iraq. For the coalition airstrikes against ISIS to work, they must be carried out in coordination with an effective ground force—addressing the organization militarily on the ground in Syria is necessary, not optional, if we wish to mitigate the mounting ISIS poses threat to the region. Even though forces taking on the Islamic State on the ground are unlikely to be American, it is within the interest of the United States to make sure they are trained, equipped, and successful. If the Islamic State’s movement continues to grow, many future threats will either “emanate from or have a connection back to Syria.”

By Megan Anderson

     Tonight, President Obama stands to answer a crucial question in American foreign policy: Is the United States willing to cooperate with Iran when it comes to fighting the Islamic State?

     Lately, there seems to be a double-standard taking place. While the U.S. has been quietly cooperating with Iranian troops on the ground in Iraq, it’s been publicly building an anti-ISIS coalition made up of mainly Sunni-based allies. And despite the fact that we are backing Iraq’s Shia-led government, we are calling on President Bashar al-Assad, an Alawite, to step down from his regime in Syria.

     Traditionally, the American approach to Iran has been one of containment, guided along the sectarian rift that exists between Shia-dominant Iran and our Sunni-led ally and key energy guarantor, Saudi Arabia. Fearful of an overwhelming Iranian power, which has the potential to stir unrest amongst key Shiite populations, the United States has sought to curb Iran’s influence where it can, mostly in Iraq.

   Defeating ISIS will require a large ground campaign, one that the U.S. is more than reluctant to commit to. While the Obama administration claims that the Iraqi Security Forces, Kurdish Peshmerga, and a number of moderate Syrian rebels are ready to take on the Islamic State, the reality from the ground is that the ISF and Peshmerga have needed Iranian military support in order to do so.

    To leave Iran out of the fight against the Islamic State would be a grave mistake. Whether we like it or not, Iran is a regional power in the Middle East, and its proximity to both Iraq and Syria means it has a stake in each conflict. Since the American invasion of Iraq, it has become evident that Iran seeks to extend its influence in Baghdad and Kurdistan, with or without the consent of the United States.

     Failing to include Iran in a coalition against the Islamic State has the potential to severely undermine what most people would consider to be President Obama’s sole prerogative in the Middle East: an Iranian nuclear deal. Avoiding cooperation with Iran against ISIS would mean compromising the outcome of nuclear negotiations which have yet to take place. It would be telling Tehran that we cannot trust them, nor do we take their word seriously. As Aaron David Miller stated earlier this year, “Simply put, to have any chance of getting things done with Iran, America needs to be talking with the Iranians — not shooting at them in Syria or anywhere else.”

     Iran has been one of the only viable forces in Iraq to support the Iraqi Security Forces and Kurdish militias in their brutal fight against the Islamic State. Preventing Iran from participating in the coalition against ISIS will not change the reality that Iran maintains influence in Iraq and Kurdistan, making cooperation more logical than not. A coalition against ISIS that excludes Iran only reinforces Tehran’s belief that the true goal of the United States is to contain Iran’s sphere of Shia influence with its usual Sunni allies. This type of thinking will most certainly undermine any success the United States hopes to achieve come time for nuclear talks. So now it’s up to you, President Obama: To Iran, or not to Iran?

By Megan Anderson

From the start of the Syrian conflict, we’ve been paranoid about the accidental arming of militant groups aligned with Al-Qaeda. For three long years, we’ve debated whether or not moderate rebel forces would be capable of keeping American arms out of the hands of radical jihadists. What we didn’t realize is that groups like ISIS might be able to get them somewhere else: Iraq.

Entering Iraq through the porous border it shares with Syria, Sunni militants fighting for the jihadi group Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) seized the northern city of Mosul on Tuesday. Despite being heavily armed with advanced military equipment from the United States, the Iraqi army abandoned their weapons and removed their uniforms in an attempt to blend in with fleeing civilians. 

After overrunning security checkpoints, police stations, and several military installations, ISIS took the opportunity to bolster its forces by freeing thousands of prisoners from Mosul’s prisons. Similar tactics have previously been used by ISIS to increase the size of its manpower, most notably in last years’ Abu Ghraib jail break. 

The taking of Mosul, the second largest city in Iraq, is much more strategic for ISIS than the attack on Fallujah was earlier this year: 15% of Iraq’s oil flows through Mosul, and the city is considered to be an epicenter of trade coming from Turkey and elsewhere. Mosul being a hub of economic activity makes the fact that the militants are reportedly in control of Mosul’s banks especially concerning, as access to such cash reserves will likely aid ISIS in purchasing arms. 

More frightening than a jihadist group considered “too ruthless“ for Al-Qaeda controlling Iraq’s second largest city is that the Iraqi military deserted their American-supplied weaponry and equipment as they fled. “When the battle got tough in the city of Mosul, the troops dropped their weapons and abandoned their posts, making it an easy prey for the terrorists,” Osama Nuajaifi, the speaker of Iraq’s parliament, said during a news conference in Baghdad.

One of the primary ways in which rebel groups in Syria (including ISIS) have been able to replenish their weapons supplies is through battlefield pick-ups, or "taking equipment left over from skirmishes with the Syrian Army.” The irony, however, is that it’s the Iraqi army that ISIS has defeated rather than Assad’s, and this time they are re-arming themselves with American-supplied weaponry that is likely to give them a tactical advantage on the battlefield. 

As of now, no Iraqi military response has taken place on Mosul, despite the fact that it is now under the complete control of ISIS. Prime Minister Maliki has since declared a state of emergency, and has appealed directly to the United States for assistance. In the mean time, the arms that we have so generously provided to Iraq might be falling into the hands of ISIS.

by Megan Anderson

After the successful overthrow of Tunisia’s Ben Ali, Egypt’s Mubarak, and Yemen’s Saleh, there were many scholars that initially attributed the current uprising in Syria to the simple notion of “proximity” – unrest had reached Syria because it had spread to everywhere else in the region. Once the Arab Spring had emerged, it was only a matter of time until it engulfed the rest of the Middle East in a domino effect. The wave of discontent that began with the Tunisian revolution of January 2011 reached Syria by mid-March. Residents of a small Syrian city in the South assembled to protest the torture of students who had put up anti-government graffiti. The dissent quickly spread into the surrounding provinces within weeks, prompting the Assad regime to lift a decades-long state of emergency and hint at government reform. Months passed, and it became clear that the protests were being met with violent crackdowns; Syrian security forces were sending tanks into restive cities and opening fire on peaceful demonstrators. Despite a series of demands by the United Nations and the extended international community, the Assad regime refuses to relinquish its power, or surrender its fight against what it claims is a domestic terrorism issue. In August of 2011, Syrian dissidents formed the Syrian National Council, or SNC, in order to organize a united opposition front against the Assad regime and to represent the concerns and demands of the Syrian people.

Although the removal of long-consolidated tyrants and their authoritarian regimes likely inspired the Syrian people in some sense or another, the truth is that the conditions for revolution have existed in Syria for quite some time. The regime itself is hardly a reflection of the people it rules over, and very little opportunity exists for those who find themselves estranged from the Alawite minority in power. Accumulated discontent resulting from Syria’s institutional structure, economic inequality, and other domestic grievances ultimately resulted in the emergence of the strongest opposition movement the Assad regime has ever faced.

It is likely that the Assad regime will fall sometime within the next year—allies that had long stood by the regime have slowly begun to abandon their loyalties, and the Syrian Opposition receives more and more legitimacy with each passing day. Most members of the SNC are Sunni Muslims and therefore share many of the same political interests with the majority of Syrians. The Assad regime, in comparison, is Alawite, which only makes up roughly 10-15% of the Syrian population (Watson). Even though the Syrian Opposition has been recognized by several key actors in the international community as the sole representative of the Syrian people, the Assad regime continues to cling to its power. Connections to Iran and other significant states, such as China and Russia, maintain the regime’s survival. With significant Security Council influence, China and Russia continue to veto any and all U.N. resolutions that call for Assad’s removal. Ultimately, Syria’s democratic transition will only be successful if the Syrian Opposition can dislodge the Assad regime from power, dissolve its security apparatus, establish free and fair elections with consensual political representation, and protect the rights of minority groups (Alawites, Kurds).

Historical Background:

Syria is an artificial state, created by the French at the end of the First World War, after territory surrendered by the Ottoman Empire was divided up into a series of mandates. The British received Iraq, Trans-Jordan (Jordan), and Palestine while the French were allocated the territories that currently make up Syria and Lebanon. The border that separates Syria from Lebanon today is a fundamentally superficial border, drawn up by the French as an attempt to divide Lebanon from Syria in the hopes of creating a predominately Christian state in the Middle East. Syria’s population is mainly Muslim, and roughly 75% of its 20 million inhabitants are Sunni Muslims. The other 25% of the population consists of other Muslim sects (Shia) such as Alawites and Druze, as well as some Christian and tiny Jewish communities (Andersen & Wagner). Ethnically, Syria is almost 90% Arab, but there is also a significant presence of both Kurds and Armenians.

In 1949, a coup ushered in a military-based regime to govern over Syria. The ideology shaping the new regime combined socialism and Arab unity in order to unite a fractioned and divided population. The appeal of the Pan-Arab movement encouraged the Syrian government to align itself with Nasser’s Egypt. In 1957, the United Arab Republic was established between Egypt and Syria, focusing on a secular Arab union that was economically social and homogeneous in identity. The relationship between Egypt and Syria deteriorated after the defeat of the Arab countries by Israel (and as a result, Pan-Arabism), and the death of Nasser (Cleveland & Bunton). Soon after, another military coup allowed Hafez al-Assad to take power, placing the Alawites in a position of complete government control. The Alawites belong to sect of Islam that is an offshoot of Shia Islam, and are not typically recognized by other Muslims, such as the Sunni Muslims that make up the bulk of Syria’s population. This has caused a crisis of legitimacy for the Alawite authority that rules the Syrian government, and they have created a coercive state apparatus to deal with the emergence of political opposition groups. The opponents of Assad and his regime are Sunni, and the people that are supporting him are Shia. In 1982, the ethnic and religious tensions reached an all-time high when a Muslim Brotherhood movement in the Syrian city of Hama was brutally repressed by the Syrian mukhabarat (Arabic term for state intelligence, i.e. secret police). The roots of the movement, based in Sunni ideological foundations, threatened the status quo being held by Assad’s Alawite regime.

Classic Explanations for the Arab Spring:

Seventy percent of respondents stated that a lack of freedom and citizenship rights, along with excessive repression, was the cause of unrest in the region (Salamey). The authoritarian regimes that defined the political institutions of the Middle East for most of the twentieth century could no longer fend off the resentment that had been accumulating silently beneath them. Freedom has become a universally demanded right, and the freedom to express one’s religious, political, and cultural beliefs has become something worth dying for throughout the Arab World. Authoritarian governments, their coercive state apparatuses, and the corruption and unfair practices that they created institutionally established a threshold of relative deprivation that could no longer be sustained.

With little to no economic growth, very little opportunity exists for those outside the elite few that enjoy connections to the regime or military. In societies where the wealth is concentrated within the hands of a select minority, those with the closest ties to state-owned industries or enterprises often monopolize investment opportunities. For many of the societies that witnessed Arab Spring-based uprisings, the extreme levels of economic inequality that resulted from this concentration of wealth created large gaps between the rich and the poor, high levels of unemployment, and extreme levels of poverty. The rising costs of living, coupled with food shortages and little to no opportunity created mass frustrations, which resulted in collective action demanding reforms to the system.

Syria’s Institutional Structure:

The institutional nature of the Syrian government undoubtedly played a role in the emergence of an opposition movement. Syria’s regime is completely controlled by a Shia minority, the Alawite sect, and rules over a large Sunni Muslim population. In order to ensure uncontested domination, the Assad family has saturated the ranks of the Syrian military and political elite with fellow Alawites. “The Assad regime may be running a minority government, but it has substantial support from a military of mostly Alawite officers leading a largely Sunni conscript force” (George Friedman). Designed to be essentially “coup-proof”, the upper-ranks of the regime’s power structure are able to consolidate their rule through the extension of force vis-à-vis the state’s coercive apparatus (i.e. military and police).

For the most part, the Assad regime’s strategy of applying overwhelming force to any sign of opposition has worked significantly well. It took years for Syrians to forget the events that followed the 1982 Muslim Brotherhood uprising in the city of Hama: “It was ruthlessly put down with hardly anyone to bear witness to what took place. The consensus is that at least 10,000 died, though some estimates are twice that” (Vivienne Walt). By eliminating all public assembly of political opposition with fear, the Assad regime drove its dissidents underground, forcing them to silence their demands and remain invisible to the Alawite leadership.

A majority of Syrians were forced to silence their opposition to the Assad regime, but their grievances did not disappear. Silent risks began to accumulate below the surface of the regime itself, undetectable to the elite benefitting from the extensive Alawite patronage system and intimate military connections. “Complex systems that have artificially suppressed volatility tend to become extremely fragile, while at the same time exhibiting no visible risks,” explain Nassim Taleb and Mark Blyth (Taleb and Blyth, 33). This is exactly what happened to Assad’s regime in Syria.

Syria’s Economic Grievances:

Although Syria has one of the highest literacy rates in the Middle East, and a large number of the population completes secondary school – the reality on the ground is that the economic benefits that are rendered through development are concentrated in the hands of an elite few. Average Syrians do not receive many of the advantages that result from foreign direct investments into their economy, and very few find jobs once they have attained a college degree, as access to public and many private jobs is tightly controlled by those connected to the regime (Goldstone, 12). When the entire population grows rapidly while “the lion’s share of economic gains is hoarded by the elite, inequality and unemployment surge as well” (Goldstone, 10). On top of economic inequality, high unemployment, and growing populations, the Syrian people are also crippled by low wages and rising food prices, which have increased by almost a third in the last year alone. The persistence of such widespread and unrelieved poverty amid the extravagant wealth possessed by those close to the Assad regime has created an unprecedented resentment amongst a majority of Syrians that has up until now, remained silent.

Syrian Use of Information-Communication Technologies (ICT):

The technological revolution, most notably the Internet, has allowed social interactions to take place between people from all over the world in a matter seconds. This capability, of instant connection and communication, proved to be a vital source of garnering support for Syria’s opposition movement during the Arab Spring. Social media websites, such as Facebook and Twitter, brought transparency to the Assad regime’s violent crackdown on peaceful demonstrations (Stepanova). As Bashar made desperate attempts to convince the international community that his government was facing a radical “terrorist” uprising, Syrians were uploading videos to Youtube that painted a very different picture: protestors demanding democratic reforms being fired upon by the Syrian army, some left in the street to die. The entire world was able to witness what was really happening inside of Syria, and the political opposition was able to organize and legitimize itself by reaching hundreds of thousands of people at once through the Internet. Even for those living outside of the Middle East, Syria’s Arab Spring became impossible to ignore, making the front pages of virtually every newsfeed on the web.

Conclusion:

Although the removal of authoritarian regimes in Tunisia, Egypt, and Yemen likely allowed the Syrian people to realize they were capable of undermining Assad, there were many significant underlying factors already present in Syria to drive revolution. Resentment fueling opposition to the Assad regime stems mainly from the institutional injustices that allow Alawites profound political advantages over their Sunni counterparts. Economic inequality and high unemployment also plague a majority of Syrians, and very few find relief unless they are well connected to the regime. Without any outlets to express political discontent, political opposition groups were forced to organize underground, and their grievances went unheard and remained unanswered. As silent discontent began to accumulate, the perfect catalyst appeared, in the form of the Arab Spring. For the first time, taking down Assad seemed like a fathomable reality, and with the help of ICTs, the opposition, known as the Syrian National Council, was able to successfully organize itself and garner support both from inside Syria and around the world.

The Arab Spring has allowed Syria to experience a political movement unlike any other magnitude that the country has ever witnessed. United Nations estimates put death tolls at nearly 40,000 people, and recent reports claim that President Bashar al-Assad has ordered his military to prepare Syria’s Sarin gas stockpiles in a last-resort effort to squash the rebels that have seized Damascus (the same gas was used by Saddam Hussein in 1988 against roughly 5,000 Kurds). The Syrian Arab Spring has the potential to transform Syria’s government into a successful democratic process, however it must first remove the Assad regime and its security forces from political institutions, establish free and fair elections, and ensure political representation and guaranteed protections for minority populations.

Author’s Note: This paper was originally written and published in December of 2012 for a class titled “Middle Eastern Politics & Institutions” at the State University of New York. The assignment was a country case-study on the variables effecting the emergence of an Arab Spring movement in your respective case (mine being Syria).

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