Syrian Opposition RIP
An obituary

With little fanfare and few mourners, Syria’s formal political opposition has expired. On 12 February the Istanbul-based Syrian Opposition Coalition (SOC, also known as the etilaf), the Azaz-based Syrian Interim Government (SIG), and the Syrian Negotiation Commission (SNC) headquartered in Geneva, were all dissolved by presidential decree. Even to seasoned Syria analysts, the composition and roles of these entities had long been a source of confusion. Now, they pass into history after a late-night meeting with President Ahmad Sharaa in which a large delegation from the political opposition “handed over to the Syrian state the special files entrusted to the SNC and SOC and associated institutions,” in the words of a presidential statement.

The SOC was the opposition’s mothership that gave birth to a governance arm (the SIG), and a UN-recognised negotiating arm (the SNC), the latter including an array of opposition “platforms” including those imposed by Russia and Arab states. For most Syrians, however, the SOC and its related entities hardly mattered: their reputation had been in ruins for most of the last decade. Once hailed as the sole legitimate representative of the Syrian people, the SOC will be remembered less for what it achieved than for what it failed to achieve.

Some of the disdain was justified. The political opposition was plagued by internal competition between leaders that to outsiders appeared parochial and petty. These leaders were largely based outside Syria, leaving them open to the charge of being ‘hotel oppositionists.’ The top positions since 2017 were held by a clique that rotated Putin/Medvedev-style and were ‘in the pay of foreign interests,’ albeit that their subventions were nothing compared to Assad’s subsidies from his backers. Above all, they failed to attain their chief goal: the removal of Bashar Assad. It may have been a long-shot for an opposition that lacked an army to unseat a brutal and deeply entrenched dictator; but they failed even to produce political successes that could justify their declared status as the “sole and legitimate representative of the Syrian people.” The 2019 Caesar Act – the most important political achievement of the Syrian opposition – was not their work but that of wealthy Syrian-American lobbyists. 

The international community had for some time taken distance from the opposition. Some viewed it as irrelevant, while others dismissed it as little more than a Turkish proxy. In the diplomatic games over Syria, however, the opposition had a useful function as a placeholder at UN-facilitated talks that kept the moribund political process alive. This was important as it allowed normalisation with Assad (i.e. recognising Russia and Iran’s victory in Syria) to be resisted on the basis of continued commitment to a UN-mediated ‘political solution’ requiring two sides. For some capitals, meanwhile, links with the opposition served as a convenient cover for their military involvement in the conflict. Generally, however, foreign engagement with the opposition after 2017 was limited to envoy-level meetings that allowed states to appear diplomatically invested; while the opposition’s poor reputation provided a convenient excuse for a lack of real commitment. 

It had all started very differently. Shortly after the SOC’s establishment as the primary opposition platform in November 2012, dozens of governments recognised it as the legitimate representative of the Syrian people at the Friends of Syria Conference in Marrakesh. As politically significant as this gesture of recognition was, however, it had few legal or practical consequences. 

Inside Syria, many local councils and Free Syrian Army (FSA) factions were initially supportive, hoping  that the SOC’s Interim Government, established in March 2013, would provide them with funding and arms. Moreover, they expected the SOC to secure decisive Western military intervention akin to what had occurred in Libya after the Qadhafi regime’s ouster. When the Obama administration failed to enforce its ‘red line’ after the August 2013 chemical attacks, however, many armed factions lost hope in the SOC and threw in their lot with the Islamists. 

Russia’s military intervention in 2015 forced a re-think, with the international community now urging the opposition to negotiate. The SOC initially refused to engage, demanding Assad’s departure as a precondition. To break the deadlock, international pressure in December 2015 led to the formation of the High Negotiations Committee in which the SOC was the leading element. In 2017 it evolved into the SNC. The Geneva process itself was a dead letter, however, its endless rounds of talks merely served to discredit those oppositionists that still believed in a negotiated settlement with Assad.  

On the ground, meanwhile, Turkey granted the SIG partial control over parts of northern Aleppo province it had seized with the Syrian National Army (SNA) – the rebranded FSA. Waning Arab and international support for the opposition caused increased reliance on Turkey, which in turn caused problems. The US and EU were outraged when the SOC and SIG openly supported Turkey’s Operation Peace Spring in 2019, and subsequently ended all direct support. Later that year the SOC’s relationship with Saudi Arabia broke down irrevocably because of the SOC’s choice of Ankara over Riyadh. 

The swift offensive by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) that finally toppled Assad underscored a harsh reality: a military solution was the only way to bring about an end to the conflict. Before 27 November, HTS and its leader, Ahmad Sharaa, had an even worse reputation than the Syrian opposition. While the latter were seen as ineffectual but harmless, Sharaa’s Islamism and authoritarianism were regarded as a genuine threat to Syrian society and to the region. That perception changed overnight when he became the new occupant of the presidential palace. 

To its international backers, the opposition had served its purpose and was simply no longer useful. SNC President Badr Jamous was belatedly given the opportunity to address the UN Security Council on 17 December, after years in which no such speech had been considered necessary; but the transition plan he presented, attempting to connect the content of UNSCR 2254 to recent developments, was largely ignored. For Syria’s new leader the opposition’s continued existence was a potential threat as a rallying point for dissent. Sharaa used the occasion of his accession to the presidency to dissolve all revolutionary bodies, including the SOC and its offshoots. In a private meeting with the SOC and SNC presidents on 7 January, he declared that there would be “no place for opposition” during the transition period.  

For years, the Syrian opposition played the tedious yet necessary game of international diplomacy. Its key achievement was simply to have held the line just by continuing to exist, thereby denying Assad any claim to full monopoly on political legitimacy. From opposition-held northern Syria, it governed a million and a half people, albeit under considerable Turkish tutelage. Of all the civil war governments, it was not the most efficient or well-endowed, but it was the least authoritarian and ideological. 

The opposition of yesteryear is now defunct, but a new opposition to Sharaa will inevitably emerge. For all its foibles, the SOC remained the official guardian of the idea that the revolution stood for a free, democratic, and secular Syria based on equal citizenship and the rule of law. It is an idea that will endure.