Foreign powers jockey for control in Syria, risking new conflict
The collapse of the Assad regime in Syria has set off a scramble for control of the heart of the Middle East, a competition that could defer indefinitely the peace and stability Syrians crave and potentially spill into a wider region already roiled by war.
In Syria’s first week without Bashar al-Assad, the longtime despot who has since fled to Moscow, three foreign powers bombed targets in the country in pursuit of their strategic goals: the United States against Islamic State remnants in the east, Turkey against Kurdish forces in the northeast and Israel against Syrian military assets in multiple locations.
Russia and Iran, Assad’s key supporters and the biggest losers from the change of power in Damascus, were meanwhile rushing to withdraw or reposition their forces in the country. Iran has evacuated 4,000 personnel from Syria since Assad’s fall, an Iranian government spokesman said. Russia has also been pulling troops from its bases around Syria and transporting them to the Hmeimim air base on Syria’s Mediterranean coast, although it remains unclear whether the relocations represent a full-scale withdrawal.
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