Introduction Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik ments German Institute for International and Security Affairs m Co U.S.-led Bombardment Challenges Islamic State’s Hold on Eastern Syria WP S But without Addressing the Roots of the Conflict, the Group Will Remain Hard to Beat Khaled Yacoub Oweis In July 2014, the so-called Islamic State solidified its hold on large parts of the Euphra- tes river basin in eastern Syria, expelling its al-Qaeda rivals from the region, weeks after having captured the city of Mosul in neighboring Iraq and having declared a caliphate. The advance undermined the pro-Assad Shi’ite-dominated government in Baghdad and prompted Syrian regime forces to confront the group. In September 2014, a U.S.-led air campaign against the Islamic State in Iraq expanded into Syria. It was met by dismay on the part of Syria’s opposition about the lack of pressure on President Bashar al-Assad as jihadists feed on Sunni resentment against his minority Alawite rule. This has increased the urgency for forging an international solution to Syria’s civil war that not only ad- dresses the jihadist dimension but also includes a strategy to reclaim the east – namely one that provides an alternative to Islamist militancy and the Assad family’s reign. Comprising the provinces of Raqqa and provided fertile ground for militant groups Deir al-Zor along the Euphrates river basin, there. Since its entry into Syria, the Islamic eastern Syria has been among the most State has used a mixture of cash and terror neglected parts of Syria for decades, despite to subdue and enlist local tribes in the east accounting for one-third of national gas and create a reputation for ruthless effi- and oil production and contributing signi- ciency in providing order. This tactic has ficantly to its wheat and cotton output. attracted recruits from other militant bri- Divide-and-rule tactics during the reign of gades and made it difficult to build local President Hafez al-Assad (1970–2000), father alliances to counter the group. At the same of current President Bashar, altered the time, the Islamic State itself is a product of region’s tribal structure by marginalizing fragmentation. The group, formerly known the traditional leadership in favor of several as the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant/ local power centers that were answerable Greater Syria (ISIL or ISIS), was formed in to the security apparatus. Indeed, decades April 2013 after a schism with the al-Nusra of neglect, corruption, and societal frag- Front, al-Qaeda’s Syrian affiliate. mentation under Assad family rule have Khaled Yacoub Oweis is a fellow in the project „The fragmentation of Syria. Halting the slide towards a failed state“ SWP Comments 43 realized by the Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik (SWP) and funded by the German Foreign Office. October 2014 1 tribal representatives also objected to fight- Facts on Eastern/Northeastern Syria ing fellow Sunnis without being offered help to bring down the Assad regime. Populatio n: Approximately 3 million (till A Sunni backlash against the political 2010) : 1.2 million in Deir al-Zor province; order on both sides of the border then help- 800,000 in Raqqa province; and 1 million ed the Islamic State to conquer territory in the mostly Kurdish province of Hasakah quickly, leading to the declaration of a self- in the northeast. Significant numbers of styled caliphate in July 2014 that covered Syria’s Kurds also live in the enclaves of an arc of territory from the city of Mosul in Kobanê and Afrin in the province of Alep- Iraq through to eastern Syria to the out- po, as well as in Kurdish neighborhoods skirts of the province of Aleppo. The group, of Damascus and Aleppo. at least in theory, aspires for a global reach Oil output: Syria’s total production was that harks back to the zenith of the Arab- 370,000 barrels per day in 2010, accord- Muslim empire. ing to official figures (actual production was estimated to have been significantly lower due to U.S. sanctions and deterio- Ripe for Militancy rating conditions of some fields). Hasakah A difficult socioeconomic situation, in accounts for approximately two-thirds of particular in Syria’s east, has provided the the output, with Deir al-Zor producing background for the Islamic State’s success the remaining one-third. there. The east had been hit by a drought Oil fields: In Deir al-Zor, the largest are al- that started in 2006 and lasted until the Omar, al-Ward, and al-Tayyem, which are run-up to the revolt. Mismanagement of near the Iraqi border. In Hasakah, the the water system and lack of investment, largest fields are situated in the province’s coupled with a dearth of rainfall, caused northeaste rn corner along the border water and food shortages, destroyed agri- with Turkey and Iraq. culture and grazing land, and drove hun- Wheat production: Raqqa and Deir al-Zor dreds of thousands of people from Raqqa, together produce one-quarter of Syria’s Deir al-Zor, and the mostly Kurdish prov- overall output, which totaled 4 million ince of Hasakah in the adjoining northeast tons in 2012. Hasakah accounts for one- to seek a living in the peripheries of Damas- third of the country’s total output. cus, Deraa, Hama, and Aleppo – outskirts that developed into slums. The number of Syrians living under what In a bid to stop the Islamic State and the the United Nations defines as “extreme less powerful al-Nusra, the United Arab poverty” – deprived of food, clean drinking Emirates convened a Western-backed water, sanitation, health, proper shelter, meeting for Eastern tribal figures and mili- education, and information – increased tary defectors from the region in Abu Dhabi between 2004 and 2010 from 2 million to in November 2013. The apparent aim of the as much as 3 million, out of a total popu- meeting was to explore the possibility of lation of 21 million. Most of the extremely creating an equivalent to the Sahwa (awak- poor were inhabitants of a territory starting ening) tribal alliances that had contained in Deir al-Zor and encompassing Hasakah, al-Qaeda’s gains in Iraq before the United Raqqa, and its neighboring Aleppo country- States withdrew its troops from the country side. It is no coincidence that these regions, in December 2011. The meeting came to with the exception of the Kurdish areas, nothing, mainly because the participants have formed a main support and recruit- lacked effective control over their tribes, ment base for the Islamic State and al-Nusra. and, unlike in Iraq, there were no U.S. Until the revolt broke out, it appeared troops in Syria on which to count. Some as if tribal loyalty and the emergency U.N. SWP Comments 43 October 2014 2 food aid that was being distributed in the state ruled by Islamic law, or sharia. A crack- east to help mitigate the effects of the down on Hizb al-Tahrir in Syria took place drought, as well as the pervasive security only in the late 1990s, when the group tried apparatus, would keep the region quiet. to lure two army lieutenants into joining Farmers were grouped under a corrupt pro- its ranks. It resulted in the arrest of 920 of regime “Peasants Union,” which distributed its members across the country in 1999 and subsidies for the wheat and cotton crops. the (temporary) demise of Eastern Salafism. Land and water rights were used to buy loy- But the U.S. invasion of Iraq a few years alty. Indeed, army and secret police person- later prompted the Assad regime to open nel stemming from poor rural communi- another chapter with Salafists, this time of ties in the east, known as shawaya, were the jihadist variety, who were less interest- considered so reliable that they were in- ed in ideological nuances and more reliant cluded in the storm troops that overran the on the barrel of the gun to fulfill their reli- city of Hama in February 1982, killing up to gious vision. Hundreds of Syrian would-be- 40,000 of their Sunni brethren and quelling jihadists were allowed to go fight in Iraq in the insurgency led by the Fighting Van- 2003, just before the toppling of Saddam guard branch of the Muslim Brotherhood. Hussein, who had been an arch foe of the Drawing on the poor from the east has Assads. When Iraq’s Sunni insurgency gath- also worked for the Islamic State. The group ered steam a year later, clerics in Syria, has used a war chest, mainly financed by licensed by the authorities, began recruit- selling oil from captured wells, to recruit ing Syrian jihadists and sending them over young men who have known little except the border. Facilitating a jihadist move- poverty under the Assad regime, despite ment appeared worthwhile to the Assad living in the vicinity of energy sources that regime at the time to counter Western pres- were the regime’s main source of hard cur- sure on it with regards to Lebanon – where rency. Salaries of at least $400 per month it was accused of being behind the murder have attracted thousands of Syrians, who of statesman and former Prime Minister now constitute a majority of the Islamic Rafiq al-Hariri – and to keep the United State’s rank-and-file in Syria, in contrast to States occupied with Iraq. foreign fighters, who formed the majority Assad’s honeymoon with the jihadists, of fighters in the country when the Islamic however, began to sour in 2008 when a State was created and, to date, dominate its group of Iraqi-bound jihadists mounted an command structure.