The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and stop supporting M23 fighters attacking Goma, the nation’s eastern city, have been ordered by UN chief Antonio Guterres to withdraw from Rwandan forces.
According to his spokesman Stephane Dujarric, Guterres “reaffirms his strongest condemnation of the M23 armed group’s ongoing offensive and advances toward Goma in North Kivu with the support of the Rwanda Defense Forces.”
He urges the M23 to halt all hostilities and leave occupied areas right away.  , He further calls on the Rwanda Defence Forces to cease support to the M23 and withdraw from DRC territory”, the statement said.
The DRC and the UN accuse Rwanda of backing the M23 (March 23 Movement) rebels, an accusation that Kigali denies.
The DRC alleged that Rwanda’s forces had entered its territory during a “declaration of war” at a later UN Security Council meeting on Sunday, and that it had demanded sanctions against Rwanda.
More than 900 Rwandan troops entered our country in broad daylight in a deliberate violation of our national sovereignty, according to Congolese Foreign Minister Therese Kayikwamba Wagner, who has crossed the 12th and 13th posts between Goma (in the DRC) and Gisenyi (in Rwanda).
She referred to this as a “frontal assault,” “a declaration of war that no longer hides behind diplomatic artifice,” and called for the Security Council to “impose targeted sanctions including asset freezes and travel bans” against political decision-makers responsible for this aggression as well as against identified members of the Rwandan armed forces’ chain of command.
Rwanda was also put under pressure by France and the UK over its involvement in recent fighting in the eastern DRC city of Goma.
The UK demanded an end to M23 rebel attacks on peacekeepers while the UN ambassador for Rwanda demanded that it withdraw its troops from DRC territory.
Following the fatal shooting of three UN peacekeepers from Uruguay and South Africa in the eastern DRC, the meeting took place one day earlier than planned.
According to South African and UN officials, three Malawian soldiers and seven additional South African soldiers were killed this week.
Rebels approaching Goma
As government forces battled to stop the rebels from seizing the city, M23 fighters swooped on Goma on Sunday, causing thousands of civilians to flee and ground flights from the neighborhood airport.
The M23 rebel movement has made rapid advances this month in DRC’s mineral-rich but conflict-riven eastern borderlands, raising fears that the fighting could spill over into a regional war.
More than one million people live in Goma, the capital of North Kivu province, and M23 fighters have already made plans to seize the city.
Residents told the Reuters news agency that gunfire and artillery fire could be heard early on Sunday in some areas of the city, causing panic in some areas.
By mid-afternoon, the rebels were approaching Goma’s airport, two government soldiers told the agency.
Flights were no longer operating, according to airport officials. On Sunday, the UN advised Goma’s staff to avoid going to the airport and remain sheltered.
In response to the rebel offensive this week, the DRC cut diplomatic ties with Rwanda.
In the wake of two regional wars that came after Rwanda’s genocide in 1994, Eastern Congo is still a tinderbox of rebel-zones and fighters’ fiefdoms.
The rebels now have greater control over Congolese territory than they did before, three years into the current conflict.
Well-trained and professionally armed, M23 – the latest in a long line of Tutsi-led rebel movements – says it exists to protect DRC’s ethnic Tutsi population.
United Nations peacekeepers ride on a pick-up truck truck in Goma, DRC]Arlette Bashizi/Reuters]
Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, the head of Sudan’s army, made his first appearance at the military’s headquarters in Khartoum since government forces claimed to have broken the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF)’ months-long siege.
Accompanied by top military officials on Sunday, al-Burhan praised the “resilience and sacrifices” of soldiers who defended the army’s General Command for 20 months, vowing to “eradicate” the RSF and pursue its fighters “in every corner of Sudan”.
He also hailed the continued operations by the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) elsewhere in the country, including in Omdurman, Bahri, and el-Fasher, where fierce clashes have been reported in recent days.
At the headquarters, which had been encircled by RSF since the start of the war in April 2023, al-Burhan stated, “Our forces are in their best condition.”
The SAF’s announcement on Friday that it had successfully lifted the RSF’s blockade on Khartoum and restored control of some of the city signaled a potentially decisive turning point in the nearly two-year conflict. The RSF denied the army claims as “propaganda” aimed at boosting morale.
Earlier this month, the army recaptured Wad Madani, the capital of Gezira state, which had been held by the RSF for more than a year. After assuming control of the strategic city, there are rumors that military forces allegedly carried out ethnic killings.
The RSF has been accused of carrying out genocide during the war in various ways, including by the United States.
Al Jazeera’s Hiba Morgan, reporting from Khartoum, said al-Burhan’s comments on Sunday signalled that the general was not interested in diplomacy at this time.
“Al-Burhan made it clear he will not be holding negotiations with the RSF, that there will be no reconciliation, and that there will be fighting until the very last rebel is killed”, she said.
The army chief’s words are not the first time, but regional partners and the international community have also made an effort to reach a diplomatic solution. General al-Burhan appears to be favoring a military victory at this time, especially given how quickly the army has regained control of more territory in recent weeks.
Sudan’s army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan arrives at Beijing Capital International Airport before the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) Summit, in Beijing, China September 3, 2024]File: Florence Lo/Reuters]
Attack on a hospital that is “packed with patients”
The World Health Organization (WHO) head made the remarks at a hospital in El-Fasher, Darfur, where dozens of people were killed, during the ceremony.
The Saudi hospital, the main hospital in the besieged area, was the target of the attack late on Friday. Who was the attacker’s perpetrator at the time was unknown. According to a local official, the RSF launched a drone attack.
At least 70 people were killed and 19 others were wounded, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus confirmed on Sunday.
In a post on X, Tedros wrote, “The hospital was full of patients receiving care.”
The attack was described as a “violation of international humanitarian law” by Saudi Arabia.
Local organizations and international human rights organizations have previously reported RSF-related attacks on civilians’ displacement camps and other facilities.
Local authorities claim that more than 5, 000 people have died or been injured since the RSF’s initial bid to take over El-Fasher in May.
According to Amgad Fareid Eltayeb from the Fikra for Studies and Development think tank, El-Fasher is the biggest city in the Darfur region and has the largest operational airport. The army controls the last significant area in the area, making it the last major area.
Eltayeb told Al Jazeera, “The RSF has been trying to take El-Fasher to create the environment for the establishment of a government of its own along with its allies.”
“Darfur must be fully seized by the RSF and its allies in order to form a government, leaving Sudan with a regime akin to what occurred in Libya,” the RSF and its allies say.
Eltayeb expressed concern about the RSF’s ongoing attacks on power plants, oil refineries, and power stations since January 15.
A ceasefire was established in Gaza after a week. The constant sound of explosions has been replaced by silence for the first time in 15 months. However, there is no peace in this silence. It is a silence that screams loss, devastation, and grief – a pause in the destruction, not its end. It feels like standing amid the ashes of a home, searching for something, anything, that survived.
The images coming out of Gaza are haunting. In the rubble of what was once their home, young children with hollow eyes stand. Parents hold onto the remains of toys, photographs, and clothing – fragments of a life that no longer exists. Every face is a tale of trauma and resurrected lives, broken up and divided. I can’t help but stare because turning away makes me feel like I’m abandoning them. They deserve to be seen.
When I called my mother after the ceasefire was announced, the first thing she said to me was, “Now we can grieve”. I had a blade-like piercing force from those words. For months, there was no space for grief. Everywaking moment was suffocated by the fear of an imminent death, leaving no room for mourning. When you are battling to survive, how do you grieve for what you have lost? But now, as the bombs stop falling, the grief comes rushing in like a flood, overwhelming and unrelenting.
More than 47, 000 people – men, women, and children – are dead. Forty-seven thousand souls extinguished, their lives stolen in unimaginable ways. More than 100, 000 are injured, many maimed for life. Behind these numbers are faces, dreams, and families who will never be whole again. The scale of loss is so vast it feels impossible to grasp, but in Gaza, grief is never abstract. It is personal, it is raw, and it is everywhere.
People in Gaza grieve both for their homes and their loved ones. More than just the loss of a physical structure, a home’s loss is also. A friend of mine in Gaza, who also lost his home, told me, “A home is like a child of yours. It takes years to build, and you care for it, always wanting it to look its best”.
In Gaza, people often build their homes brick by brick, sometimes with their own hands. Losing your home means the loss of safety, of comfort, of a place where love is shared and memories are made. A home is not just bricks and mortar, it is where life unfolds. In Gaza, countless families have lost that piece over and over again because losing it means losing something.
My parents ‘ home, the house that sheltered my childhood memories, is gone. Burned to the ground, it is now a heap of ash and twisted metal. Six of my siblings’ homes have also been destroyed, and their lives have been strewn all over like the wall debris. What remains are stories we tell ourselves to survive – stories of resilience, of endurance, of hope, perhaps. But they now feel fragile as well.
For those of us outside Gaza, the grief is compounded by guilt. Being infuriated for not being present, for not enduring the same arousal as our loved ones, and for leading a relative safety lifestyle while suffering. It’s an intolerable tension, with the desire to stand up for them but feeling completely helpless. I try to hold onto the idea that my voice, my words, can make a difference, but even that feels inadequate against the magnitude of their pain.
My family’s story of loss is just one of tens of thousands. Communities have been left to their own, and entire neighborhoods have been destroyed. The scale of destruction is beyond comprehension. Schools, hospitals, mosques, and homes – all are reduced to rubble. Gaza has been stripped of its infrastructure, its economy shattered, its people traumatised. And yet, somehow, they endure.
The Palestinian people’s resilience is both heartfelt and inspiring. Inspiring because they continue to survive, to rebuild, to dream of a better future despite the odds. No one should have to be this resilient, which is heartbreaking. No one should have to endure this much suffering for the sake of existence.
But even as we feel relief now, we know that any ceasefire is temporary, by default. When the occupation is still at the center of this destruction, how can it possibly be anything else? As long as Gaza is blockaded, as long as Palestinians are denied their freedom and dignity, as long as their land is occupied, and as long as Israel is supported by the West to act with impunity, the cycle of violence will continue.
Ceasefires are not solutions, they are merely interruptions, pauses, a momentary reprieve in a cycle of violence that has defined Gaza’s reality for far too long. They are destined to fail without addressing the root causes of injustice, leaving Gaza stranded in a never-ending cycle of destruction and despair.
Beyond putting an end to the bombing, true peace requires more. It requires an end to the blockade, to the occupation, to the systemic oppression that has made life in Gaza unbearable.
Now that the bombs have stopped falling, the international community is unmovable. They must hold Israel accountable for its deeds. The reconstruction of Gaza is important, but it requires more urgent action to address the conflict’s root causes. It requires political courage, moral clarity, and an unwavering commitment to justice. Anything less constitutes a betrayal of Gaza’s citizens.
For my family, the road ahead is long. They will rebuild, as they always do. In the ruins, they will discover a way to give the place a new sense of home. However, this genocide’s scars will never be erased. My mother’s words – “Now we can grieve” – will echo in my mind forever, a reminder of the immense human cost of this conflict.
As I write this, I am overwhelmed by a mix of emotions: anger, sorrow, and a glimmer of hope. I’m angry at the world for allowing these atrocities to occur, I’m saddened by the lost lives and the destroyed homes, and I’m hopeful that my people will find peace one day. Until then, we grieve. We mourn the passing, the living, the past, the present, and the future.
According to Lebanese health officials, the Israeli army killed at least 15 people in the south of the country on the day Israeli forces were scheduled to leave in accordance with a ceasefire agreement.
According to a statement released on Sunday, Lebanon’s ministry of public health said at least 83 people were also hurt when the Israeli army opened fire on residents who attempted to return to their homes.
The killings are the most recent violent attacks to take place since the ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah, which have reportedly started in November.
The ceasefire brought a reduction in the number of daily attacks on Lebanon’s south, Bekaa Valley, and Beirut’s southern suburbs. Israeli forces have continued to support Israeli operations in south Lebanon.
On the final day of the ceasefire, let’s take a look at the state of southern Lebanon.
Lebanese army members gesture as they drive through a damaged site at the Lebanese village of Khiam, near the border with Israel, southern Lebanon, January 23, 2025]Karamallah Daher/Reuters]
What are the terms of the Israel-Hezbollah ceasefire?
Hezbollah agreed to withdraw its forces from Lebanese territory during the terms of the Israel-Hezbollah ceasefire, and Israel was supposed to do so over the course of 60 days.
The Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) were the first to join the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), which was established once the Israeli military left.
Furthermore, the LAF is supposed to ensure that they are the only Lebanese armed presence in south Lebanon.
Israeli forces were still present in the south on Sunday, and both sides pointed fingers at the violators for not observing the ceasefire’s terms. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had previously stated that Israel would maintain control over some areas of Lebanon’s southeast.
Hassan Nasrallah’s portraits are exhibited in Lebanese women in Aita al-Shaab [Bilal Hussein/AP]
When did the ceasefire expire?
As the ceasefire came to an end at 02:00 GMT on Sunday, Israeli forces had to leave Lebanon.
Why does Israel refuse to leave southern Lebanon?
Field data suggested that Israeli forces were preparing to retain positions in the east, according to a UN source who spoke to Al Jazeera on Friday.
Netanyahu blamed Lebanon for the delay, saying Hezbollah , has not pulled back sufficiently from the border region. Israel has been urged to respect the deadline by Lebanon, which denies the claim.
Israel also argued that the LAF had not deployed to the entire south in sufficient time.  , The LAF denied those claims, saying they are fully prepared to deploy.
UNIFIL, who has previously reported Israeli violations, has called on both sides to obey the terms of the ceasefire.
Israel reportedly requested from the new US administration, according to an article in the Israeli Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper on Friday, that it had been asking for an extension of the deadline because Hezbollah had reorganized in the south.
Since November 27, how many times has Israel violated the ceasefire?
Israel has repeatedly violated the ceasefire agreement, according to investigations by media outlets and think tanks.
Israel used the truce to reinforce military positions that had been taken over during previous combat operations, according to Al Jazeera’s Sanad agency, who was in charge of monitoring the region.
Sanad reviewed more than 30 videos and images of Israeli ground incursions and aerial attacks during the ceasefire.
There have been at least 660 incidents, according to Anadolu Agency, while the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a pro-Israel DC think tank, said Israel has committed at least 800 airspace violations since November 27.
Prior to the ceasefire agreement, Israel’s military had to invade fresh regions and destroy numerous civilian homes. Sanad found that 4.5 square km (1.74 square miles) of land, primarily along frontline villages, were subject to demolishing and bulldozing by Israeli forces.
At least 90 people in Lebanon were killed by the Israeli military between the ceasefire and early December, according to Lebanon’s Health Ministry.
An Israeli soldier sits on top of a tank as it stands by near the Israel-Lebanon border in northern Israel, January 18, 2025]Avi Ohayon/Reuters]
What has Lebanon’s government said?
The Lebanese Army should be trusted by the country’s leaders and Israel must adhere to the terms of the deal.
Joseph Aoun, the president of Lebanon and a native of southern Lebanon, wrote to the area’s residents to plead with them to trust the army and maintain calm.
“Lebanon’s sovereignty and territorial unity are non-negotiable, and I am following this issue at the highest levels to ensure your rights and dignity”, he said in a statement.
Nawaf Salam, the prime minister of Lebanon, expressed similar sentiments when he said he had full confidence in the LAF to defend its sovereignty and bring back residents to the south. Nabih Berri, the speaker of the Parlement from southern Lebanon, demanded that Israel resign from occupied Lebanese territory.
Hezbollah has not put out a public statement, but Hassan Fadlallah, a parliamentarian linked to the group, appeared on local television station Al-Jadeed to praise people pushing into their southern villages. There hasn’t been a military response from Hezbollah so far.
Due to the cutting of its supply lines in Syria with the fall of the al-Assad regime, “Hezbollah’s military capabilities and regional influence have been diminished, leaving it more vulnerable to Israeli demands”, Imad Salamey, a political scientist at the Lebanese American University in Beirut, said.
Nawaf Salam, the president-designate of Lebanon, shakes hands with Joseph Aoun at Baabda’s presidential palace.
What has been the international reaction?
On January 25, French President Emmanuel Macron spoke to his Lebanese counterpart, Joseph Aoun, and stressed the need for Israel to abide by the ceasefire agreement’s terms of withdrawal.
The UN’s special coordinator for Lebanon, Jeanine Hennis-Passchaert, and UNIFIL’s head of mission, Aroldo Lazaro, released a joint statement saying the “timelines envisaged in the November Understanding have not been met” and urged displaced communities to “exercise caution”.
During a visit a week earlier, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres emphasised the need for Israel’s military to withdraw.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres meets with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun at the presidential palace]Mohamed Azakir/Reuters]
Are civilians in the area able to return?
Since November 27, thousands of Lebanese have returned to their southern neighborhoods. Tens of thousands of people traveled to their homes and lands in the hours following the ceasefire’s implementation.
However, an Israeli military spokesman declared a no-go zone across many villages in southern Lebanon. He warned against the return to prominent villages such as Shebaa, al-Habbariyeh, Marjayoun, Arnoun, Yohmor, Qantara, Chaqra, Braachit, Yatar, and al-Mansouri due to them being declared “restricted zones”.
On Saturday, the day before the ceasefire was set to end, southerners began to circulate messages calling for people to march toward villages in the area on Sunday morning.
Israeli tanks were still obstructing the road, according to a member of Lebanon’s civil defense forces, and people were being denied entry, according to a source close to Meiss el-Jabal, which is in southern Lebanon.
Israel opened fire on residents who were gathering in their villages, even though some villagers were able to enter their towns and be followed by the LAF, which claimed Hezbollah was responsible for the gathering.
What will happen next?
In an effort to control the situation, the Lebanese Army has set up checkpoints close to southern villages. The Army also entered certain villages, as did some villagers.
Residents were photographed escaping in some areas while standing face-to-face with Israeli tanks or soldiers, according to social media videos that were circulated.
Some villagers have been seen waving Hezbollah, or their ally Amal, flags and others carried images of the late Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah.
As for Israel, Salamey, the political scientist, says its decision not to leave represents its long-term strategy to reshape the political and military landscape of Lebanon so as to “neutralise any threats emanating from a post-Syria Hezbollah”.
In Athens, tens of thousands of protesters have gathered outside the country’s parliament to demand justice for the railroad accident victims, who were nearly two years ago.
One of the largest demonstrations to be held in the capital in recent years came on Sunday, days after a recording from local media suggested some of the 57 victims might have survived the collision but died in a fire of an unknown origin that persisted for more than an hour following the collision.
Protests were also held in dozens of other cities in Greece and abroad, with participants rallying under the “I have no oxygen” slogan, which echoed a woman’s last words in a call to emergency services.
Attendees in Athens held banners reading “We won’t forget” while chants of “Murderers, murderers” reverberated around Syntagma Square.
Just before midnight on February 28, 2023, a freight train and a passenger train carrying students collided near Tempe, outside the city of Larissa. A judicial investigation is still being conducted.
The crash, on a line linking Athens with Greece’s second-largest city Thessaloniki, triggered angry protests across the country, where it was seen as the result of widespread neglect of the railways after a decade-long financial crisis.
Many of the victims’ deaths have not been identified many years later because their families have accused authorities of trying to conceal evidence.
“Many thanks to all the Greeks, wherever they are, for their support”, Maria Karystianou – a representative of the association of families of Tempe victims, who lost her 20-year-old daughter in the disaster – told reporters.
“Our voice says one thing: no crime will go unpunished, ever again”, she said. Because that’s what society’s entire society wants, let the crime in Tempe be the beginning and justice be served as it should be.
Protesters outside the parliament building, shouting slogans]Stelios Misinas/Reuters]
Fire’s cause unclear
Ilias Papangelis, who lost his 18-year-old daughter in the crash, told the crowd in Athens: “Two years after the tragedy, no one has been punished, no one is in prison”.
According to a report by experts hired by families, the crash led to a huge fireball. What caused it is not known.
Questions surround the cargo of the freight train have become a result of increasingly debunked assertions that electricity cables or oils used in the passenger train caused the fire.
The centre-right government, which was re-elected after the crash, has denied the accusations.
The relatives, who claim that under his leadership, the Greek presidency was proposed by former Greek parliament speaker Constantine Tassoulas last week, further enraged them.
“We don’t know what caused the explosion, what the]freight] train was carrying”, said Nikos Plakias, who lost his two daughters and a niece in the accident.
“We will always have questions … and if we need to reach the European courts, we will”, he added.
Following the largely peaceful demonstration in Athens, when police officers fired tear gas to disperse some of the crowd, brief clashes broke out between riot police and a number of protesters.
Riot police fire tear gas during clashes with a group of protesters in Athens]Alkis Konstantinidis/Reuters]
Because it has always been the most strategically contested diplomatic hub in the Middle East, Syria is today the most dynamic diplomatic hub. Political trends in the Levant and the Middle East as a whole will be determined by the results of the conflict to control Syrian government and alliances for years to come.
Three concentric circles of domestic, regional, and global actors compete for power and influence in Syria because of the country’s unique position and status. It is a rare complete and consequential Arab country, due to its human and natural resources, strategic geography, and political, cultural, and ethnic ties in the Middle East and the world.
Syria today, even in its dilapidated state after half a century of autocratic abuse and 13 years of war, hosts hundreds of diplomats, businesspeople, civic activists, and carpetbaggers. This is not a new phenomenon, though.
Since Damascus and Aleppo emerged as productive, vibrant, and strategic urban centers in the third millennium BC, the people and rulers of the region of Syria have experienced this for the past 5, 000 years. Throughout recorded settled human history, the land and people of Syria have consistently generated knowledge, value systems, food, wealth, culture, technology, and identities that have made their land a strategic and coveted global crossroads.
A trip by land across Syria reveals overlapping networks of roads, forts, farms, water systems, and urban centres that have long serviced the east-west and north-south trade routes linking Asia, Europe and Africa. Along them stand Syria’s major entrepot cities – Aleppo, Damascus, Homs, Hama, Deir az-Zor, Palmyra, Deraa, Latakia, and others – that have played prominent roles in the country’s history. Diverse ethnic and religious groups coexisted in these strategic urban centres – Sunnis, Shia, Alawites, Druze, Christians, Armenians, Jews, Arabs, Kurds, Circassians, and a few others. They have coexisted throughout history by negotiating differences through formal and informal means of communication.
Syria has always been and continues to be unique because it is the most comprehensive Arab nation with all the benefits of true nationhood and statehood. These include fertile land and water resources, mineral and agricultural wealth, an industrial base, human wealth in skilled citizens, proficient managers, and entrepreneurial businesspeople, a pluralistic citizenry across vibrant and creative urban centres, alongside deeply anchored villages and rural settlements, a strong national and cultural identity, and, access by land and sea to the wealth and trade routes of three continents.
Due to its strategic geography and intrinsic wealth, it is also a powerful nation. Ancient and contemporary empires, including those in Greece, Rome, Persia, Byzantium, India, Britain, France, and Russia, have fought to rule Syria in an effort to protect its resources and significant cross-continental routes. Spend a few days at the Damascus Sheraton Hotel to get a sense of how everything works.
Syria is consequential in more ways than any other Arab nation, including modern Egypt and Gulf states with their energy-rich Gulf states, because it generates waves of emotion and identity that reflect what ordinary Arabs look for in order to fulfill both their human and civic aspirations. At various moments in the past century, these sentiments emanated from the realms of pluralism, constitutionalism, Islamism, anti-colonialism, and Arabism.
Syria is also important for people around the world to grasp because its experience reminds us in a single stroke of the entire modern Arab region’s strengths, weaknesses, failures, identities, and aspirations.
For millennia, “Syria” meant the bigger Greater Syria, or Bilad-el-Sham (“The Land of Sham”), which comprised most of the Levant and parts of the Fertile Crescent territories that are now Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Israel, Palestine, and parts of Turkey and Iraq.
Following the fall of the Ottoman Empire, Franco-British imperial militarism, which prevented the establishment of a constitutional monarchy based in an elected assembly in 1920, cut short the term. Predictably, the colonial-engineered state experienced the same problems and vulnerabilities that characterize most modern-day Arab nations.
These include: anti-colonial resistance and a struggle for independence that never achieved full sovereignty, non-stop foreign military interventions, attempts at consultative and participatory decision-making that always ended in dictatorships and military rule, bouts of genuine development in education, healthcare, infrastructure, and economic growth that ultimately stagnated and deteriorated, due to corruption, mismanagement, and lack of accountability, and pluralistic societies that often succumbed to sectarian wars, stoked by external forces.
Today, many Arab and other citizens across our region follow Syria’s transformation with hope and admiration. We all want Syria to become the modern Arab world’s first self-determinant, citizen-validated, and truly democratic and sovereign state.
It is not lost on any of us that Syria’s current leadership emanates from Islamist groups who were battle-hardened in US-occupied Iraq and overthrew the regime of Bashar al-Assad with US, Israeli, Turkish, and other non-Syrian assistance. Our support for Syrians accomplishing their lofty objectives only grows as a result.
Regional and international powers that exert exerted pressure on the new Syrian leadership will use subterfuge, bribes, and weapons to ensure that the new Syria they form align with them. As has been the case in the past in this area, new authorities will likely face foreign-funded and inspired attempts to overthrow them if they refuse to.
In a way, Syria’s struggle for dignified, stable statehood today is the delayed culmination of the historic but quashed decade of mass Arab uprising for democracy, pluralism, and equal rights for all. As in 1920, Syria today examines whether external forces can permit its citizens to define themselves and set a precedent for the rest of the world. Because they have practiced for this purpose for 5, 000 years, the Syrians are the only Arab citizens who can accomplish this.
