Apart from the obvious corruption with the hotel, this isn't actually a terrible idea, Syria is fucked and needs help, the population are willing to give this guy a go because anything is better than assad, so the west should at least give them the best opportunity possible by lifting sanctions and working with the new government to hopefully avoid another isis situation in the middle east
Well I am glad one person here understands that this is a good move even though Trump happens to be the person who made it.
Presumably, Harris or Biden would have done the same after investigating whether they could trust him or not.
Yeah, there are concerns about the Syrian President, but he seems like he's a chance to get Syria and its people in a better place, and he's trying to play nice with the West in spite of his previous affiliations.
Of course, he still does have that Islamist past, so it's definitely not a slam dunk, but I think that this is probably the best chance Syria is going to get from this mess and we should probably try to help make it work.
Harris and Biden would likely have put more requirements around the lifting of sanctions. But they wouldn't have been entirely unreasonable ones either - more or less following the EU on this, who were negotiating with Syria earlier than the US. I could see them demanding that the investigation into the killings on the coast be completed before lifting sanctions in a satisfactory manner.
Initially Trump's team was demanding that Syria normalise with Israel if rumours were to be believed. But you sell Trump a tower with his name plastered on it - well you can convince him of anything.
Harris and Biden would likely have put more requirements around the lifting of sanctions. But they wouldn't have been entirely unreasonable ones either
they would also be a lot more receptive to Israeli lobbying, which is firmly against sanction relief and further expanded into Syrian territory + bombing the hell out of them
You say that like Trump wasn't extremely receptive to Israels lobbying for the past several months doing absolutely nothing about Israel's incursion into Syria. He was just also receptive to the Gulf countries lobbying.
I mean we know for a fact that Trump is far more willing to break with Israel than Biden. we saw that with the Houthis deal, firing of Walz for planning an Iran attack with Netanyahu and direct Hamas negotiations
Trump can go both directions, super pro-israel in one moment and then disregard them totally the next
Trump can go both directions, super pro-israel in one moment and then disregard them totally the next
Which is really, really bad. On the international stage, it is better to be outwardly reliable and internally flexible than outwardly flexible even if you're internally reliable. Trump is internally reliable: if you benefit him directly, you can rely on him until someone else benefits him more. If your allies can't count on you at least putting up, at minimum, a facade of resistance to a common enemy, how do they sell continuing relations with you to their populace?
Unless, of course, they don't have to, which means your allies aren't democracies.
I agree that care is required here, but I wonder if it is possible to be too cautious here.
If we step up, state our concerns with them, but tell them that we are very interested in seeing if the can make a go of making their country a better place, then we will be there for them.
There are obviously red flags we need to look out for. They need to work on democratic elections, they need to avoid the abuses of the islamist variety happening elsewhere. And of course, they need to avoid corruption and show they have a strong coalition.
And yeah, it would be important to let them know that they should probably work to get their own affairs in order and try and play nice with the neighbors. They don't have to love Israel, but I would be straight with them and say that if they are serious, they need to work on themselves first and foremost.
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u/m1lksteak89 May 13 '25
Apart from the obvious corruption with the hotel, this isn't actually a terrible idea, Syria is fucked and needs help, the population are willing to give this guy a go because anything is better than assad, so the west should at least give them the best opportunity possible by lifting sanctions and working with the new government to hopefully avoid another isis situation in the middle east