During the last years Qatars played an oversized role on several foreign policy issues especially with regard to Syria. The Saudis and other Persian Gulf countries were generally concerned about that but especially about Qatar’s promotion of the Muslim Brotherhood. Most GCC countries see the political Islam of the Brotherhood as a danger to their autocratic systems.
Some strings were pulled and the emir of Qatar was persuaded to hand power over to his son Tamim. The fall of the Muslim Brotherhood presidency in Egypt is one consequence of this. Qatar also had to hand over the “Syrian file” to the Saudis. The dysfunctional Syrian National Council, which had been led by Syrian Muslim Brotherhood members, named a new “leader” who is polygamous tribal sheik from east Syria with roots in Saudi Arabia but no connection to the MB. The SNC’s “prime minister”, a U.S. citizen and also a Brotherhood member, had to step down.
While lots of new anti-tank and some anti-air weapons arrived in Syria during the last month they have shown no decisive value. After three weeks of battle the Syrian army will now soon have kicked out the last insurgents from Homs city. Unfortunately the situation in Aleppo has become worse. The insurgents seem to have had some successes there and there are rumors, though no confirmed news yet, that some government friendly parts of Aleppo are under siege with no food supplies coming through. But in total the momentum is with the government side which explains this laughable request:
In Istanbul, the newly elected head of the opposition Syrian National Coalition told Reuters that the rebels’ military position was weak and proposed a truce for the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which begins on Tuesday, to stop fighting in Homs.
The SNC has absolute no control over the insurgents and especially not over the foreign Jihadists which have grown in numbers to 5,000 men or more.
These Jihadist are taking over (vid) by force more and more towns in northern Syria that had earlier been under control of Syrian insurgents. In an interview in that video one of the Jidhadist commanders says that he buys his weapons, including the latest anti-tank and anti-air stuff, from the Free Syrian Army.
This is one reason why the Obama administration has not yet directly delivered the promised weapons and may never deliver them. Another one is resistance in Congress where several committees are unconvinced of Obama’s weaponizing strategy.
In one of the first interviews with the Syrian president Bashar Al Assad during the crisis he was asked when it would end. He said something like “when a certain the sheik stops paying” and he seemed to have meant Qatar. With its new emir the foreign policy of Qatar has changed. Its support for the Muslim Brotherhood has stopped and foreign nationals with Syrian roots are no longer welcome in Qatar.
The door is now open for private talks between Syria and Saudi Arabia which is now responsible for the “Syrian file” and the insurgents. There might be a negotiable solution there and after that the only problematic actors left will be Turkey’s Erdogan and his sidekick Dovatoglu. They have already been cut to size due to the Gezi Park protests and the loss of their friends in Egypt. There will be ways and means to convince them to shut down their border for insurgents and weapon deliveries. Shortly after that the insurgency will die down.