Syria’s November: From Assad’s revolution to Jolani’s Washington trip.
The head of the Syrian transitional government, Ahmed al-Sharaa, is making history by becoming the first Syrian leader to visit the United States and meet with the country’s president at the White House.
The trip is historic because until almost a year ago, al-Sharaa was the leader of a group that broke away from the al-Qaeda group that carried out the famous New York attack. Before that, he was a fighter against American forces in Iraq and was imprisoned for five years for his membership in the Islamic State group. However, he is now on his way to Washington to announce Syria’s joining the US-led international coalition against ISIS and perhaps agree to establish a military base near Damascus.
Al-Sharaa is going to the United States, a country that managed to pass a resolution in the Security Council that removed him from the terrorist list, after which Britain lifted financial sanctions on al-Sharaa and Syrian Interior Minister Anas Khattab yesterday (Friday). The European Union also announced on the same day that it adheres to the UN resolution and is lifting similar sanctions.
The month of November, in which Ahmed al-Sharaa is traveling to the United States, has witnessed two other historical events in Syria: On November 13, 1970, the military coup led by Hafez al-Assad, the father of Bashar al-Assad, was victorious, and the Assad family came to power. 54 years later, in the same month, Syrian opposition groups led by al-Julani began their attacks on various regions of Syria on the morning of November 27, and 11 days later, Bashar al-Assad’s government fell.
Al-Quds al-Arabi continued its article: Al-Sharaa’s unprecedented trip to the United States is a turning point in Western relations with Syria and the region, because the Assad government had severed its political, economic, social, and ideological ties with the world by taking a stance on the Soviet Union in the past and establishing strategic relations with Iran for decades.