From “Free Syria” to Normalization with Israel
When we wrote ”Free Syria” Sold Out Palestine, we were not speaking metaphorically. We were naming the political destination of a project that was already underway—a straight line from regime change to normalization with Israel. That destination has now been reached. Syria, once a core pillar of the Axis of Resistance, is now sitting at the same table with the United States and Israel.
On January 6, following U.S.-mediated talks in Paris, the United States, Israel, and Syria—now ruled by the HTS junta under Abu Mohammad al-Jolani—issued a joint statement announcing a U.S.-supervised coordination mechanism for intelligence sharing, military “de-escalation,” diplomatic engagement, and commercial cooperation. This is not peace. It is the formal announcement that Syria has been politically absorbed into the U.S.–Zionist imperial camp.
To understand the significance of this moment, we must be clear about what has been lost. Syria was not merely rhetorically opposed to U.S. and Zionist power. It was a central logistical and political backbone of the Axis of Resistance. For decades, Syria functioned as the strategic artery connecting Iran to Hezbollah in Lebanon and onward to the Palestinian resistance in Gaza and the West Bank. Weapons, supplies, training, and coordination moved through Syrian territory under constant attack. This was not symbolic solidarity—it was material resistance.
That role is now fully dismantled.
For 14 years, Syria under Bashar al-Assad defended its sovereignty under siege, proxy war, sanctions, and direct aggression. Under Jolani, Syria is not defending itself at all—it is being handed over on a silver platter. What bombs, sanctions, and invasion could not accomplish has now been delivered through “coordination” and normalization.
There is no ambiguity about who HTS is. HTS is a rebranded continuation of Al-Qaeda and ISIS, elevated into power by the same forces that destroyed Syria: the United States, the Zionist entity, Turkey, and Gulf monarchies. It was never a liberation force and never anti-imperialist. This is why HTS and ISIS never fired a single bullet at Israel. Their violence was always directed inward—against Syrians, minorities, and resistance—while Israeli occupation expanded freely.
HTS cloaks this project in takfiri and Wahhabi ideology, a Sunni-supremacist doctrine that declares ethnic and religious minorities apostates and legitimizes their killing, displacement, and repression. Shi’a, Alawites, Christians, Druze, Yazidis, and others are targeted outright, while Sunnis who resist regime change, refuse compliance, or try to defend civilians are branded traitors and eliminated. Takfirism weaponizes Islam to redirect violence away from occupiers and inward toward Syrian society itself—shielding collaboration and crushing resistance in service of Zionism.
“Free Syria” was never about reform or taking down a dictator.
It was never about democracy.
It was never about human rights.
It was about forcing submission—breaking Syria’s alliances, severing resistance supply lines, and removing Syria from the road to the liberation of Palestine. Syria under HTS is now formalizing its role as a U.S.–Zionist client state, enforcing Israeli security rather than challenging occupation.
The U.S.-designed coordination mechanism mirrors the so-called “security coordination” imposed through the Oslo Accords. As in the West Bank, it does not restrain occupation—it manages it. Southern Syria is being demilitarized and policed to meet Israeli security demands, while sovereignty is stripped away under the language of “stability.”
This is a direct blow to the Axis of Resistance and to the liberation of Palestine. Peace be upon Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah and Hezbollah. Every martyr of Hezbollah in Syria was a martyr on the road to Palestine, defending the supply lines and strategic depth that made resistance possible. Those sacrifices are now being undermined by collaboration and normalization.
Jolani’s treachery is exposed to the world. What was sold as “Free Syria” has delivered occupation, normalization, and submission. The reactionary Syrian diaspora that manufactured consent for regime change bears responsibility for what Syria has become.
We warned about this when it was unpopular and costly to do so. We were among the very few organizations, with a small number of principled allies, who took to the streets to oppose regime change in Syria—and we were attacked, smeared, and isolated for it, including by liberal forces within the Palestine movement that refused to confront imperialism when it wore a “humanitarian” mask.
We are unequivocal: we do not support HTS, and we do not support the SDF as a U.S.-managed partition project. We support only the indigenous Islamic resistance in Syria confronting occupation in all its forms—Israeli, American, and Turkish—and standing with Palestine without compromise.
In the days ahead, we will reshare and revisit the political education, analysis, and organizing we have produced on Syria, because everything unfolding now was built into the regime-change project from the start.
Syria is not free.
Syria is occupied.
And the cost is being paid in Palestine.
