Geddit? I'm not entirely sure Der Spiegel does, those heavy-humoured Germans y'know. But anyway, this is my excuse to spread my wisdom.Overall, I feel hopeful.
The Israelis are pushing their hand a bit; some of this is reasonable, some perhaps less so; but the new bloke is so far being very sensible about it and saying, correctly, that rebuilding Syria is his first priority. The Russians are fucking off, which is always good news for anywhere; the Turks are a bit murkier, ditto the Iranians.
The optimistic scenario is that the Syrians do indeed settle down to national reconstruction, focussing on actually making life better for the people rather than the minutiae of borders or imposing theocracy. They (continuing the optimism) stop terrorists using it as a pathway to attacking Israel; reach an accomodation with Israel on the frontier; reach an accomodation with the Kurds; and expel Iran. Whose theocracy then falls, leading to an outbreak of Peace and Light across the entire region. Oh, and of course the idiot West revokes their blacklisting.
Apart from that I leave you with a collection of links to my previous thoughts on this and related topics.
Refs
* [2013] Syria: the West makes the usual mistake.
* [2015] The UK should not bomb Syria. [2019] Governance is hard.
* [2020] Coronavirus days: more endless summer.
* SCOTUS: How To Think About Justice Jackson "& Juliet": answer: the Supremes should have the sense to decline such offers.
* Syrian HTS leader says rebel factions that overthrew Assad will be ‘disbanded’ (FFS Graun, will you drop the shit-for-brains scare quotes please?).
