Category: Civil War
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Managing Foreign Jihadist Fighters in Post-Assad Syria: Evaluating U.S. Counterterrorism Policy Options
April 23, 2026. Abstract: This study analyzes the growing problem of foreign fighters in Syria and assesses the challenges they pose to U.S. counterterrorism objectives, regional stability, and the prevention of an ISIS resurgence. It evaluates how the integration of jihadist factions into Syrian state institutions contributes to sectarian violence, institutional fragmentation, and opportunities for…
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Jihadists Threaten Stability in post-Assad Syria
March 23, 2026. In early March 2025, clashes broke out between Assad loyalists and Syrian security forces in the coastal region of Latakia. However, after initially beginning as an attack on state forces, the clashes triggered a much larger sectarian conflict, leading to the massacre of approximately 1,000 Alawites, most of them civilians.[1] The attack…
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Analyzing the December 2025 Terrorist Attack in Palmyra, Syria
March 16, 2026. On December 19, 2025, the United States military began Operation Hawkeye Strike, a series of large-scale airstrikes against ISIS weapons sites and infrastructure in Syria. While the operation was aimed at disabling and preventing a resurgence of ISIS, Secretary Hegseth stated that it was “not the beginning of a war,” but instead…
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ISIS Threatens Syria’s President, Calls for Attacks on the West.
February 23, 2026. Syria’s president, Ahmed al-Sharaa has come under recent fire by ISIS’s media and propaganda wing. The group called Sharaa a “puppet without a soul” controlled by the West, stating that he will have a similar fate as Bashar al-Assad. The audio message, delivered by ISIS spokesman Abu Huzaifa al-Ansari, is the first…
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Syria’s Ahmed al-Sharaa Meets with Putin for Second Visit
February 3, 2026. Ahmed al-Sharaa, former leader of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham and Syria’s al-Qaeda branch, assumed power late in 2024 after ousting Bashar al-Assad. Fourteen months later on, January 28, Sharaa made his second visit to Russia, “attempting to repair relations” and hash out details surrounding the future of Russia’s “military presence in Syria.” The…
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Clashes in Syria Threaten ISIS Prisons and U.S Strategy
January 25, 2026. Recent clashes between the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and the Syrian government have disrupted operations and security at prisons holding ISIS fighters in northeastern Syria. As the Damascus government continued its offensive to annex parts of northeastern Syria, the SDF withdrew, abandoning control over prison facilities such as the al-Hol camp. In…
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Fragile Integration: The SDF, State Consolidation, and U.S. Counter-ISIS Strategy in Post-Assad Syria
January 19, 2026. Aleppo Escalation and the Failure of Integration The January 6 clashes in Aleppo’s Sheikh Maqsoud and Achrafieh neighborhoods marked the most serious confrontation between Syrian government forces and the Kurdish-led SDF since the fall of the Assad regime. After several days of fighting, the SDF withdrew its forces from Aleppo on January…
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The Islamic State in a Jihadi-Led Syria: Rethinking a U.S-Syria Foreign Policy
April 13, 2025. Emerging from the instability created by the invasion of Iraq and the Arab Spring, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, more commonly called the Islamic State or ISIS, was able to conquer large amounts of territory in Syria and Iraq, ruling over a population of 12 million people at its height…
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What’s Next for Syria After Assad?
February 20, 2025. On December 8th Bashar al-Assad and his Ba’athist regime succumbed to the overwhelming pressure posed by militant group Hay’at Tahir al-Sham, leading to the fall of Assads Syria. As HTS closed in on the Syrian capital Damascus, Assad fled, leaving behind a country ravaged by 13 years of civil war and the…
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Analysis: Trumps Middle East Foreign Policy
March 23, 2025. During the second half of the 20th century and into the 21st century, the Middle East has remained a key area of focus for American foreign policy makers, marked by a complicated and often tense relationship with the region. Following the end of Ottoman rule after the First World War, President Woodrow…