Yesterday, the Syrian state founded in 1946 ceased to exist. This is the downfall not only of the Assad regime but of the state of Syria as a political framework that can impose order and structure. In this connection, it must be noted that the collapse of Syria, and of its Assad regime, is part of the same regional upheaval that began in 2010 and that has, in fact, not yet ended.
Since 2010, the Middle East has undergone a transformation out of the modern era where the region was organized under the “logic” of states as political frameworks. It has reverted to the pre-modern era of a different “logic” where the region is defined by communities, ethnic groups, transnational structures, and borderless ideologies.
With the developments in Syria, the Middle East is currently continuing a sort of backslide into the pre-nationalist, pre-modern era. In a way, this can be seen as a kind of revenge by the East against the West. The East is breaking away from the foundations of modernism and nationalism that the Europe of the late 19th century and early 20th century forced on it.
But the breakaway and the reversion to pre-nationalism are far from enough for the Middle East. Accompanying the breakaway process, it must be noted, is a quiet, creeping conquest of Western Europe by the pre-modern East through various agents — primarily through immigrant groups who never abandoned the ideological beliefs that they brought from the East and who are undermining the foundations of the modern, European-style order.
It may be said in general that the Middle East now speaks in a neo-olden language of politics and culture — one that is new in that it overrides its previous, European-made nationalist-modernist predecessor but is old in that it connects to the foundations of pre-modern political culture. The message is very difficult to define in simplistic terms of the positive and the negative.
From this standpoint, it must be granted that in the Middle East’s internal power struggle, the Shiite “Axis of Resistance” has suffered a critical blow. To that extent, Israel can claim a significant victory in this year’s battle against that axis’s representatives and proxies. But on the other hand, the collapse of Syria, and of the Assad regime, contains the seeds of a new Mideast reality full of dangers and complexities.
This reality has two immediate implications. The first concerns the situation in Syria, which is no longer Syria as we once knew it. At this stage, it is difficult to define the emerging new entity, which is evolving into a mix of sectarian power centers (Kurds, Druze, Alawites), transnational jihadist power hubs driven by an anti-Israel worldview no less than an anti-regime one, and the presence of actors like Turkey, whose transnational agenda is not far removed from that of Iran.
Practically speaking, the entire system of arrangements on the ground — as worked out between Israel and Syria after the war of 1973 and based on the logic of arrangements between states — is thus called into question and is little protected from those sources of power that do not at all think in terms of the “borders” that characterize a state. Consequently Israel must define red lines of its own befitting the situation, and strive especially to set up an iron wall preventing the “little jihad” against the Assad regime from turning into the “great jihad” against Israel.
But the second immediate ramification, which is even more significant, has to do with Iran — which has lost its Shiite axis, or at least two elements of it (Hamas and Hezbollah). Iran is at a strategic crossroads. It may be pushed into crossing the nuclear threshold in a sort of tit for tat, even before the US president-elect enters office. That move would leave little sand in the hourglass for an Israeli reaction against the prospect of an “Iranian Auschwitz.”
From that standpoint, Israel may possibly be said in general terms to be entering the third stage of its current war in the Middle East. The first stage was the illusory stage between May 2021 (Operation Guardian of the Walls) and October 7, 2023. The second stage proceeded intensively from October 7, 2023, into December 2024. But now Israel is entering the third stage of the war. In the shadow of a changing Mideast reality, Israel faces both veteran players — such as Iran, where the systems of ideology are eroding; and Turkey, which is turning from a shadowy enemy into a much more significant threat — and other players who are newcomers as Israel’s neighbors to the north.
But it is impossible to conclude without one important remark regarding Israel’s domestic arena. The currents of the Middle East have not bypassed Israel. Israel is part of the enormous process that the Middle East has experienced since 2010. In recent years it has also begun to budge away from its clearly state-centered foundations toward definitions of identity based on tribes and communities (haredi, secular, religious Zionist, Arab, and more) who, in their way, are battling for power.
The statehood concept championed by Ben-Gurion, which relied on elements such as the centralization of governmental power, the establishment of a politically neutral civil service, defined rules of governance, and respect for political authority, is undergoing significant erosion. This process is approaching a state akin to an undeclared civil war. So Israel must not only re-establish and rebuild the boundaries between itself and its obvious external enemies, but must also establish the political and cultural boundary between itself and the Middle East in order not to descend to the same condition in which the Middle East as a whole is thickly stewing.
This article was originally published in Makor Rishon
The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the movement
