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Iran Moves to Cement Its Influence in Syria

Tehran uses cash, food and public services in a hearts and minds campaign to cultivate loyalty, draw military recruits and win converts to the Shiite Muslim sect

A member of the U.S.-allied Syrian Democratic Forces was on watch duty this week in the village of Baghouz in eastern Syria, where Islamic State was ousted last week from its last stronghold.
Link https://www.wsj.com/articles/islamic-state-leader-goes-low-tech-to-evade-capture-11553608802?shareToken=st56721ad9c9ac44039c2c00c87ac8a32f

 

By Raja Abdulrahim and Benoit Faucon
March 26, 2019 4:42 p.m. ET

 

MUHAYMIDA, Syria—In Islamic State’s former eastern Syrian stronghold, the Islamic Republic of Iran is parlaying its military and economic might into a lasting foothold.

On the heels of an Iranian military intervention that has helped bring President Bashar al-Assad to the edge of victory in Syria’s eight-year-long war, Tehran is moving to cement its long-term influence in Syria by cultivating goodwill and winning converts to the Shiite Muslim sect.

To Syrians battered by war, Iran is offering cash, food, Iranian ID cards, public services and free education.

“The goal is to re-create the Persian empire,” said Muneer al-Khalaf, a member of the City Council of Raqqa, Islamic State’s once de facto capital.

Iran’s hearts-and-minds campaign undermines efforts by the U.S., Israel and Arab states to roll back Tehran’s influence and force it out of Syria. It also comes as President Trump plans to shrink the U.S. military footprint in the country—currently more than 2,000 troops—after the battle to eliminate Islamic State-held territory was declared over on Saturday.

U.S. officials said they aren’t abandoning efforts to check Iran’s activities in Syria. The U.S. plans to focus its intelligence gathering efforts on countering Tehran’s strategy of creating a land corridor from Iran through Iraq, Syria and Lebanon to help funnel weapons and fighters to its regional allies.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, center, during a February meeting in Tehran with his Iranian counterpart Hassan Rouhani, right, and the commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard's Quds Force, Gen. Qassem Suleimani.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, center, during a February meeting in Tehran with his Iranian counterpart Hassan Rouhani, right, and the commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard's Quds Force, Gen. Qassem Suleimani. PHOTO: SANA/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES

Iran’s influence campaign is aimed at Syria’s majority Sunni Muslim population—including in some former Islamic State strongholds—that extends from the eastern Deir Ezzour Province to the country’s western border with Lebanon.

The wooing of locals is evident in major cities like Albukamal, near the Iraqi border. There, from a Syrian police station now controlled by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps., or IRGC, Iranian forces distribute food and household items to the city’s needy, according to a 24-year old male resident from the nearby village of Jalaa.

Along with the charity come offers to join the ranks of the Iranian militia and convert to the Shiite sect of the Islamic faith, he said. In return for enlisting, the men are promised a guard corps ID card—allowing them to cross checkpoints without hassle—and $200 a month. “From every family you find one or two people who have become Shiite,” he said. “They say they do it so they can find jobs or they become Shiite so they can walk and no one bothers them.”

To incentivize Arab tribesmen in areas formerly controlled by Islamic State to convert to Shiism, Iran is granting cash subsidies, providing public services and free education, according to residents, a U.S. official and a person familiar with U.S. intelligence operations in the region.

In cities and villages across the country’s east and in parts of central Syria, the Iranian militia has taken over mosques and is sounding the Shiite call to prayer from the minarets. They set up shrines in places with religious historical significance, bought real estate under a contested property law and opened Persian-language schools.

“If you’re a student, they offer a scholarship. If you’re poor, they give you aid,” said an aid worker in Qamishli, in northeast Syria, whose friend was offered a chance to study in Iran. “Whatever your need is they fill it, just so you become Shiite.”

 

Al Qaeda-affiliated groups destroyed this Shiite shrine in the Syrian city of Deir Ezzor.
Al Qaeda-affiliated groups destroyed this Shiite shrine in the Syrian city of Deir Ezzor. PHOTO: AHMED DEEB FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

The Syrian government didn’t respond to requests for comment.

But for Mr. Assad, who belongs to the Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shiite Islam, Iran’s conversion and resettlement campaign is less about tipping the sectarian scales and more about settling its debt to one of its main military backers in the country’s conflict.

“For Assad, it’s a way to repay the Iranians and to make sure they won’t let them down,” said the person involved in U.S. intelligence operations in the region.

 

Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Bahram Ghasemi said his country’s humanitarian efforts have no ulterior motive. “No one seeks to carry out religious propaganda and creating religious conflicts,” he said. “Iran’s efforts are fully in line with creating a peaceful climate necessary for calm and helping these people for their most basic needs.”

 

Residents from Deir Ezzour Province liken Iran’s strategy of wooing the younger generation to the same tactics of indoctrination once used by Islamic State.

“Just like ISIS gave religious lessons to children after prayers, they are doing the same thing,” said a father of two school-aged children, who said his village is now under control of Iranian militias.

 

iran-moves-to-cement-its-influence-in-syria-11553632926

 

 

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End of the Caliphate: What to Watch for After ISIS’s Territorial Defeat

 

U.S.-backed forces in Syria have expelled Islamic State from its last outpost, but jihadist fighters are still active in the region. Here’s what might follow the demise of the so-called caliphate. Photo: Reuters

Many of his family and friends have converted to the Shiite sect of Islam from the Sunni sect largely for access to jobs or for protection, the father said. He is living here in Muhaymida, a few miles from his own village, both in Deir Ezzour Province, and is trying to avoid having to move back.

“If America withdraws [from Syria], I will have to return home. Where else am I going to go?” he said. After a pause, he added: “I will probably become Shiite.”

Tehran’s push for converts and loyalists has encountered some resistance from residents who objected to mosques being changed from Sunni to Shiite. In some cases, the call to prayer has reverted back to the Sunni script. Followers of the two sects have some differing religious beliefs and use somewhat different prayers and rituals.

Iran’s campaign of influence goes far beyond a pay-for-pray scheme.

As Mr. Assad’s regime struggles to provide basic services in areas it has recaptured, the Iranians and their affiliated militias and charities have filled the void. The Hussein Organization, an Iranian charity, has brought in generators and water pumps and distributed food and school supplies in cities and villages in Deir Ezzour, said a security analyst consulting with the U.S. government on eastern Syria.

Iran’s campaign has mostly targeted areas that fall along parts of Syria where Tehran has sought to establish military supply lines, the “land bridge” between Iran and Lebanon, said Hanin Ghaddar, a fellow at the Washington Institute, a D.C.-based think tank.

Islamic State militants destroyed this Shiite religious shrine in the Syrian city of Raqqa.
Islamic State militants destroyed this Shiite religious shrine in the Syrian city of Raqqa.PHOTO: AHMED DEEB FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

“This is their only way to keep influence in case they are forced to withdraw [militarily],” Ms. Ghaddar said.

Iran has also encouraged pro-Iranian foreign fighters to resettle in areas deserted by the Sunni population during the conflict, according to residents, the U.S. official and the person involved in American intelligence operations in the region.

This is not the first time Iran has sought to alter Syria’s sectarian makeup, residents say. In the city of Raqqa, an Iran-funded Shiite mosque once offered religious classes and a bookstore that distributed religious books free, said Ahmad al-Khaboor, owner of Raqqa’s oldest bookstore. Islamic State militants later blew up the mosque but parts of the structure—with signature blue and turquoise tiles—is still partially standing.

Iran’s current efforts of converting and sowing allegiance may have more success now than in previous decades, as Syrians faced with postconflict lawlessness are eager to ally themselves with a powerful patron, several residents said.

“Before they used money, and now they use power and fear,” said the father of two. “Fear is a stronger motivation.”

—Nazih Osseiran in Beirut and Aresu Eqbali in Tehran contributed to this article.

Write to Raja Abdulrahim at raja.abdulrahim@wsj.com and Benoit Faucon at benoit.faucon@wsj.com