<\/p>\n
FILE \u2014 Exposing himself to the danger of unexploded ordnance, a boy touches an unexploded Iranian projectile that landed in an open field in the outskirts of Qamishli, eastern Syria, March 4, 2026.<\/p>\n
Baderkhan Ahmad\/AP<\/p>\n
FILE \u2014 A man takes a cellphone photo as missiles fired from Iran toward Israel fly over Syrian territory in Damascus, Syria, early Wednesday, June 18, 2025.<\/p>\n
Ghaith Alsayed\/AP<\/p>\n
An oil tanker is anchored off the Baniyas refinery, north of the Mediterranean coastal city of Baniyas in Tartus Governorate, western Syria, Friday, May 1, 2026.<\/p>\n
Omar Sanadiki\/AP<\/p>\n
Iraqi trucks loaded with oil wait to drive toward the Baniyas oil refinery along a highway in Tartus Governorate, western Syria, Friday, May 1, 2026.<\/p>\n
Omar Sanadiki\/AP<\/p>\n
The Baniyas refinery, north of the Mediterranean coastal city of Baniyas in Tartus Governorate, western Syria, Friday, May 1, 2026.<\/p>\n
Omar Sanadiki\/AP<\/p>\n
BEIRUT (AP) \u2014 Ahed Badawi lived for more than a decade in Bahrain, a small Gulf country that \u2014 unlike her native Syria \u2014 rarely made headlines.<\/p>\n
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It provided a refuge for her, her sister and their elderly mother during Syria\u2019s 14 years of civil war.<\/p>\n
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\u201cNothing at all ever happened there,\u201d she said. \u201cI mean, the Bahrainis don\u2019t even know what war is.\u201d<\/p>\n
But after the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran, sparking a regional war, Bahrain and neighboring Gulf countries found themselves in Iran’s crosshairs. So the family fled back to their home in Aleppo, which was once the site of some of the civil war’s fiercest battles but now offered a safe haven.<\/p>\n
War-battered Syria has stood out as one of the few spots of calm in the region\u2019s latest conflagration. Its leaders have been working to rebuild relations with Arab and Western countries that had shunned Syria under former President Bashar Assad, who was ousted in December 2024 by rebels, who then installed a new government.<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n Add Preferred Source<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n Since the outbreak of the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, Damascus has seized on the opportunity to strengthen those relationships by staying neutral.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Syria has \u201cpresented itself as the solution to strategic crises in the region,\u201d said Obayda Ghadban, an official with the Syrian Foreign Ministry.<\/p>\n Syria positions itself as a safe corridor<\/p>\n After the U.S.-Israeli attacks, Iran rained missiles not only on Israel but on Gulf countries hosting U.S. bases. In Lebanon, the dormant war between Israel and the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah reignited. And Iraq \u2014 which is home to both Iran-backed militias and U.S. bases \u2014 found itself in the crosshairs of both sides.<\/p>\n Despite missiles flying overhead \u2014 and occasionally falling on Syrian territory \u2014 Syria managed to stay on the sidelines and positioned itself as an alternative transport route for oil exports that could no longer be sent through the strait.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n \u201cSyria, which was once an arena for others\u2019 conflicts, has today chosen, through the will of its people and institutions, to be a bridge to security and a fundamental pillar of the solution,\u201d interim Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa said last week at a meeting of European leaders in Cyprus.<\/p>\n He touted his country as \u201cthe alternative and secure artery connecting Central Asia and the Gulf to the heart of the European continent.\u201d<\/p>\n Since Iran blocked access to the strait, oil shipments have been trucked from Iraq into Syria and shipped to European markets via Syria\u2019s Baniyas port, bypassing the Hormuz route. A key border crossing between northern Iraq and Syria reopened last month after being closed for more than a decade, with officials touting it as an additional route for energy exports.<\/p>\n The overland route is less efficient and more expensive than shipping exports through the strait, but it provides a workaround as long as Iran maintains its stranglehold on the channel.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Country has ‘strategic enemies\u2019 on both sides<\/p>\n Ghadban said his country had no interest in allying with either side in the war.<\/p>\n \u201cThe parties participating in it are strategic enemies of Syria, whether we talk about Iran and its affiliates, or if we talk about Israel and its aggressive expansionist policy in Syria,\u201d he said. \u201cBoth parties have an interest in weakening Syria.\u201d<\/p>\n Iran was a key ally of Assad and came to his aid during the civil war, as did Hezbollah and allied Iraqi militias. That put them in conflict with the groups that are now ruling in Damascus.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Israel, meanwhile, has been suspicious of and sometimes openly hostile toward Syria’s new Islamist-led authorities. After Assad\u2019s fall, the Israeli military seized control of a U.N.-patrolled buffer zone in southern Syria and has been occupying it.<\/p>\n In the early weeks of the U.S.-Israeli war against Iran, some had speculated that Syria might join the fray to settle scores against Hezbollah.<\/p>\n But the Syrian military made no such move, and al-Sharaa and other officials insisted they had no interest in intervening in Lebanon.<\/p>\n U.S. withdrawal helps Syria stay on sidelines<\/p>\n Noah Bonsey, senior adviser on Syria with the International Crisis Group, said that while \u201cDamascus was really clear from the beginning that it wanted no part of this war and signaled to everyone accordingly,\u201d its ability to actually stay out of the fray was in part due to fortuitous timing.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Eastern Syria had for years hosted bases housing U.S. troops, but the U.S. had drawn down its presence before the war with Iran started.<\/p>\n After fighting broke out between forces of the central Syrian government and the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces in northeastern Syria in January, the U.S. military moved thousands of suspected Islamic State militants held in detention centers in Syria to Iraq. The military also scaled down its own presence in Syria, where the main mission was to prevent a resurgence of IS.<\/p>\n \u201cBecause the withdrawal had gone so far by the time the war (with Iran) started, there were very few U.S. assets and personnel still in the country\u201d that could have drawn Iranian fire, Bonsey said.<\/p>\n Syria is not immune from economic pain<\/p>\n Syria may have gained politically from its neutral positioning in the regional war, but it will still suffer from the conflict economically, Bonsey said.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Damascus had counted on Syria\u2019s postwar reconstruction receiving investment from wealthy Gulf Arab countries once known for their shopping malls and skyscrapers.<\/p>\n But now those countries will have fewer resources and “less bandwidth to spare for lower-priority issues\u201d as they focus on \u201cshoring up their own defense and getting their own economies back up to speed\u201d after the war, Bonsey said.<\/p>\n While Syria could benefit in the long term from infrastructure projects such as proposed rail lines and gas pipelines that would link the Gulf to Turkey and to European markets, those projects will take years, if they happen at all.<\/p>\n In the meantime, Syria\u2019s new government faces increasing discontent from the population over the country\u2019s flagging economy.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n But Badawi, for now at least, is happy to be back home, despite the difficulties.<\/p>\n By signing up, you agree to our Terms Of Use<\/a> and acknowledge that your information will be used as described in our Privacy Policy<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s nothing like being in your own country,” she said. “When you\u2019re in your own country, you feel a different kind of security.\u201d<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Associated Press journalist Ghaith AlSayed in Damascus, Syria, contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FILE \u2014 Exposing himself to the danger of unexploded ordnance, a boy touches an unexploded Iranian projectile that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":93023,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[1828,887,34,32627,3284,3285,12510,3282,12511,3283,12512,3286,95,32626],"class_list":{"0":"post-93022","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-syria","8":"tag-ahmad-al-sharaa","9":"tag-bashar-assad","10":"tag-iran","11":"tag-noah-bonsey","12":"tag-package-100024-ap-online","13":"tag-package-100373-mc-complete-state-national","14":"tag-product-30597-ap-business-news-f-wire","15":"tag-product-30598-ap-national-news-report-a-wire","16":"tag-product-31995-ap-online-general-financial-business-news","17":"tag-product-32505-ap-online-middle-east-news","18":"tag-product-32509-ap-online-religion-columns","19":"tag-product-46986-ap-online-top-stories","20":"tag-syria","21":"tag-syria-iran-us-israel-regional-war"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116500050968167007","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93022","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=93022"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93022\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/93023"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=93022"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=93022"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=93022"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"image\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/1775619498_73_rawImage.jpg\" "\\"#\\"")
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