Published in the Jerusalem Post, 1 September 2025
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When Ahmed al-Sharaa – or Mohammad al-Jolani as he was then – swept down with his militia from the north of Syria to oust then President Bashar al Assad, suspicions proliferated in Israel about his true intentions.
Born in Riyadh in 1982 to a Syrian family from the Golan Heights, al-Sharaa grew up in Damascus. He went to Iraq when the US invaded in 2003, subsequently joined the jihadist group known as Al-Qaeda in Iraq, and was imprisoned by American forces from 2006 to 2011. When released he returned to Syria, and in 2012 founded the al-Nusra Front. In 2016 he severed ties with al-Qaeda, and rebranded his militia as Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS). It was as the leader of HTS that he toppled the Assad regime.On the very day that Assad fled from Syria – December 8, 2024 – Sharaa, speaking at the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus, outlined his vision for Syria's future. He intended, he said, to open a new chapter in his country’s history. Condemning Syria's prior role as a playground for Iranian ambitions, he vowed to protect religious minorities and allow them to practice freely. His aim was to unite the nation, introduce free and impartial elections, and form an inclusive government reflecting the diversity of Syria's population.
On appointment as Syria’s interim president in January 2025, he formed a transitional government and pledged to draft a new constitution within a few years. To tide the nation over, he produced an interim constitution committing the nation’s governance to unity and inclusivity. It explicitly pledges to maintain freedom of opinion and expression.
Opinion in Israel was sharply divided as to whether Sharaa’s apparent wholesale adoption of secular, democratic values was genuine or not. Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel in December 2024 strikingly described Sharaa’s administration as wolves in sheep’s clothing. In March Israel Katz, the Defense Minister, labeled Sharaa a “jihadist terrorist from the Al-Qaeda.”
Israel could not take a chance on the genuineness of Sharaa’s intentions. Assad’s Syria had been used by Iran as a warehouse for high-tech military hardware, and a staging post for its transmission to Hezbollah in Lebanon. That infrastructure and the massive quantities of stored armaments remained on Syria’s soil. Israel felt obligated to downgrade or remove them.
Within two days of Assad's fall, Israel conducted nearly 500 airstrikes targeting Syrian military weaponry and stockpiles. It destroyed air defense networks, missile systems, naval assets, and chemical weapons stockpiles.
These actions might have been thought to put Israel and Syria on a direct collision course. The evidence indicates that this was not the case.
Sharaa visited the United Arab Emirates (UAE) on April 13. Just a few days later, according to a report by Reuters, the UAE set up a secret mediation back-channel between Syria and Israel. Those participating reportedly included officials from UAE security and Syrian intelligence, and former Israeli intelligence officers.
Focusing on security and intelligence issues, the main objective was de-escalation, especially in light of Israel’s recent airstrikes.
Later in May Reuters reported that direct, face-to-face talks between Syrian and Israeli security officials had taken place in the border region.
Since then direct Israel-Syria contact has expanded significantly. For example officials from the two countries met in Baku, Azerbaijan, on July 12 to de-escalate the situation in Sweida province after Israel’s intervention to protect the Druze, after ancient tribal hostilities had boiled over into armed conflict. On July 31 a further high-level meeting between Syrian and Israeli officials was held in Baku.
A few days earlier, however, on July 24, the highest-level engagement between Israel and Syria in over 25 years was held in Paris, brokered by the US. On the Israeli side was Strategic Affairs minister Ron Dermer;
A month later, on 20 August, news media confirmed that Shaibani had again met with Dermer to discuss regional stability, particularly in southern Syria.
These promising contacts are scheduled to continue. According to Saudi-owned newspaper Independent Arabia, citing “senior Syrian sources”, Israel and Syria are expected to sign a security agreement under US auspices on September 25, aiming to reduce tensions further. Sharaa’s first speech at the UN General Assembly is scheduled for the same day.
The agreement is described as a security arrangement rather than a full peace deal. The US is reportedly trying to facilitate a meeting around that time involving Sharaa, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and possibly US President Donald Trump.
By then Syria will have held its first parliamentary elections since the fall of Assad. Due to take place between September 15 and 20, these elections promise to be above board. International organizations have been invited to oversee election procedures.
Being contested are the 210 seats in the People’s Assembly. Of these 70 will be appointed directly by the interim president, while 140 will be filled by local electoral college committees in each province. At least 20% of the members of these committees must be women. Women can also be selected as electoral candidates and elected as members of parliament.
Women’s rights groups have called for the threshold to be raised to parity in future elections.
The new assembly will serve for 36 months, during which a permanent constitution is expected to be drafted and preparations made for future democratic national elections.
These forthcoming elections will not include three provinces: Sweida, Hasaka, and Raqqa. The electoral commission and government authorities have postponed voting in these areas due to ongoing security concerns and lack of full government control. The seats allocated to these provinces will remain vacant until conditions allow for safe and fair elections at a later date.
For practical reasons the electoral process uses an indirect college system rather than direct voting. There has not been a census in Syria since 2004, and it is accordingly impossible to institute voter registration. As a result, although the rules governing them are more liberal than anything Syria has seen for some time, they place power firmly in Sharaa’s hands. The transitional government is aware that this is a limited, pragmatic solution during a fragile period of rebuilding institutions. It is a notable improvement on the Assad regime’s sham elections, but still far from a fully democratic electoral system.
Cautious diplomacy will continue to guide Israeli–Syrian relations, while in the background no-one is forgetting US Congressman Cory Mills’s meeting with Sharaa in April during which, Mills reported, Sharaa said that, under the right conditions, Syria could consider joining the Abraham Accords.
Published in the Jerusalem Post and the Jerusalem Post online titled: "Airstrikes, cautious diplomacy: Israel and Syria draw closer", 1 September 2025:
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-865815Published in Eurasia Review, 3 September 2025:
https://www.eurasiareview.com/03092025-israel-and-syria-draw-closer-oped/
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