When former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert appeared on Russia Today in May 2021, he claimed that Bashar al Assad’s “mistake” was failing to strike a peace deal with Israel. That single comment says much about how Syria’s tragedy is seen from outside — and how the upheavals of the Arab Spring ended up serving Israel’s long game for a “Greater Middle East”.
From the start, the uprisings split opinion. Many saw them as an overdue revolt against stagnant regimes; others viewed them as an orchestrated scheme to fracture strong Arab states. A decade later, the evidence leans towards the second view. Instead of freedom, most nations were left with collapsed institutions, civil wars and exhausted societies. Few Iraqis, Libyans or Syrians today would say their own people truly brought down their rulers.
If we ask the familiar question — who benefitted? — the answer is obvious. The region’s turmoil weakened Arab states and gave Israel a freer hand. Many Arabs now look back on the pre-2011 years, not with fondness, but with the reluctant thought that stability, however flawed, was less costly than disintegration.
Syria became the central test case. To some, its uprising was part of a broader democratic wave. To others, it was a carefully engineered operation involving Western, Turkish and Arab players aimed at toppling a state that had long supported the resistance. Olmert’s remark fits neatly into that narrative. He said Assad could have avoided war by signing a peace accord in 2008 — one that would have opened embassies and trade with Israel; and paved the way for Western recognition.
Had Assad accepted, he might have remained president for life, hailed as a “moderniser” while his country quietly surrendered the Golan and its independence. History shows that the West rarely objects to strongmen who serve its interests. In this sense, democracy is less a principle than a convenient slogan.
The role of outside powers was confirmed in 2017, when Qatar’s former prime minister, Shaikh Hamad bin Jassim al Thani, admitted on state television that Doha had been assigned the Syrian file. Gulf states, he said, worked with Washington and Ankara, funding and arming groups including Al Nusra Front. Nearly $200 billion was spent by 2013 in the attempt to unseat Assad.
The rhetoric was about freedom, but the motive was power. Those who intervened cared little for democracy. What have they offered the Syrian people since? Assad’s choice left him isolated, but there is a difference between removing a ruler and dismantling a nation. Syria’s destruction, like Iraq’s before it, erased the very institutions that held the state together.
So, was Assad wrong to reject peace? If some errors can be noble, this may be one. He could have secured himself through a hollow deal — peace in name, subservience in practice. Other Arab states took that path and gained only a brittle calm built on fear. Syria, instead, clung to its narrative of resistance, deepened its alliance with Iran and Hezbollah; and turned its back on normalisation. That choice cost it dearly, yet it preserved a measure of self-respect.
Since 1948, Syria has faced Israel in wars both open and covert, maintaining a Baathist policy that refused to legitimise occupation. Even in indirect talks via Türkiye in 2008, Damascus stopped short of compromise, betting instead on its alliances and on defiance as a source of legitimacy.
Olmert’s comment that Assad’s refusal was a “mistake” neatly sums up Syria’s ordeal since 2011. The demand was surrender; Syria chose resistance and paid the price. Today, submission is rewarded and independence punished — but that doesn’t make defiance wrong. It only exposes the moral bankruptcy of an era that condemns those who stand firm.
This is not a defence of Assad’s rule; repression and mismanagement are facts across the region. Yet the larger question remains: must every Arab state bow to survive? Syria’s tragedy shows that nations may lose battles and still preserve their dignity. Whether it joins the camp of those who yielded or continues to stand apart, history will decide which choice truly mattered.
Zahir al Mahrouqi
The writer focuses on regional politics
Translated by Badr al Dhafari
The original version of this article was published in the Oman Arabic newspaper on October 27, 2025
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