Syria’s Forgotten Island of Opposition

In an essay from the LARB Quarterly issue no. 43, “Fixation,” Charlie Clewis reports from a military compound in the Syrian desert.

By Charlie ClewisDecember 7, 2024

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This essay is a preview of the LARB Quarterly, no. 43: Fixation. Become a member for more fiction, essays, criticism, poetry, and art from this issue—plus the next four issues of the Quarterly in print.

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WITHIN AL-TANF GARRISON, a military compound strewn with rubble in the Syrian desert, a fountain murmurs in a peaceful courtyard. Cages of canaries overlook American soldiers eating baklava, sipping Turkish coffee, and sharing cigarettes with fighters of the Syrian Free Army (SFA). The two forces inspect their weapons and conduct a course prior to live training in the hot afternoon to come.

The base takes most by surprise. Built atop the M2 highway running from Baghdad to Damascus, the SFA headquarters sits within the 55-kilometer Deconfliction Zone (DCZ). Those who have grown accustomed to sprawling military installations across Iraq and Afghanistan, equipped with state-of-the-art gyms and Burger Kings, often arrive at al-Tanf expecting an airport terminal, only to find desert austerity.

For the SFA, the DCZ is a desert island. The southern border with Jordan remains inaccessible to all except American military supply convoys. Similarly, the al-Waleed border “crossing” with Iraq contains no crossing of any sort and is, for all intents and purposes, sealed shut. To the north, Bashar al-Assad’s forces and Russian advisers operate out of over 100 small combat outposts situated sporadically along the entirety of the DCZ border, just kilometers from SFA forces.

While on a patrol with Americans and the SFA in July 2022, I stood on the unmarked border, staring directly at a Syrian outpost less than three kilometers across the unmarked line. We watched the silhouettes of regime soldiers scurrying around their outpost. Then we got back into the armored American vehicles and the SFA’s white Toyota pickup trucks, with mounted Soviet-era DShK machine guns, and drove back 55 kilometers through the desert. The SFA have been holding this land for eight years and they know the terrain. Over steaming hot tea, they share hand-drawn cardboard maps revealing features missing from the laminated versions produced by American intelligence officers.

The 2011 revolution against Assad, Syria’s dictator, and the subsequent civil war fractured the country. Opposition militias emerged in the dozens, battling regime forces and capturing swathes of territory. The power vacuum enabled the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) and other radical Islamist groups to enter Syria and seize cities throughout the country, terrorizing civilians and establishing the caliphate. Syria became a quagmire of US-backed Arab and Kurdish rebel forces, international jihadists, and forces from Turkey, Iran, and Russia—all with differing motives and objectives. Vladimir Putin’s support for the Assad regime substantially aided in its survival, but rebel forces still maintain control of nearly one-third of Syria today.

The SFA emerged in 2016, out of dissolution of the New Syrian Army, a militia formed to counter ISIS. With Coalition special forces and air support, they helped seize al-Tanf in March 2016. At the time, the Deconfliction Zone had yet to be established and the area surrounding al-Tanf remained open to movement in and out of the desert region. Al-Tanf was repeatedly attacked, first by ISIS and later by Russian forces, whose cluster munitions killed several SFA soldiers. The necessity of a Deconfliction Zone only became more apparent with time, since Russian aircraft targeted the base on multiple passes, despite nominally supporting the mission of the soldiers there and despite the potential presence of Coalition forces. The DCZ was eventually established by diplomatic means and originally seen by US Central Command as a method to “reduce the possibility of misunderstanding, miscalculation, or unintended conflict” with Russian and Syrian regime forces.

Al-Tanf’s rubble tells its history. Many of the buildings are crumbling or collapsed, products of the initial expulsion of ISIS and the Russian airstrikes shortly after. An empty plot of land is labeled “Zombieland,” because it is rumored to be a burial site for deceased ISIS militants. Craters dot the ground from Iranian drone attacks. The clinic formerly featured an entryway with the face of Assad emblazoned in tile on the floor. SFA soldiers took pleasure in stepping on it.

Unlike many of Syria’s early revolutionary militias, the SFA fighters don’t hail exclusively from one city or single tribe. Much of the militia’s senior leadership formerly served in Assad’s military and intelligence services prior to defecting, but many others were civilians who took to the streets during the Arab Spring or joined the rebels in the early fight to overthrow the regime. They have all suffered. “You can’t find any Syrians where the whole family lives under one roof,” one fighter told me.

In March 2011, during the uprising’s early days, Alaa al-Hassan, then a soldier in the Department of Anti-Terrorism in the Syrian Army, flew by helicopter into the Syrian city of Daraa and touched down on a field in the municipal football stadium. He was then loaded into a bus and driven to the nearby eruption of civil protests with the instructions to “capture and detain them, then take them away.”

Daraa was the heart of the revolution. Protests against the Assad regime ignited after a number of children were detained and tortured. Though al-Hassan had served on “attack teams” designated to quell protests, and took pride in doing so, the anger of the Daraa citizens was palpably different. In retrospect, al-Hassan told me, he never truly grasped the full picture of the regime’s cruelty. “They prohibited us from watching Al Jazeera and Al Arabiya,” he said, “I swear to God, sometimes when I would go home on leave, and I would hear the music starting the news on Al Jazeera channel, I would get upset and an uneasy feeling.”

Upon arriving in Daraa, he was appalled to hear a lieutenant colonel say, “I know the nature of these people. They only understand this way. Shoot towards them.” This was a turning point for al-Hassan, as well as for a number of his fellow intelligence officers. He began to supply the revolutionaries clandestinely with ammunition and conspired to sabotage future regime attempts to kill protesters. When civilians at home would ask al-Hassan how he could still serve the regime, he didn’t have an answer. Eventually, a colleague, still loyal to the regime, informed on him. He spent the next eight months in Assad’s infamous prison system. “You can still see the abuse on my wrists from the zip ties,” he told me. “I cannot describe the treatment. Not human.” For eight months, al-Hassan lived in an 11 x 1 meter cell. As al-Hassan demonstrated to me, the width of one meter was about the size of a single square of tile. “No sun. No medical care whatsoever. Not even a bar of soap. They would provide an adult male with one or two olives. For the whole day, maybe a piece of pita bread,” al-Hassan said. He was, of course, one of many. The atrocities of Assad’s prisons are well documented. The Syrian Network for Human Rights reported that over 250 civilians were killed and nearly 1,500 arrested in the first month of protests alone.

As the civil war progressed, Syria splintered and ISIS began to metastasize. After eight months in prison, al-Hassan appeared before a judge, who ordered him to be released. Soon after, he officially defected from the regime and joined an armed faction of the newly formed opposition—the Free Syrian Army.

Another soldier, Mohammad al-Tadmuri (a pseudonym), tells me a similar story, but from the angle of the revolutionary. In 2011, al-Tadmuri took to the streets to protest. Encouraged by the protests across the Arab world, particularly in Tunisia and Egypt, al-Tadmuri continued to demonstrate, even after Assad enacted a state of emergency allowing protesters to be shot on sight.

The knock at his door wasn’t a surprise. Al-Tadmuri was arrested on charges of terrorism and faced similar conditions to al-Hassan’s. “You might get one piece of olive and bread, then they would cut off all food and water,” he said. “Just starvation. They would starve me for four or five days, then give me a piece of rotten bread.” Al-Tadmuri was eventually brought to a “security branch,” a facility notorious for inflicting sadistic methods of torture on prisoners. Al-Tadmuri described the method widely known as shabeh—the act of hanging a prisoner from the ceiling in a variety of positions over the course of many hours. He witnessed guards administering diuretic pills to increase urination and then tying the prisoner’s penis with a string in order to cause extreme bladder pain and, eventually, kidney disease. “Darkness, no water, no electricity. Some people lost their minds. They went insane. This was all systematic. They knew what these methods would lead to.” Al-Tadmuri was among four protesters arrested together; he was the only one to survive the security branches.

Al-Tadmuri eventually hired an attorney to negotiate his release, which also required payments and bribes to the regime. But by the time he returned home, Tadmur had become the site of intense bombing, scarcity of goods, and the threat of ISIS. “Our only options were death; either death from the regime’s shelling or death by ISIS,” al-Tadmuri told me. To escape the violence in Tadmur, he and his family traveled north to Raqqa—the heart of the caliphate. While living conditions improved, the viciousness of ISIS’s rule was inescapable. Walking down the streets of Raqqa, al-Tadmuri would pass severed heads lodged on poles, bodies strewn with signs stating their alleged crimes, and Islamic State militants questioning civilians. “It was truly a horror movie,” he said.

ISIS was also arresting and punishing citizens for activities labeled as forbidden under Sharia law: watching television, sporting unfit attire or a shaved beard, and walking during times of prayer were all justifications for apprehension. Al-Tadmuri was arrested and detained for three days after he was found carrying cigarettes.

Soon, Raqqa was besieged by a Kurdish-led and Coalition-supported armed opposition group. Coalition airstrikes during the offensive are reported to have killed over 1,600 civilians, while leaving much of the city decimated. As the bombing on Raqqa intensified, civilians snuck out of the city, crossing the bridges above the Euphrates River. Al-Tadmuri’s family left everything behind in their apartment to avoid raising suspicion: “Everybody crossed the bridge, then the bridges were bombed.”

Al-Tadmuri and his family traveled south, taking dirt roads and hiding under tarps. They eventually arrived here. Al-Tadmuri joined the SFA at al-Tanf and his family relocated to an IDP camp in nearby Rukban.

The isolated desert outpost has enabled the American forces and the SFA factions to foster a distinct connection. On Thanksgiving Day, fighters from the SFA entered the American side of al-Tanf with a live turkey. When the US forces admitted that they didn’t have a soldier who knew how to properly kill and cook the bird, the Syrians offered to do it.

US troops are expected to maintain their professional appearance. Once a week, the SFA barber sets up shop in the shade of a crumbling building and issues haircuts to American personnel. On Sunday evenings, a ragtag team plays soccer against the SFA. In my months at al-Tanf, the Americans lost badly in every match, often not even bothering to keep score. Despite the circumstances, the atmosphere is lighthearted and relaxed, with the US soldiers playing hip-hop and country songs through portable speakers, making sure to pause the music during the evening call to prayer. But there are constant reminders of the protracted conflict: during the conclusion of one match, a US F-16 fighter jet screamed across the sky, flying fast at low altitude and shaking the ground below.

Despite their lack of recognition in American newsrooms and security offices in Washington, DC, al-Tanf and the SFA have taken dozens of drone attacks from Iranian-backed militias, and the SFA has been targeted directly by Russian warplanes. During the early morning of August 15, 2022, I was awakened by what one soldier called a “flying weed-whacker,” an armed suicide drone, followed by an explosion. The war in Gaza has accelerated attacks on al-Tanf. Israeli military strikes on Iranian-aligned militia groups are often met with retribution visited on the base by Iranian drones. A mid-October 2023 drone attack left 19 US soldiers with traumatic brain injuries.

Russia, meanwhile, has continued to engage in a propaganda campaign, largley through state news and social media, to label the SFA as a terrorist militia or simply as synonymous with ISIS. In raw numbers, al-Tanf and the SFA are trivial—the SFA is roughly the size of a traditional infantry battalion and accompanied by fewer than 500 US troops. Still, the Kremlin and Tehran have used the 55-kilometer region as a punching bag to express their anger and remind the United States of their willingness to reach into the Deconfliction Zone.

In the face of the looming aerial assaults, the men of al-Tanf spend much of their time trying to alleviate the humanitarian crisis nearby—an IDP camp in Rukban, characteristic of a situation that the United States barely acknowledges.

The Rukban refugee camp is the bleeding wound of the DCZ: it both unifies the SFA and serves as its greatest vulnerability. Comprised of thousands of Syrians who fled the civil war, Rukban sits along the Jordanian border, a short ride from al-Tanf, and is within eyesight of the joint US-Jordanian outpost Tower 22. American soldiers deploy solo to al-Tanf for nine-month tours. The families of SFA members, however, live just miles from the base. The conditions in the camp remain dire. The central well in Rukban receives water pumped from across the Jordanian border and is under the administrative control of the Jordanian NGO Better World, which receives direction from UNICEF regarding the daily water provided. The camp is often subject to water shortages, with no explanation as to why the supply is being limited. The lead medic of the SFA team told me, “When I go to Rukban, I see people waiting in line to get water for their children. They start at 6:00 a.m. [and wait in line] until 3:00 p.m. just to get a jug of water. That image says a lot about this place.”

Blocked by the Syrian regime, the UN has not delivered humanitarian aid to Rukban since 2019. The Syrian government also severely limits any shipments from regime territory—a tactic the US has labeled as the “starve-and-siege” campaign. Ahmed, the former head of the SFA Civil Affairs team, lamented, “We are still paying our debts to Assad.” In September 2023, without access to a hospital, Ahmed died from a liver condition. His brother, also an SFA officer, messaged me on WhatsApp: “He passed and no one helped him.”

Despite effectively controlling the 55-kilometer zone, which Rukban lies within, the US has maintained that the camp is the responsibility of the Syrian regime. The flow of Kalashnikovs and RPGs, not to mention broad military support for the SFA from the United States, has been virtually limitless, yet government humanitarian assistance for the camp is nonexistent. In a reverse of traditionally orthodox roles, the American military officers at al-Tanf appear to be pushing the hardest for the US government to intervene in Rukban, while policymakers at the State Department and USAID have avoided the issue at all costs.

American officers at al-Tanf often find themselves sitting across from SFA leaders during meetings, listening to updates on the camp, unable to offer much besides sympathy and empty promises. SFA leaders understand that the US forces at al-Tanf are far removed from policy decisions in Washington, but constant rotations of new American units that repeat the same rhetoric have become palpably frustrating. An SFA intelligence officer lamented to me: “Moving to Rukban is simply escaping one suffering to enter another. We are still expats. Expats in our own country.”

In September 2022, I joined an American platoon as they entered Rukban, an unprecedented event for conventional US forces. Residents, celebrating their arrival, offered to slaughter two sheep for the soldiers as they unloaded from their vehicles to visit a local clinic. After we returned to al-Tanf, I read a text from a member of the SFA: “I saw your guys in the camp. So many people welcome that.” In 2024, US patrols have continued to travel deeper into Rukban to engage with civilians, but American policy remains unchanged.

The past year, however, has offered hope for the residents of Rukban and the SFA. Out of a small office in Washington, DC—about the size of two cubicles—the NGO Syrian Emergency Task Force (SETF), led by executive director Mouaz Moustafa, has worked to deliver humanitarian aid to Rukban, including the SFA and their families. Through the use of vacant space on military aircraft, SETF’s aid deliveries have temporarily made Rukban “food secure”. But, Moustafa admitted, “That will run out in 100 days.” With the Assad regime intensifying the starve-and-siege campaign, the camp has become wholly reliant on SETF’s operation, which is contingent upon international donations and, most importantly, an ongoing American presence at al-Tanf.

The Americans and Syrians occupy separate sides of the al-Tanf base, but it is not difficult to differentiate the two spaces. Where the Syrians have planted trees and foliage around their compounds, the American side remains completely barren. The transitory nature of American units, coupled with the uncertainty of the future, serves as an explanation. Why plant a tree if you won’t be there to watch it grow?

The official mission of the US forces in Syria, titled Operation Inherent Resolve, is to support regional partners in the defeat of ISIS. Yet, during my eight months serving as a US Army officer at al-Tanf, there was no trace of terrorist activity within the 55-kilometer zone. Though this fact remains unspoken by US officials, the forces at al-Tanf have become a pawn on the regional chessboard—if the Americans didn’t occupy the space, it would be open for the taking by regime forces, Iranian militias, and Russian advisers. The US presence is a de facto peacekeeping force.

How long will the Americans stay, and what will happen when they finally leave? “The regime has my name, face, and a bounty on my head,” an SFA fighter, Khaled al-Homsi, told me. For many like him, the bridge with the regime was burned long ago. There is no option to return safely to their former homes. The Syrians in the DCZ feel a mix of hopelessness and entrapment. As al-Tadmuri lamented, “A child who was eight years old arriving at Rukban is now 14. What has this generation seen?” Yet, as I was leaving, the soldiers there had begun preparing to build a new gym and dining facility to replace the crumbling structures and tents that had served these functions in the years prior.

The contours of recent American military history in Syria are different than in Iraq and Afghanistan. There was no formal invasion to topple a regime, the conventional troop presence remains consistent and low, and, other than the occasional special operations raid or drone strike, kinetic operations have ceased. Many Americans citizens are only vaguely aware of US operations there.

Birds sing from their cages in the al-Tanf courtyard. The stalemate continues, 13 years into the war. “The whole world showed up here,” said al-Hassan. “Because we have a cause. We have an idea. The revolution is an idea that will never die.”

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All photos by Charlie Clewis.