Oman’s Strategic Leverage in Syria

• Commentary Middle East and North Africa
  by Eleonora Ardemagni

As Bashar Al Assad's regime faces increasing challenges from Turkish-backed armed groups, Oman's diplomatic relations provide the Sultanate with significant leverage to potentially facilitate a political entente between the GCC states and Iran regarding Syria.

This underscores the breadth of the multi-alignment posture (known as "omani-balancing") that Omani foreign policy has maintained, and even enhanced, since Sultan Haitham bin Tariq Al Said's rule began in early 2020.

Regarding Damascus, the GCC states and Iran have different perspectives and interests. Positions are nuanced even in the GCC and the final communiqué of the annual GCC Summit, held in Kuwait on December 1, does not mention Syria. What remains clear is that Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Iran are now prioritizing regional stability over open escalation, and Syria is part of this equation.

In recent years, Muscat has strengthened political and economic ties with Iran and Russia, while also improving relations with Turkey -currently the most influential powers in Syria.

Consequently, Oman is uniquely positioned among regional players to facilitate an informal compromise between Gulf rivals over Syria's internal balances. This would promote Middle Eastern stability, while supporting de-escalation efforts in the Gulf.

GCC states, Iran, and the stakes in Syria

The GCC states and Iran have dissimilar stakes in Syria. The UAE and Saudi Arabia have come to terms with the survival of Assad authoritarian government at last, restoring diplomatic relations with Syria respectively in 2018 (although the Emirati ambassador was sent back only in early 2024), and in 2023. Qatar has instead refused to normalize relations with the country so far, although Doha did not prevent the reintegration of Damascus into the Arab League (2023).

As balances in Syria reshape, Saudi Arabia and the UAE can benefit from the weakening of Iran's regional influence, and from the further fragmentation of the Tehran-led constellation of non-state armed groups. They can also aim to better contain the smuggling of Captagon drugs from the Levant towards the Gulf.

At the same time, however, Riyadh and Abu Dhabi are now quite uncomfortable with the prospect of a coalition led by Hayat Tahrir al Sham (HTS), a salafi-jihadi group whose bulk was formerly tied to al Qaeda, seizing a strategic part of the Syrian territory, likely worsening regional destabilization. When the Syrian uprising began in 2011 and the GCC states were engaged in the regional intra-Sunni power competition, even private donors in the Gulf funded Jabhat Al Nusra, the group that later rebranded as HTS. On November 30, the Emirati president Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan was the first GCC leader to call Assad, stressing "UAE's solidarity with Syria and its support in combating terrorism and extremism".

Between 2013-15, Iran, alongside Lebanese Hezbollah and Russia, helped save Assad's regime. For Tehran, Syria represents a strategic depth towards the Mediterranean, a component of its "forward defense" strategy (now consistently weakened), and the essential route for finances, weapons, and fighters from Tehran to Beirut.

Despite different strategies, Gulf rivals currently show some converging points. Both the GCC states and Iran do not want the Gulf de-escalation process to collapse now, nor the empowerment of a Sunni extremist group in north-western Syria. Additionally, Riyadh, Abu Dhabi and Tehran now support the Assad presidency, albeit to varying degrees.

"Omani-Balancing" 2.0: Iran, Russia, and Turkey

A GCC states-Iran political compromise on Syria would also improve stability of the Gulf region. In such a scenario, Oman could be the most well-positioned country to fulfil this goal. Under the rule of Sultan Haitham, Oman has further strengthened political and economic relations with Iran, Russia, and Turkey, which in 2017 agreed upon de-scalation zones (the "Astana Process"), de facto dividing the country under externally backed spheres of influence.

Further improving good neighborhood relations, the Sultan paid an official visit to Iran in 2023 for the first time in a decade, meeting both the Iranian president and the Supreme guide Ali Khamenei.

In 2024, Haitham bin Tariq Al Said and Vladimir Putin held the first-ever phone call between an Omani Sultan and a Russian President. A few months later, Oman participated as the guest country at Russia's St Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF).

On November 28-29, 2024, Sultan Haitham travelled to Turkiye for a historic visit, the first-ever by an Omani Sultan to the country. Oman and Turkey, which share a harsh stance on Israel's post-October 7 regional strategy, signed ten agreements, from agriculture and food security to healthcare, logistics and technology. Security and defence cooperation was also discussed.

Oman's approach to the crisis: room for an intra-Gulf entente in Syria?

Unlike its GCC neighbours, Oman has never downgraded diplomatic relations with Syria after 2011, and was the first Gulf state to re-instate its ambassador to Damascus in 2020. President Assad visited Muscat in March 2023.

After HTS seized Aleppo, the Omani minister of foreign affairs Badr bin Hamad Al Busaidi called his Syrian counterpart on November 30 stressing "the importance of the sovereignty and unity of Syrian territory", and "the necessity of restoring security and stability".

For the GCC states and for Iran, the reigniting of the Syrian crisis represents a new test for the ongoing rapprochement process in the Gulf. In this context, Oman has the right cards to facilitate some sort of political entente between Gulf rivals about Syria, prioritizing stability. For Iran, this could mean the survival of the Assad regime, albeit weaker than before. For Saudi Arabia and the UAE, this could lead to a reshaped power balance in Syria. A new balance where Tehran and its allied non-state actors could no longer maintain the political-military "golden share" in Damascus.

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