Turkey and Saudi Arabia join forces against Assad

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leaders in Saudi Arabia and Turkey have agreed to cooperate in organizing the various Syrian rebel groups to bring down the Assad government.

The report comes on the heels of a dramatic turnaround in rebel combat capability in which the cities of Idlib and Jisr al-Shughour were recently seized by the opposition. The gains didn’t go unnoticed by Assad or his allies, however. On May 5, Hezbollah General Secretary Hassan Nasrallah took to the airwaves to claim his fighters were preparing an attack on al-Nursa Front positions near the Qalamoun Mountains. This was most likely in response to the rebel gains. These areas are of vital importance to the regime for logistical reasons, but the loss of this route also means cutting off overland contact from Damascus to the northern coastal province of Latakia where the bulk of Alawite community resides.

According to In HomeLand Security the fact that opposition forces were able to coordinate and effectively operate cohesively in a combat environment is a marked departure from past infighting. Officials in Turkey and Saudi Arabia cite these recent gains as evidence of efficacy of the recent pact between the two nations. Even with this agreement between the two nations in place, there is still an elephant in the room – what happens after Assad and his government fall?