Last week, Syrian president Ahmad Sharaa/Jolani flew to Moscow to meet with Putin to open diplomatic relations with Russia.

Critics of Jolani, including myself, pointed out the double standards of Syria allying with Russia but turning its back on fellow Muslim country Iran. The usual argument used to justify Syria breaking all ties with Iran is that Iran was involved in backing Bashar al-Asad, who killed hundreds of thousands of Sunni Syrians. How then can new Syria ally with a country that committed atrocities against its people?

But, Russia also backed Asad and, in fact, provided him with the most lethal weapons used agaisnt the Sunni Syrians. So, given Russia’s recent involvement in atrocities against Syria, why is Jolani meeting Putin with a smile and building diplomatic ties with his nation?

Sectarian Reasoning

In a recording, Jolani explains why it is in the interest of Syria to ally with Russia and not Iran.

In the recording, Jolani claims that the difference between allying with Russia as opposed to Iran is that Russia only has geopolitical concerns, not sectarian ones. Unlike Iran, Russia is not interested in meddling in Syrian internal affairs or spreading their religious beliefs or dominating Syrian politics and society.

This logic is often repeated by Syrian and Arab nationalists online to justify Syria allying with Russia and other Western powers, including the US, rather than Iran.

Russia and the US, they argue, do not seek to reshape Syria’s religion or its internal culture. Iran, by contrast, advances an explicitly sectarian project, spreading its ideology through militias, schools, and seminaries. In other words, the Western involvement is merely external and temporary; the Iranian interference, by contrast, is civilizational and enduring and, therefore, intolerable.

This is not a new argument.

It is exactly what Arab separatists such as Sharif Husayn said during the First World War regarding the British vs. the Ottoman Turks.

The Arab separatists insisted it was better to ally with Britain than remain under Ottoman rule because, in their words, the British would not interfere in Arab affairs, while the Ottomans sought to impose their Turkish culture and religious authority on the Arabs. The British, they believed, were distant and pragmatic; the Ottomans, intimate and intrusive and, therefore, intolerable.

Arab-Turkish Conflict

By 1914, the relationship between the Arab provinces and Istanbul had become strained. The rise of the Young Turks and their program of centralization and Turkification convinced many Arab notables that Ottoman rule was no longer Islamic universalism but Turkish nationalism dressed in religion.

In his correspondence with Sir Henry McMahon, Sharif Husayn of Mecca described his goal as reclaiming Arab self-rule:

“Whereas the whole of the Arab nation without any exception have decided in these last years to accomplish their freedom, and grasp the reins of their administration both in theory and practice…”

 

— Husayn to McMahon, 1915

Husayn saw Ottoman control of Mecca and Madina as an encroachment. After the Young Turk revolution, Istanbul increasingly sought to administer Mecca and Madina directly. Encyclopaedia Britannica notes that Husayn “mistrusted the Young Turk government, which had indicated a preference to rule the holy places directly.”

RELATED: [WATCH] New Syria Is Becoming Jordan 2.0?

The British Promise: Non-Interference and Arab Sovereignty

The British, eager to undermine the Ottomans, exploited this Arab sentiment. In late 1914, British officials in Cairo issued an Arabic proclamation declaring:

“The Government of Great Britain does not intend to possess any part of your country — neither in the form of conquest and possession nor in the form of protection.”

 

—Elie Kedourie. In the Anglo-Arab Labyrinth: the McMahon-Husavn Correspondence and its Interpretations. 1914-1939 (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ crsity Press, 1976). pp. 21-22. Cited in “BRITAIN AND THE UNITED STATES IN THE GULF: ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES, 1892-1979“

In their letters to Husayn, British diplomats repeatedly framed their alliance as one of equals and assured Husayn that they were not interested in meddling within the Arab provinces.

McMahon wrote that Britain had no ulterior motives whatsoever beyond concern for the independence of Arabs. Husayn echoed that confidence:

“It is in the interest of the Government of Great Britain to support them [the Arabs] … without any ulterior motives whatsoever unconnected with this object.”

 

— Husayn to McMahon, 1915

For Husayn, the crucial distinction was not only between foreign domination and independence, but between two kinds of foreign presence: one that interferes and reshapes society, and one that stays out and merely offers protection. The Ottomans had become the former while the British promised to be the latter.

Later, other British politicians, like Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald, also went out of their way to proclaim that their attitude towards internal Arab political and religious affairs was one of “complete disinterestedness.”

“Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald made it clear that “His Majesty’s Government are not entitled, either on political or religious grounds, to comment on or interfere in any way in a matter in which their policy has consistently been and will remain one of complete disinterestedness.” The word disinterestedness was frequently used to describe the official attitude toward the issue. There is a sense that Britain, being a foreign non-Muslim power with no interest in the Islamic world’s esoteric religious politics, was pleased to remain blissfully ignorant of the subject.”

 

— The Caliphate Question

For Arab leaders of the time, Ottoman imperialism was “interference” and political, linguistic, and theological control over daily life. British imperialism, on the other hand, appeared distant and less intrusive. This perception proved crucial in convincing Husayn and his sons join the British in revolting agaisnt the Ottomans.

The British offer appealed to the Arabs because it promised Arab sovereignty. Colonial Adminstrator Herbert Kitchener’s 1914 statement captured this:

“On 31 October 1914, the same day on which the British announced war against the Ottomans, Kitchener sent a message to Abdullah, second son of Hussein, which promised that “If the Arab nation assist England in this war that has been forced upon us by Turkey, England will guarantee that no internal intervention takes place in Arabia, and will give Arabs every assistance against external foreign aggression.” Kitchener also added “It may be that an Arab of true race will assume the Khalifate at Mecca or Medina and so good may come by the help of God out of all the evil that is now occurring.”

 

—Cited in “BRITAIN AND THE UNITED STATES IN THE GULF: ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES, 1892-1979“

It was precisely this assurance of “no internal intervention” that differentiated the British from the Ottomans in Arab eyes. The Turks were fellow Muslims but sought to dictate to the Arabs, while the British were Christians but promised the Arabs independence. This logic contributed, ultimately, to the decision of the Arabs to revolt, which led to the fall of the Ottoman Caliphate and the evenutal malaise we see in the modern Middle East.

RELATED: Pan-Islamism vs. Wahhabism

The US Promise: Non-Interference and Syrian Sovereignty

The colonial powers reuse the same playbook to dupe a new generation of Muslims.

Here are the promises that the US has been making Syria since December of 2024 and the takeover of the country by Jolani’s HTS. See if you can notice any similarities with what the British promised the Arabs over a century ago.

As early as October 2024, former Secretary of State Anthony Blinken was promising no “external interference” in Syrian affairs.

G7 statement on Syria (12 December 2024) published by the White House:

“We reaffirm our commitment to […] a Syrian-led and Syrian-owned political transition […] we call on all parties to preserve Syria’s territorial integrity and national unity, and respect its independence and sovereignty.”

A related statement from US special envoy Tom Barrack in May 2025:

“The era of Western interference is over. […] The future belongs to regional solutions, but partnerships, and a diplomacy grounded in respect.”

Fell For It Again Award

More than a century later, this old Arab calculus reappears in Syria.

Contemporary Syrian nationalists, whether secular or Wahhabi sectarian, claim that Western or Russian powers, for all their geopolitical maneuvering, do not seek to transform Syria’s religion or society. Iran, by contrast, aims to remake it in its own image. Or at least that is the claim.

Of course, we have to wonder how these Syrian nationalists can actually believe that Iran, a relatively weak country compared to the US or Russia, has the will or the ability to engage in a massive cultural engineering project that could possibly make a dent in the socio-religious environment of Syria, whereas the US and Russia are… not interested in this?

Is this really a serious suggestion?

Maybe the Syrian nationalists are ignorant of very recent history, where the US and Russia, two world powers, socially engineered numerous Muslim societies for their own benefit and to the massive detriment of Muslim populations. In fact, they are presently involved in this social engineering project in Muslim countries throughout the world. And by “socially engineer” I mean, destroying traditional religious institutions, detaining and killing imams, taking over mosques and madrasas, spreading liberal secular beliefs and norms, etc., all in order to impose secularism, atheism, communism, zionism, etc.

Perhaps the supporters of Goylani would do well to remember that the promises of the British not to interfere in Arab affairs were not only bald-faced lies, but calculated deception which lay the ground work for decades of brutal Western (and Jewish) oppression and tyranny.

And it should also not be lost on anyone that Goylani has been directly tied to the CIA and other intelligence agencies. Is it a surprise, then, that he is at the forefront of spreading the propaganda of the Western imperial powers?