What is the role of Turkey in Syria?

One of the main reasons for the Syrian revolution against the regime of Bashar Al-Assad was the support they received from regional countries, especially Turkey, who took a strong stand against the Syrian regime at the start of the revolution. This drove many Syrians to make huge sacrifices in the hope that they could create the country they were dreaming of, as was promised by neighboring countries.

When the first red line by the former US President Barack Obama was broken, international support for the Syrian people and the desire to protect them from genocide began to decline. Despite the many victories achieved on the ground, Russian intervention not only turned the tables, but it exposed the stands of many regional countries that were claiming to protect the interests of the Syrian people. It was finally exposed that they were only defending their own interests in the name of protecting the Syrian people. They were searching for their own piece of the Syrian pie.

Saudi journalist Abdul Rahman Al-Rashed, in a recent column, wrote about the Turkish government and Syria getting closer together and the reality of Turkish military action in Syria and the under-the-table dialogue of the Turks with the allies of the Syrian regime.

While the countries supporting the rights of the Syrian people found that their noble intentions collided with the politics of big countries, the stand of Turkey changed back and forth. It is no longer acceptable nor is there any justification for Turkey to engage in political dialogue with allies of the Syrian regime to defend the Syrian people and put an end to bloodshed.

In fact, Turkey has only offered the Syrian people surrender agreements, while at the same time, the Turkish military was killing Syrians in another geographic location claiming that they were fighting the Kurds.

In Syria, there is a table with a dead body on it that is being divided by the same faces, even if the masks are different.

This article was first published by Saudi Gazette.
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Khaled al-Sulaiman is a Saudi writer and commentator for Okaz and Saudi Gazette. He can be followed on twitter @alsulimankhalid.