The first week of 2026 witnessed a significant turnaround in US policy in the Middle East.  

A key factor was the visit of Syria’s interim president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, to US President Donald Trump in the White House on November 10, 2025. Speaking in the Oval Office, Trump said of Sharaa: “We aspire to see Syria evolve into a prosperous nation, and I believe this leader has the potential to achieve it…”

By December 2025, the US was publicly expressing satisfaction with “steps being taken by the Syrian interim government.”

For more than a decade, the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) had maintained effective governance in Rojava, the extensive region in north and north-east Syria where Kurds form the largest community alongside other minority populations.

But on January 6, Sharaa launched an intensive campaign across the SDF held areas in the north-east aimed at absorbing the SDF into the Syrian army. Washington pressed the SDF to accept integration and focused on mediating ceasefires and withdrawals.

On January 18, a US mediated ceasefire was announced, setting out terms for SDF integration into the Syrian army. In reports of a lateJanuary phone call between Trump and Sharaa, Trump is quoted as supporting “the aspirations of the Syrian people to build a unified and strong state” and welcoming “the understandings related to the integration of military forces, including the SDF, into official state institutions.”

So what began as Trump’s full military and political backing for the SDF as the central antiISIS instrument has evolved........

© Eurasia Review