When fifty-plus years of Assad family rule in Syria collapsed earlier this month, Iran was perhaps the first to mourn the loss and Israel the first to celebrate. The two countries have been engaged in a Shadow War for the better part of two decades. Tehran’s Axis of Resistance, or the proxy warfare strategy it deployed against the Jewish state, heavily involved its clout in Syria. 

Beginning in the early 1990s, the Iranian regime has successfully been able to smuggle weapons via Syria to its affiliates in Lebanon and Gaza thanks to friendly governments in Damascus. Now that Assad has been ousted, Iran’s influence in the Middle East has undoubtedly been fractured.

The Origins of the Assad-Iran Partnership

Analysts believe Iran first toyed with transferring arms to its regional proxy groups via Syria more than twenty years ago under the tenure of former Syrian president Hafez Assad. Initially, only light weapons were permitted to transit through the country, including ammunition, mortars, mines, and several anti-tank systems. 

When Hafez’s son Bashar assumed power in the early 2000s following his father’s death, the alliance between the Assad family and Tehran grew stronger. According to the Jerusalem Post, weapons ranging from Scud surface-to-surface missiles and Fateh-110 precision missiles were transferred to Hezbollah via Syria, giving the Lebanon-based terror group the ability to strike virtually any target in Israel.

Understanding Tehran’s Grasp on the Region 

When the Syrian Civil War erupted in 2011, following the string of demonstrations that swept the region known as the Arab Spring, a new period of Syrian-Iranian relations was presumed. As detailed by Understanding War, “Lebanese Hezbollah began to take on a more direct combat role in Syria as the Assad regime began losing control over Syrian territory in 2012. Hezbollah has supported Assad with a robust, well-trained force whose involvement in the conflict aligns with Iranian strategic interests.” Iraqi Shi’a militias, which are directed by Tehran, have also fought in support of the Assad regime in Syria.

Originally, the Syrian Army began to transfer many of its weapons warehouses to more secure facilities under Hezbollah control in Lebanon to ensure rebel forces could not get their hands on vital resources. While Assad’s objective may not have been to directly arm Hezbollah as part of this process, the build-up of the group’s weapons arsenal was inevitable. Iran’s covert smuggling of weapons into Syria was notably documented in 2023 following a 7.8 magnitude earthquake that shook the Levant. Tehran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) was able to transfer weapons into Syria using humanitarian aid shipments as a cover.

Syria has served as a central pillar in Iran’s regional strategy. The fact that the Iranian regime did not put up a more fervent defense of Assad indicates the country is faring worse amidst its current war against Israel than it likes to purport. Without clout in Syria, Iran’s go-to doctrine of asymmetric warfare via its proxies will surely suffer.

Maya Carlin, National Security Writer with The National Interest, is an analyst with the Center for Security Policy and a former Anna Sobol Levy Fellow at IDC Herzliya in Israel. She has by-lines in many publications, including The National Interest, Jerusalem Post, and Times of Israel. You can follow her on Twitter: @MayaCarlin. Carlin has over 1,000 articles published over the last several years on various defense issues.

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