When Syrian President Ahmad Al Shara met Iraqi security officials in January 2025, only weeks after taking over power in Damascus, distrust was so high that he wore what was speculated to be a gun under his suit jacket.
More than a year and a half later, Damascus and Baghdad are co-operating in various sectors – from developing markets for Syrian produce to reactivating, under US auspices, an oil pipeline between Iraq’s northern oil centre of Kirkuk and Syria's port of Baniyas.
At least 2.1 million tonnes of Iraqi fuel oil exports have also flowed by lorry to Baniyas since April, as the blockade in the Strait of Hormuz has cut off maritime routes in the Arabian Gulf.
“Everyone from Iraq to Israel” has developed an interest in seeing Syria become a “regional safe zone”, a Syrian official said, as Iran's quest to control navigation in the strait undermines its own allies in Baghdad.
Iraq's crude oil exports fell sharply because of the Hormuz crisis and associated security threats. Oil revenue fell from $6.8 billion in February to about $2.3 billion in May and June. Many public employees have not been paid their July salaries.
It is the second time that the US has tried to steer transport routes to its advantage in Iraq and Syria since the American-led invasion that ousted Saddam Hussein in 2003.
During an increase in the US troop presence in Iraq, in 2007, David Petraeus, US military commander at the time, pushed for the routing of commodity imports into Iraq through Syrian ports to give Damascus a stake in the stabilisation of Iraq.
The approach fizzled out as the forces started withdrawing by the end of that year, with corruption at Syria's ports ultimately undermining the plan.
This time, Washington is “interested at the highest levels” in making the nexus work, the Syrian official said. The official added that the US special envoy to both Iraq and Syria, Tom Barrack, brokered the oil pipeline deal, with the participation of Chevron and the Al Khayyat brothers, Syrian-Qatari businessmen who are well connected in Washington. Mr Barrack is a confidante of US President Donald Trump and is also the ambassador to Turkey.
The US, the official said, is also looking to Damascus to “save face” amid the stalemate with Iran. He warned that the new Iraqi government has been striking high-profile, US-mediated regional deals without seeking significant support among the pro-Iranian Shiite militias, who wield significant power in the system.
The militias, along with Lebanon's Hezbollah, constituted the bulk of the ground component of the support Iran extended to Bashar Al Assad in Syria's 2011-2024 civil war.
Baghdad cannot proceed with the pipeline project without Iranian approval, the official said. However, Iran acquiesced to the fuel transport deal as a convenient way to maintain a minimum of hard currency flows to Iraq.
“It is not a permanent arrangement,” the official said. “The oil pipeline is a different issue. It would affect Iran strategically”.
In Baghdad, the Iran-backed armed groups remain hostile to Syria’s new government, although falls in oil revenue ultimately affect their constituencies.
“This regime is not to be trusted,” an Iraqi legislator linked to a militia that carried out operations in Syria told The National. American sponsorship of the normalisation is another factor, as well as what he described as a rise in hostile rhetoric towards them on Syrian social media. “Our eyes are always open, and our fingers on the trigger,” he said.
However, tension has subsided on the 400 kilometre frontier between the two countries since the ouster of Al Assad raised fears of cross-border incursions.
Commanders from both sides have been “exchanging whatsapp numbers” to make sure that troop movements are not misconstrued, a regional security source said.
Co-operation on countering ISIS, as well as intercepting shipments of crystal meth, a potent illicit drug, has increased, the source said. The Syrian commanders stationed along the frontier are drawn from Hayat Tahrir Al Sham (HTS), the offshoot of a former Al Qaeda affiliate, founded by Mr Al Shara, who started his militant career in Iraq after the US-led invasion. On the Iraqi side, the influence of the Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF), an amalgamation of pro-Iranian militias, is strong.
“The two sides are ultra-ideological but ultra-pragmatic, although they don't trust each other one per cent,” the source said.
In June, the focus expanded beyond security co-operation, with the first visit by the Iraqi Foreign Minister, Fuad Hussein, to Damascus since the fall of the Assad regime. Water and agriculture co-operation were discussed, as well as easing the movement of goods and people across the border.
This week, videos on social media reportedly showed a Syrian army column near the border, prompting rumours of renewed tension. However, Lt Gen Mohammed Al Saidi, an Iraqi border guard commander, said the Syrians moved there “with our knowledge and in co-ordination with us”.
An Iraqi security official said progress in co-operation with Syria has been “remarkable” on fighting ISIS and drug trafficking networks.
“We carried out several operations inside Syria,” he said, without elaborating.
An Iraqi diplomat said relations with Syria “are currently at their best”. However, there has been no significant project between the two countries since the Kirkuk-Baniyas pipeline, which was built in the early 1950s by the Iraq Petroleum Company, which was an international consortium.
Iraq was a monarchy at the time, and Syrians lived through a brief period of democracy. The pipeline has been mostly shut down for the last four decades because of political differences between the two countries.
