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President Assad regime
Full scale war between Syrian government and anti government rebel groups -
Islamic state begins to seize control
Islamic state began to seize control of territory in Syria in 2013. Terrorist attacks lead by Islamic State lead to 11 thousand air strikes with support from U.S, United Kingdom, France, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and other Arab partners. -
Syrian government regaining control
Syrian government has steadily regained control of territory from opposition forces, including the oppositions stronghold in Aleppo in 2016. They have been accused of using chemical weapons numerous times over the course of the conflict -
Russia initiates peace talks
Russia initiated peace talks between Astana, Kazakhstan, with Iran, Turkey, and members of Syria's government and armed opposition leaders which resulted in a cease- fire agreement of four de-escalation zones. -
Cease fire did not work
Shortly after the cease fire was announced attacks by Syrian government forces against rebel held areas in the de-escalation zones resumed -
Unsuccessful efforts to reach diplomatic resolution
Peace talks on Syria have not been successful in reaching a political resolution as opposition groups and Syrian regime officials struggle to find mutually acceptable terms for resolving the conflict. There has been a new round of peace talks that began in Geneva in May 2017 with a 18 person delegation from Syria but has since stalled. -
More concerns
There is also concerns about the complicating civil war and the raising concerns of unintended escalation. Ongoing violence conflicts could also facilitate the resurgence of terrorist groups. -
Latest "victory"
The latest so called victory was a six week operation that killed an estimated 1700 civilians. Only 6 days later there was a chemical attack in Douma only 6 miles away that killed 40 and affected 500. So the US, France, and the UK carried out air strikes on on three chemical weapons facilities near Damascus. -
US troops in Syria
Also in April president trump announced that roughly 2000 US troops will stay in Syria to prevent the resurgence of Islamic state. -
Concerns
According to the World Bank more than 400,00 have been killed in Syria since the start of the war. The UN reports that more than 5.6 million have fled the country and 6.5 have been internally displaced. Many have fled to Jordan and Lebanon. straining already weak infrastructure and limited resources. More than 3.4 million Syrians have fled to Turkey and many have attempted to seek refuge in Europe.
