Syrian

The bombings mark a sharp escalation by the armed group, which views the new government in Damascus as illegitimate.

ISIL (ISIS) has claimed responsibility for an attack on the Syrian army, representing the armed group’s first strike at government forces since the fall of Bashar al-Assad, according to analysts.

In a statement released late on Thursday, ISIL said its fighters had planted an explosive device that struck a “vehicle of the apostate regime” in southern Syria.

The bombing appears to mark an escalation by ISIL, which views the new government in Damascus as illegitimate but has so far concentrated its activities against Kurdish forces in the north.

The blast, in the al-Safa desert region of Sweida province on May 22, reportedly killed or wounded seven Syrian soldiers.

A second bomb attack, claimed by ISIL earlier this week, targeted fighters from the United States-backed Kurdish-led Free Syrian Army in a nearby area. ISIL said one fighter was killed and three injured.

There has been no official comment from the Syrian government, and the Free Syrian Army has yet to respond.

Members of the new Syrian government that replaced al-Assad after his removal in December once had ties to al-Qaeda – a rival of ISIL – but broke with the group nearly a decade ago.

However, over the past several months, ISIL has claimed responsibility only for attacks against the Syrian Democratic Forces in the northeast.

The United Kingdom-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the convoy blast was the first ISIL-claimed operation targeting the new Syrian military.

ISIL was territorially defeated in Syria in 2019 but maintains sleeper cells, particularly in the country’s central and eastern deserts.

While the group’s capacity has been diminished, the latest attacks suggest it may be seeking to reassert itself amid shifting alliances and weakening state control.

Chairman of the Inaugural Committee and real estate investor Thomas J. Barrack Jr. stops to talk to members of the media in the lobby of the Trump Tower in New York, N.Y., in 2017. Barrack was appointed a special envoy to Syria Thursday. File Pool Photo by Anthony Behar/UPI | License Photo

May 29 (UPI) — The United States ambassador’s residence in Damascus, Syria, re-opened Thursday after being closed for 13 years, presaging a warming of relations between the two countries.

Tom Barrack, the current U.S. ambassador to Turkey, has also been appointed special envoy to Syria, and raised a U.S. flag outside the residence to inaugurate it, according to the Syrian run news agency SANA.

“Tom understands there is great potential in working with Syria to stop Radicalism, improve Relations, and secure Peace in the Middle East,” a statement from the State Department on X said. “Together, we will make America and the world, SAFE AGAIN!”

Barrack met with Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa to witness the signing of an agreement with Middle Eastern countries aimed at developing a $7 billion, 5,000 megawatt energy project that would revitalize Syria’s aging and worn electricity grid and use it as the backbone of the new power project.

The new energy project could supply Syria with 50% of its electricity needs, according to a statement from Qatari-based UCC Holding, which is among the partners in the project.

In a further sign of warming relations between the United States and the Middle East, President Donald Trump met earlier this month with al-Sharaa in Riyadh, a move that prompted the United States to begin walking back sanctions imposed on Syria during the repressive regime of Bahsar al-Assad.

During the reopening of the ambassador’s residence Thursday, Barrack called lifting the sanctions a “bold move,” and said it comes with “no conditions, no requirements.”

Barrack credited Trump for “your bold vision, empowering a historically rich region, long oppressed, to reclaim its destiny through self-determination.”

May 24 (UPI) — President Donald Trump‘s administration is lifting sanctions on war-torn Syria, with the goal of speeding recovery and reconstruction efforts in the Middle Eastern country.

The move will pave the way for “new investment and private sector activity consistent with the President’s America First strategy,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a statement this week.

Trump earlier this month met with Interim Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa where he promised he would lift “crippling” U.S. sanctions.

“I have issued a 180-day waiver of mandatory Caesar Act sanctions to ensure sanctions do not impede the ability of our partners to make stability-driving investments, and advance Syria’s recovery and reconstruction efforts,” Rubio said in the statement.

“These waivers will facilitate the provision of electricity, energy, water, and sanitation, and enable a more effective humanitarian response across Syria.”

During his first term in the Oval Office in 2020, Trump imposed sweeping sanctions on Syria and its then-President Bashar al-Assad. The Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act of 2019 had a major impact on Syria’s economy, particularly its financial and construction sectors.

Trump at the time said sanctions were targeting entities and individuals that were “actively supporting the murderous and barbaric Assad regime.”

Assad was ousted from power last December, fleeing to Russia. It ended a five-decade run of Assad family rule in Syria.

In addition to lifting sanctions, the U.S. Department of the Treasury issued Syria General License 25, allowing people previously blocked from conducting business with Syrian entities to do so under the new al-Sharaa government.

“The GL will allow for new investment and private sector activity consistent with the President’s America First strategy. The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network is providing exceptive relief to permit U.S. financial institutions to maintain correspondent accounts for the Commercial Bank of Syria,” Rubio said in the statement.

“Today’s actions represent the first step in delivering on the President’s vision of a new relationship between Syria and the United States,” Rubio said. “President Trump is providing the Syrian government with the chance to promote peace and stability, both within Syria and in Syria’s relations with its neighbors. The President has made clear his expectation that relief will be followed by prompt action by the Syrian government on important policy priorities.”

The American directive comes just days after the European Union made a similar move. EU officials on Tuesday lifted its sanctions on Syria with the same goal of helping economic recovery.

“We want to help the Syrian people rebuild a new, inclusive and peaceful Syria,” EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Kaja Kallas said at the time.

Syrians are hoping sanctions relief will help boost investment, reconstruction after more than a decade of civil war.

Business owners in Syria have welcomed the European Union’s decision this week to lift sanctions on the country, in what observers say is the most significant easing of Western pressure on Damascus in more than a decade.

The EU’s move, which followed a similar announcement by the United States in mid-May, was praised by Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani as one that would bolster Syria’s security and stability.

For many Syrian entrepreneurs, it also brings the hope of rebuilding their livelihoods after years of economic isolation.

“Companies that were ousted from Syria and stopped dealing with us because of the sanctions are now in contact with us,” Hassan Bandakji, a local business owner, told Al Jazeera.

“Many companies and producers are telling us they are coming back and that they want to reserve a spot in our market.”

The EU and US sanctions had levied wide-ranging sanctions against the government of former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who was removed from power in a rebel offensive in December of last year.

The economic curbs had severely limited trade, investment, and financial transactions in Syria, cutting businesses off from supplies and international banking.

“The main obstacle we faced was getting raw materials and automated lines,” said Ali Sheikh Kweider, who manages a factory in the countryside of the Syrian capital, Damascus.

“As for bank accounts, we weren’t able to send or receive any transactions,” Kweider told Al Jazeera.

Syria’s new government, led by ex-rebel leader and interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa, had called for the sanctions to be lifted as it seeks to rebuild the country.

US President Donald Trump said after a meeting with al-Sharaa in Saudi Arabia last week that he planned to order the lifting of American sanctions on Syria.

Reporting from Damascus, Al Jazeera’s Mahmoud Abdelwahed said the government is hoping the sanctions relief will help Syria reintegrate into the international community.

It also views the EU’s announcement as additional “recognition of the new political leadership” in the country, Abdelwahed added.

Syrian authorities say three ISIL fighters killed and several others detained in Aleppo raids.

Syrian security forces have killed three ISIL (ISIS) fighters and arrested four others in Aleppo, authorities said, the first time the interim government has announced such an operation against the group in Syria’s second city.

The raids, launched by the General Security Department in coordination with the General Intelligence Service, targeted multiple ISIL sleeper cells operating across Aleppo, Syria’s Ministry of Interior said in a statement on Saturday.

One security officer was killed in the operation, it said.

Forces stormed the site and seized “explosive devices, an explosive vest and a number of General Security force uniforms”, the statement added.

The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the operation took place in Aleppo’s Haidariya district and that clashes also broke out in another neighbourhood.

Interim Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa, who assumed power in Damascus in December, has long opposed ISIL. His forces battled the group’s self-declared caliphate during the Syrian war.

US President Donald Trump met al-Sharaa this week in Saudi Arabia and described him as an “attractive guy with a very strong past”.

Following the meeting, Washington announced that it would lift sanctions on Syria – a major policy shift and boost for al-Sharaa’s transitional government.

Al-Sharaa seized power in Damascus in December after his forces toppled Bashar al-Assad in a lightning offensive. Al-Sharaa cut ties with al-Qaeda in 2016.

The recent operation comes just months after Syrian authorities said they had foiled an ISIL bombing plot near the Sayeda Zeinab shrine, a key pilgrimage site for Shia Muslims south of Damascus.