Former Syrian President Hafez al-Assad’s Baath Party regime was the first to recognize, and offer legitimacy to, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini’s Islamic revolution in Iran. But Assad was careful to never let Iran expand its influence in Syria as it later did in Lebanon through Hezbollah.
The desperation of his son and successor Bashar al-Assad has given Iran’s expansionists their chance. Iranian forces entered Syria soon after its civil war started a decade ago to help defend the younger Assad’s regime against rebels. Tehran supported the Syrian regime in the war, along with its Lebanese proxy Hezbollah, and even enrolled Shiite fighters from Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan to aid the cause. Over time, Iran recruited local Syrian fighters in militias ostensibly to guard Shiite shrines, and it intensified relations with the higher echelons of the Syrian military apparatus, particularly the 4th Division headed by one of Hafez al-Assad’s other sons, Maher al-Assad.
