Enab Baladi – Amir Huquq
The attack that the Islamic State group is accused of carrying out against a joint patrol of US forces and the Syrian army near the city of Palmyra (Tadmur, in eastern Homs province, central Syria) on 13 December has sparked debate on both the operational and political levels.
The attack killed two US service members and an American civilian, and brought renewed attention to the continuing threat posed by the group’s cells, despite repeated strikes they have faced from Syrian forces and the US-led International Coalition.
The repercussions of the incident were not limited to the military dimension. It also raised questions in Syrian and international political circles after personnel from Syria’s Interior Ministry appeared alongside International Coalition forces, rather than personnel from the Syrian Defense Ministry, something viewed as unusual given the military nature of missions linked to confronting “armed organizations.”
A report published by the Middle East Institute for Strategic Studies in Washington on 27 October spoke of multiple operational agreements between the Syrian government and International Coalition forces.
According to the report, citing what it described as a “high-level” source in the General Security Directorate, coordination with the coalition command included several operational agreements, most notably:
The exchange of intelligence information between the Interior Ministry’s reconnaissance unit and the coalition’s operations rooms. A reduction in air raids, with field operations assigned to the Interior Ministry’s counterterrorism forces.Agreement details known only to both sides
The latest incident revived debate over the distribution of roles between Syria’s security and military institutions, and raised questions about the nature of coordination between the Syrian government and the International Coalition, especially in areas such as Palmyra, where the security situation requires specific military expertise to address any threat.
Nawar Shaban, a researcher at the Arab Center for Contemporary Syrian Studies, said that speculating about why the Defense Ministry is not handling cooperation with the International Coalition is easy, but not accurate, noting that the details of any agreement with the coalition are known only to official entities.
He stressed that no unofficial party, whether on the American or Syrian side, has information about the details or mechanisms of cooperation between the coalition and the Syrian government.
Technically, the Defense Ministry would be expected to handle this type of cooperation, but each case and each operational environment has its own specifics.
Shaban pointed out that the security forces’ presence in certain areas, such as the Palmyra region, may be greater, which could explain why coordination takes place with them.
He added that the Interior and Defense ministries are sovereign ministries under Damascus, and he sees no problem with cooperation through either of them, asking whether cooperation must be limited to the Defense Ministry only, given the possibility of special agreements or conditions between the two sides.
The Syrian government announced that it had joined the International Coalition against the Islamic State group in parallel with the visit of Syria’s transitional president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, to Washington on 10 November.
On 30 November, US Central Command (CENTCOM) announced that its forces, operating within the International Coalition and in cooperation with Syria’s Interior Ministry, carried out a joint operation between 24 and 27 November that destroyed more than 15 sites containing Islamic State weapons depots in southern Syria.
According to CENTCOM, personnel from the Combined Joint Task Force, Operation Inherent Resolve (CJTF-OIR), alongside forces from Syria’s Interior Ministry, monitored and identified storage sites spread across the Rural Damascus countryside, before targeting them through a series of airstrikes and field detonations carried out by engineering teams.
Obstacles to joining
The Middle East Institute report said Damascus is aware of internal obstacles that pose major challenges to joining the coalition, including that the Defense Ministry is still in an early stage of institutional development. It also said the army’s recruitment process still suffers from limited capacity to properly vet the backgrounds of recruits, and from a broader weakness in military capabilities.
These structural challenges make it difficult for the coalition to fully trust the Defense Ministry’s ability to carry out joint operations. This reality is reflected on the ground, as coordination currently takes place primarily between the coalition and the Interior Ministry, not the Defense Ministry.
Shaban said statements issued by American entities confirm coordination between the Interior Ministry and the coalition.
He explained that the Defense Ministry includes various factions that fought the Islamic State group and can confront it, while the Interior Ministry, technically, was a larger part of the body that handled the group’s file in Idlib, due to its security and intelligence capabilities.
In his view, the issue is not about preferring one ministry over another, but may be linked to a specific case, whether in terms of information or geography.
Shaban stressed that the decision to cooperate with the International Coalition should belong to Damascus, not the coalition, emphasizing that Damascus decides whether the Interior Ministry or the Defense Ministry handles this file. He added that this does not diminish the standing of either, as both are sovereign institutions.
We warned the coalition
In an official comment on the incident, Interior Ministry spokesperson Nour al-Din al-Baba told Syria’s state-run al-Ikhbariya that the Internal Security Command had issued prior warnings to partner forces in the desert region about the possibility of security breaches or expected Islamic State attacks.
He added that International Coalition forces did not take these warnings into account.
Al-Baba said a person suspected of belonging to the Islamic State opened fire at the door of one of the headquarters in the Palmyra desert.
This coincided with a tour that brought together the International Coalition’s leadership in Syria and the Internal Security leadership in the desert region.
Al-Baba said the competent authorities are working to verify the attacker’s organizational affiliation.
The verification will focus on whether he is directly linked to the Islamic State group or only holds its ideology.
The attacker has no leadership link within Internal Security and was not part of the leadership’s escort, al-Baba added.
For his part, US President Donald Trump said the attack was carried out by the Islamic State group against the United States and Syria in a highly dangerous area, stressing that the response will be very firm.
In a post on Truth Social, Trump mourned three Americans, two soldiers and a civilian interpreter, adding that Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa is “very angry and extremely upset” about the attack.
Why the Syrian Interior Ministry, not the Defense Ministry, accompanies coalition troops in Syria Enab Baladi.
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