As northern Syria entered a new phase, the transfer of thousands of Islamic State detainees to Iraqi custody was seen as more than a logistical operation. Analysts said the move reflected shifting regional dynamics and exposed either a lack of confidence in Damascus’s emerging leadership or an effort to bolster its role in restoring security and unity.
As Syria’s new government, led by Ahmad al-Sharaa, seeks to present itself as a force capable of asserting sovereignty and maintaining security, Washington and Baghdad concluded that leaving this “ticking ISIS time bomb” in fragile prisons inside Syria amounted to a gamble whose consequences were unacceptable.
Ambassador James Jeffrey, the former U.S. special envoy for Syria, explained to Alhurra the background to what unfolded in northeastern Syria. He said a major shift had occurred, signaling the end of what he called the era of “isolated enclaves.” U.S. support for Kurdish-controlled areas, he noted, had been tied to the absence of a viable alternative to the Assad regime. With the emergence of al-Sharaa’s government—one he described as a “realistic and prudent alternative”—there was no longer justification for the continued existence of the Syrian Democratic Forces under American protection.
Jeffrey pointed out that the collapse of Kurdish authority in Arab-majority areas such as Raqqa and Deir el-Zour was a natural outcome of tribal rejection of the imposition of what he termed “Öcalan’s ideology,” a reference to Abdullah Öcalan, the imprisoned leader of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, a leftist group designated by the United States as a terrorist organization. That rejection, he said, pushed local communities to rally behind an Arab-led government deemed regionally acceptable as soon as it emerged. From this perspective, the detainee issue is merely one chapter in the broader effort to reconstitute a unified Syria.
But why was the file handed to Iraq rather than transferred to al-Sharaa’s government?
At the height of the transfer operations, a phone call between U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani clarified the political dimensions of the move. The conversation went beyond logistical coordination, amounting to an acknowledgment of Iraq’s increasingly central role as a “legal and security custodian” of the detainee file.
Al-Sudani, for his part, was explicit in stressing that hosting the detainees—despite the risks they pose—was fundamentally a preemptive step to protect Iraq’s national security first and foremost. Iraqi thinking, he said, is rooted in the reality that leaving thousands of militants in flimsy prisons inside Syria constitutes an existential threat to Iraq that far exceeds the danger they pose to Syria itself. Baghdad fears those facilities could become “wide-open gateways” for cross-border infiltration at any moment.
Rubio, who praised al-Sudani’s initiative, emphasized that the success of this security partnership depends on Iraq’s ability to keep the file insulated from regional rivalries and Iranian influence. In this context, Iraq is transitioning from a country still healing from the trauma of ISIS terrorism into a state leading “diplomatic efforts” to ensure the return of foreign fighters to their home countries and hold them accountable. Baghdad is using the detainees to bolster its international standing and secure continued global support for its stability.
This Iraqi stance, backed by Washington, may in essence reflect a lack of confidence in al-Sharaa’s government, according to analysts who spoke to Alhurra. While Damascus seeks to portray itself as a reliable partner capable of maintaining control on the ground, Baghdad and Washington view keeping the prisoners under the custody of Syria’s new authorities as an uncalculated risk. Both fear the government may be unable to effectively secure them—or worse, may deliberately turn a blind eye to their escape into Iraqi territory, using them as future political leverage, as the Assad regime was accused of doing in the past.
Despite assurances from the U.S. administration—voiced by the U.S. envoy to Syria, Ambassador Tom Barrack—that the role of the SDF has ended and that al-Sharaa’s government is capable of managing northeastern Syria through official Syrian security institutions, the decision to transfer the detainees reflects American distrust of the new leadership, according to Wladimir van Wilgenburg, a Kurdish affairs analyst.
Van Wilgenburg told Alhurra that the United States is effectively removing its “most dangerous assets” from a house it no longer trusts. While the new authorities in Damascus claim the transfers occurred only because the SDF abandoned their positions, van Wilgenburg argues the issue runs much deeper. He believes Washington is seeking to “deport foreign nationals” to their home countries, while senior Iraqi and Syrian ISIS members will be kept “in prisons inside Iraq” to ensure they do not simply disappear into Syria’s interior.
These doubts are echoed by Rami Abdulrahman, director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, who warns of a more insidious threat: the infiltration of Syria’s new state institutions themselves. Abdulrahman says the U.S. administration has no confidence in the new leadership, arguing that “if it trusted al-Sharaa, it would not have transferred ISIS detainees to Iraq.”
The real fear, he adds, is that if these fighters remain on Syrian soil, they will be “gradually integrated into Syrian security agencies” instead of being held accountable. Abdulrahman goes further, alleging that the individual who attacked U.S. forces last December—killing two soldiers and a translator—was in fact a member of Syria’s General Security apparatus. U.S. Central Command responded to that incident with airstrikes targeting ISIS positions in Syria.
Jeffrey, however, does not view the detainee transfer as a sign of distrust toward al-Sharaa’s government. Rather, he describes it as a “precautionary measure” necessitated by shifts in the security landscape. Any change in power, he said, typically creates vulnerabilities that ISIS operatives—whom he described as “smart, committed, and brutal”—are adept at exploiting.
Jeffrey said the priority lies in removing Iraqi detainees and third-country nationals, while the families of fighters held in camps such as al-Hol will remain under Syrian authority.
As for security challenges during the transfers, Jeffrey did not hide his concern over potential “external attacks,” citing lessons from the 2004 Baghdad airport assault, when ISIS exploited gaps between military units. Even so, he argued that Iraq now possesses a vast prison system and long experience in counterinsurgency, qualifying it to serve as the international community’s “legal custodian”—a role that grants Baghdad greater political and diplomatic leverage over countries that refuse to repatriate their citizens.
Iraq appears ready and prepared to absorb the detainee transfers, and van Wilgenburg believes the influx of militant prisoners will not destabilize the country. On the contrary, he argues that Iraq is moving toward a more central role in the Middle East. Its long experience in counterterrorism and handling extremist detainees, he said, means its judicial and prison systems can absorb the pressure. In return, Baghdad gains “greater weight and influence through these foreign fighters” over their home countries.
Yet, according to Jeffrey, behind these military arrangements the “ticking time bomb” remains in camps such as al-Hol. Experts who spoke to Alhurra warn that portraying these families as mere civilians is misleading, arguing they carry “ISIS ideology” that will be reinjected into Syrian society.
As the pace of change in Syria accelerates, signs are emerging of a broader American strategic shift. Washington is seriously considering a full military withdrawal from Syria, The Wall Street Journal reported. That direction places the ISIS detainee file within the context of “winding down past commitments.” While U.S. forces once provided the on-the-ground guarantee for those prisons, transferring the detainees to Iraq appears to be the final step in shedding a heavy security burden ahead of any potential full withdrawal.
The article is a translation of the original Arabic.
Rami Al Amine
A Lebanese writer and journalist living in the United States. He holds a master’s degree in Islamic-Christian Relations from the Faculty of Religious Sciences at Saint Joseph University in Beirut. He is the author of the poetry collection “I Am a Great Poet” (Dar Al-Nahda Al-Arabiya, 2007); the political pamphlet “Ya Ali, We Are No Longer the People of the South” (Lebanese Plans, 2008); a book on social media titled “The Facebookers” (Dar Al-Jadeed, 2012); and “The Pakistanis: A Statue’s Biography” (Dar Al-Nahda Al-Arabiya, 2024).
