12/5/25 William Van Wagenen on Life in Post-Assad Syria

·46 min·4 clips

An Israeli general said on army radio that Israel benefits when Sunnis kill the Druze and the Alawites.

1. This Scott Horton Show interview covers William Van Wagenen's Cradle investigation into the kidnapping and enslavement of Alawite women in Syria under the new HTS-led government that replaced Bashar al-Assad in December 2024. 2. Scott Horton hosts the libertarian foreign-policy interview show, with guest William Van Wagenen of the Libertarian Institute, author of the book Creative Chaos on the origins of the Syrian war. 3. Van Wagenen argues that Syria's new government under Ahmed al-Sharaa, still widely known as Jolani, has enabled systematic violence against Alawites, Druze, and Christians while Syria's government and allied media deny it is happening. 4. Van Wagenen explains that Jolani's forces have kidnapped, kept, and sold Alawite women to commanders since January 2025, with the wave intensifying after mass killings of Alawites in March. 5. He cites a July Spectator article by former BBC journalist Paul Wood detailing a case where a kidnapped woman was gang-raped, her death faked, and she was then sold to a commander. 6. Syria's Interior Ministry announced in November that it investigated 42 kidnapping reports and found only one genuine case, dismissing the rest as women who had run off with lovers. 7. Van Wagenen says Jolani's fighters, veterans of Jabhat al-Nusra, HTS, and ISIS, were ideologically shaped by a medieval fatwa from Ibn Taymiyyah declaring Alawites apostates whose property could be seized. 8. He describes a March 7 massacre in which security forces killed at least 1,600 Alawites across more than 50 coastal locations, pulling unarmed men from homes and shooting them, and in one case cutting out a murdered man's heart and calling his father to taunt him. 9. He says the massacre followed an Alawite uprising in the town of Dalia after residents were promised support from Kurdish, Druze, and U.S. coalition contacts that never arrived, giving Jolani's government its pretext. 10. On Christians, Van Wagenen notes a suicide bombing at Damascus's Mar Elias Church that killed 28 worshippers, which the interior minister blamed on ISIS within 15 minutes despite the bomber reportedly belonging to Syria's own internal security forces. 11. Van Wagenen argues Israel played a role in both the Alawite and Druze massacres, noting Netanyahu publicly took credit for installing Jolani and later presented U.S. officials a white paper arguing for keeping Syria weak and fragmented. 12. He cites an Israeli general who said on army radio that Israel benefits when Sunni forces kill Druze and Alawites, while publicly urging quiet about that fact. 13. He describes a July massacre of Druze in Sweda, including a disabled man burned alive in his wheelchair and three young men forced to jump from a balcony and shot as they fell, days after Jolani's foreign minister met Israeli officials in Azerbaijan. 14. Israel then carried out airstrikes against Jolani's forces and positioned itself as the Druze's protector, which Van Wagenen calls a tactic to push both minorities to seek autonomous, Israeli-backed regions. 15. On Turkey, Van Wagenen says Erdogan's MIT intelligence service effectively handles Jolani in Damascus, having sheltered and funded his fighters for years in a Turkish-controlled Idlib province before the takeover. 16. He notes Erdogan has long collaborated with Israel commercially and militarily, including an oil pipeline route from Kurdish Iraq and Azerbaijan through Turkey to Israel, despite Erdogan's public criticism of Netanyahu over Gaza. 17. The format is a long-form, largely uninterrupted interview in which Van Wagenen provides detailed, source-cited analysis while Horton asks pointed follow-up questions. 18. The tone is investigative and unsparing, describing documented atrocities in detail as part of a broader geopolitical argument rather than for shock value. 19. Best for listeners following Syrian and Middle East geopolitics who want detailed, source-based reporting on minority persecution. 20. Not for listeners seeking light content or unfamiliar with the region who want a lower-intensity introduction first.

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