A panel discussion focused on The Fight Against Daesh made for a timely first First Wednesday of the year at the Frontline Club. The packed event on 6 January was chaired by David Loyn, foreign correspondent for the BBC for over 30 years. The speakers included Richard Spencer, Middle East editor of The Daily and Sunday Telegraph; Shiraz Maher, research fellow at the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation at King’s College; and Robin Yassin-Kassab, journalist and author of The Road From Damascus and most recently co-author with Leila al-Shami of Burning Country: Syrians in Revolution and War. Completing the panel was Azadeh Moaveni, lecturer in journalism at Kingston University and former Middle East correspondent for TIME magazine, and author of Lipstick Jihad and Honeymoon in Tehran.

Fantastic debate @frontlineclub last night about what’s happening with Isis/Daesh…Always better live than on TV! pic.twitter.com/jBMWx6JbmI

— The CollectiveLondon (@Collective_Lon) January 7, 2016

From the outset, the panel approached discussions on Daesh with a thorough evaluation of the developments in Syria and surrounding region. The discussion took a turn away from the media hype surrounding Daesh towards the geo-political realities and factions at play. From Islamist and moderate groups within Syria to Saudi Arabia, Iran, the Western allies and Turkey, few stones were left unturned.

Yassin-Kassab and Spencer affirmed the widely-accepted notion that Daesh was created by the vacuum left after the destruction of Iraq, and directly enabled by Bashar al-Assad’s timely decision to release prominent jihadis from prison. Yassin-Kassab summarised the effects: “He [Assad] needed to terrify the West and he has been very successful at that. Here we are tonight discussing what to do about the enemy Daesh and not what to do about the man who has killed 95% of the people in Syria over the last 5 years: Bashar al-Assad.”

Jabhat al-Nusra, the Al-Qaeda affiliate operating in Syria, was discussed at some length. The panelists agreed that, unlike Daesh, Jabhat al-Nusra’s more tolerant and classical grassroots approach would remain deeply embedded in Syrian society in the longterm.  It was also agreed that Al-Qaeda more generally has had to reassess its tactical boundaries in order to distance itself from the relentless barbarianism of Daesh.

Maher said: “Al-Qaeda over the last 15 years has been on an incredibly steep learning curve. They have learnt far more about warfare, insurgency and human terrains than we have and that’s why, to put it very bluntly, they are winning.”

Yassin-Kassab used Russia’s ongoing bombardment in Syria – supposedly targeting Daesh – to argue that outside players are worsening the situation. He said: “80% of Russian strikes have fallen on the people that drove IS out of their areas.”

Iran was also scrutinised for its relentless military support of Assad. However, when asked by Loyn if there were circumstances under which Iran would “dump” its long term alley Assad, Moaveni said: “Absolutely, I think Iran would dump Assad in a moment if it comes to that… For them, it’s important to keep some key supply routes open to some political faction that is friendly to Tehran.”

When Spencer disagreed with Moaveni – suggesting instead that Iran was more dependent on Assad than Russia was – Moaveni pointed to the double standards of Western relations with Saudi and Iran. She said:
“It’s only in the last year or two that things are shifting a bit, that you have open discussions in editorial pages about the reliability of Saudi as an ally and if it makes sense to keep Iran permanently at a distance.”

The recent decision by the UK government to bomb Syria decidedly split the panel. Maher supported the notion and warned of the danger of outsourcing the UK’s security program in not acting militarily. He said: “Daesh is a counterterrorism problem as far as we are concerned; Syria is a much bigger problem which we are not going to fix.”

L-r: Azadeh Moaveni, Shiraz Maher, David Loyn, Robin Yassin-Kassab and Richard Spencer

Moaveni, Spencer and Yassin-Kassab expressed their skepticism of how bombing Daesh could be effective in the long term. Spencer said: “Bombing IS without a strategy for the whole Middle East is a disaster… If the Western allies – Britain, France, America – don’t stick together and form common policies then western policy will fall apart.”

Yassin-Kassab criticised the dismissive approach the West maintains towards the Southern Front, the Syrian opposition unaffiliated with Islamic groups. He said: “They [Southern Front] are dependent on aid from a military operations room in Jordan, and the West, the Americans, keep telling the Jordanians and Saudis not to allow them the anti-tank and particularly anti-aircraft weapons that they need now.”

One audience member asked the panel what they predicted for the region in the future. The panelists agreed that Assad would remain in some shape or form, but Moaveni predicted a “vast kingdom emerging” in the Persian Gulf, united under a Sunni leadership. Maher, on the other hand, saw a “federalised system of government” in the Levant. Yassin-Kassab preferred not to speculate, saying: “you can’t tell what direction we are going as we are going into so many directions at once.”

(l-r) Shiraz Maher, Moazzam Begg and Richard Barrett

At the Frontline Club on 14 January, Shiraz Maher, a senior research fellow at the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation and Political Violence (ISCR) at King’s College; Moazzam Begg, a former Guantánamo Bay prisoner turned activist with the UK group Cage; and former MI6 director of global counter-terrorism Richard Barrett, now a senior VP with security consultants The Soufan Group, joined CBS News foreign correspondent and the evening’s chair Clarissa Ward for a discussion on the fate of Syria’s foreign fighters. The panel largely debated how an understanding of returning fighters’ motivations should inform the UK’s response, both in terms of new laws and de-radicalisation programs.

What motivates foreign fighters?
The reasons why more than 500 foreign fighters have travelled from the UK to fight in Syria are as numerous as the numbers who have gone. But there are similar threads running through individual narratives that should inform the government’s response, said Maher.

“Timeline and chronology is very important in the Syrian context,” he said. “This is a conflict that has changed and morphed continuously throughout the years since it’s inception. We’ve seen an evolution of the individuals, of the groups operating on the ground, their motivations and aims.”

The current media narrative driven by Home Secretary Theresa May says that ‘if you go to Syria, you’re automatically deemed to be a terrorist,’ Maher argued.

“I have first-hand experience talking to fighters who said that very thing, that the reasons they came for have now changed; they’re no longer present, and they want to come back,” he said. “They are choosing to opt-out of this conflict because it’s not what they thought it was going to be, because they’ve been disillusioned by what they’ve seen there, because of the infighting that’s taken hold and started about this time last year. Obviously some people might wish to return to Britain who want to carry out attacks. They need to be detected and stopped.”

New UK Counter-Terrorism and Security bill promises crackdown on foreign fighters
If there are legitimate threats among returning foreign fighters, why shouldn’t the government get tough with news laws that strengthen existing antiterrorism legislation?

The law enforcement agencies need very clear legislation under which to operate. “You don’t want too much ambiguity,” said Barrett. “I’ve been through the bill, and someone can be ‘suspected of intending’, so you’ve got a double ambiguity there. And when you have prosecutors asking judges to allow them to have a secret trial because the evidence they want to produce is very sensitive, I think you’re bordering on very, very difficult territory.” He argued, “it’s close to somebody making a decision on what an individual is thinking in order to bring a prosecution, and being able to do so without the public being able to look at it.”

Britain currently has more anti-terrorism legislation than at the height of the threat of the IRA when 3,000 people were killed in Britain, said Begg, “and we’re asking for more legislation?” The proposed legislation is the like of which “we’ve never seen in the UK,” he argued. “It wouldn’t just be the royal prerogative,” Begg said, “which is what has been used on people like me in the past to remove our passports, but the police can do it on a whim. It doesn’t sound like the Britain I have known. It sounds like something out of Eastern Europe during the height of the Cold War.”

Do de-radicalisation programs work?
There are about 20 countries throughout the world running de-radicalisation programs for returning fighters, including the UK. Many adopt very different approaches with varying degrees of success.

“The people who are going to be radicalised are the people who are young, people who are vulnerable, and people who are ideologically or sympathetically attached to what’s happening there,” said Begg, adding that getting people who have travelled to, and fought in, Syria to talk to returnees is a good step.

Disengagement is possible, Barrett added. “I agree with Moazzam that you need very credible people to say ‘look, you can believe that, you can want that, that can be your objective, but you’re not going to get it by fighting with the Islamic State.’” That doesn’t mean they will necessarily be convinced, he pointed out, yet “recidivism rates from rehabilitation programs generally are not particularly high.”

The psychological effects that many returning fighters experience also needs to be taken into account, said Maher. “They’re suffering from combat stress, PTSD, that sort of thing… prosecution is completely the wrong way to go. They need to be dealt with by mental health services, by NHS professionals who are going to help them reintegrate back into a normal life because of the experiences that they’ve had.” The government, he said, “need to be far more pragmatic and with a broad understanding of the issue of returnees.”

Follow the speakers on Twitter at @Moazzam_Begg @ShirazMaher @rmdbarrett