The US is afraid of a new civil war in Syria. Rubio: “It would mean a collapse of the country”

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio warned on Tuesday that Syria could be a few weeks away from a new “large -scale civil war”, but said they hope that the Syrian transitional authorities will manage to avoid this, AFP reports.

“In fact, we believe that, honestly, the transition authority, given the challenges they face, is a few weeks or a few months away from a potential collapse and a large -scale civil war, which means a collapse of the country,” he said in front of the Senate Commission.

His statements occur after a series of bloody attacks against Alauite and Druza minorities in Syria, where Islamist fighters have removed President Bashar al-Assad from power following a lightning offensive in December.

US President Donald Trump surprised everyone last week announcing from Riad that he was raising American sanctions against Syria and has met with Syrian interim president Ahmad Al-Sharaa.

The Syrian leader, described by Donald Trump as “an attractive young man”, was until recently on the list of people sought by the US. “Their history was not checked by the FBI,” Rubio joked.

Bashar al-Assad was removed from power on December 8, 2024, following a lightning offensive of a rebellious group coalition, dominated by the Islamists now in power in Damascus.

But the new government is struggling to impose itself throughout the country, due to the presence of armed groups with various alliances. Syrian Minister of Defense, Murhaf Abu Qasra, granted the armed groups on Saturday to join the country's forces, in the latest attempt to unify them after removing Bashar al-Assad.

The head of American diplomacy met last Thursday with his Syrian counterpart, Asad Al-Shaibani, in the margin of a NATO meeting in Turkey. “If we involve them, it may work, it may not work. If we do not involve them, failure is guaranteed,” Rubio said, emphasizing that the transitional authorities “face a deep internal distrust in this country, because Assad deliberately raised these groups against each other.”

He stressed that the main reason for raising American sanctions was to allow other countries to provide help. “The countries in the region want to help, they want to start helping them, but they can't do this because they are afraid of our sanctions,” Rubio said.