by Landau, Edan -
On June 17th 2020, the U.S. Government started implementing several aspects of the Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act of 2019. The purpose of this Act is to make Syrian President Assad’s regime accountable for its atrocities during the ongoing Syrian Civil War, while at the same time sending a clear message to all those interested in doing business with the regime to refrain from doing so. While this law is important and well-deserved, ultimately it is limited in impact in terms of effective curtailing of financial dealings by Iran and Hezbollah with Syria, and moreover it may even unintentionally benefit these terrorist entities in the process.
The Caesar Act targets any attempt of the Assad regime to rebuild Syria and its military infrastructure by imposing financial sanctions on those cooperating with the regime, as well as limits the entry of designated individuals involved in such efforts into the U.S. As of today, it would seem that only two main actors are actively seeking to assist the Assad regime: Russia and Iran.