A persecution watchdog is praising President Donald Trump’s pledge to ease Syrian sanctions while also offering a caveat — a warning about the importance of locking religious liberty protections in place.
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Joel Veldkamp, head of international communications at Christian Solidarity International (CSI), told CBN News Trump’s pledge is welcomed by his organization. He also explained the sweeping impact the longstanding sanctions have had on the Syrian people.
“The impact of the sanctions has been really devastating,” he said. “The U.S. and its allies imposed these sanctions on Syria in 2011 just as the civil war between the dictatorship of [former Syrian leader] Bashar al-Assad and the rebel coalition led by al-Qaeda-linked jihadists was beginning.”
Veldkamp continued, “And, supposedly, the goal of the sanctions was to either punish the Syrian government for its crimes against the Syrian people or pressure them into a diplomatic solution. But the effect was really to devastate the country.”
He recalled living in Syria for a year before the sanctions. Though it wasn’t a wealthy nation at the time, he said it was a “middle-income” nation with a middle class. Now, the situation is tragically more dire.
“Today, over 90% of Syrians live in poverty,” Veldkamp said. “Over half a million Syrian kids are shorter than they should be because malnutrition has gotten so bad.”
Much of this pain, he said, has been driven by the sanctions, which many speculate were instituted to put pressure on Syria to enact regime change, something that finally came to fruition this past December, when al-Assad was forced from power and a new, terror-led regime came to power.
“The civil war in Syria was really a proxy war between the U.S. and Russia,” Veldkamp said. “And, for a long time, it seemed like Russia had won because they supported the Syrian government and the Syrian government really seemed to have won the day.”
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He added, “Of course, the Syrian government collapsed in December. And, as President Trump said in Riyadh … when he made this announcement, the sanctions seemed to have served their function.”
Trump, in his announcement, also discussed normalizing relations with Syria.
“Syria, they’ve had their share of travesty, war, killing in many years,” the president said. “That’s why my administration has already taken the first steps toward restoring normal relations between the United States and Syria for the first time in more than a decade.”
Veldkamp said CSI has been opposed to “broad sanctions” on Syria that target the entire country and, in turn, hurt every citizen. They have wanted to see these sanctions struck, with the persecution watchdog stating that Christians in Syria have long said this would be essential if believers “are going to survive in Syria as a religious group.”
Despite what he sees as positive steps in the right direction surrounding the sanction pledge, Veldkamp also sounded an alarm and warning.
“The problem is this regime change that the sanctions seem to have been a part of bringing about replaced brutal dictatorship in Syria with an Al-Qaeda linked dictatorship,” he said. “The current ruler of Syria, the president of Syria, is the founder of Al-Qaeda in Syria. He used to be called Abu Mohammad al-Jolani. Now, he goes by the name Ahmed al-Sharaa — and the U.S. seems to think that they can work with him.”
This development has sparked fears of religious persecution against Christians and other groups, as a militant, Islamic regime often carries with it death, carnage — and chaos.
Veldkamp said other groups have already fallen prey to some of these elements.
“In the last few months, we’ve seen huge massacres of religious minorities in Syria,” he said. “We’ve seen thousands of Alawite Muslims killed on the Syrian coast by pro-government forces, we’ve seen the attacks now on a different community called the Druze, and a lot of the Christians are wondering if they’re next.”
Trump’s sanction proclamation, according to Veldkamp, must come with an assurance of protections for Christians and other groups.
“Even as these sanctions get taken away, the U.S. needs to be really focusing on this and really thinking what else they can do to make sure that Christianity is not destroyed in Syria,” he said.
Veldkamp called images and videos showing Trump shaking hands with al-Sharaa “mind-blowing,” especially considering the newly minted Syrian leader’s terrorist past. And with Saudi Arabia stepping into the fold and supporting the new regime — a rich nation that curtails religious liberty to only permit Islamic expression — there’s much to consider.
All of this fuels concern that the religious liberty present in Syria right now will be obliterated.
“Right now, Syria is on the way to becoming like Saudi Arabia,” he said. “We’re in danger of losing this diversity. Just the fact that Christians have been in Syria for the past 2,000 years, we might be on the verge of losing that if the Trump administration doesn’t pay attention.”
Ultimately, Veldkamp said it’s essential to lock in “firm guarantees” for religious freedom in Syria, especially as these broader sanctions are potentially lifted. If such pledges aren’t made, Veldkamp warned of what could unfold.
“One possibility is that Syria becomes a place like Iran, for example, where women are not allowed to have their hair uncovered in public,” he said. “Where you can’t buy or sell alcohol, where you can’t have any manifestation of Christian religion in public, and where, under Sharia law, for example, Christians can’t testify against Muslims in court, or Christians have to pay more taxes than Muslims.”
Veldkamp added, “But Christians in Syria today are not going to accept this kind of second-class status where they’re constantly at risk of being attacked if they show their Christian identity. So, if that happens, I think all the Christians of Syria will leave.”
Watch Veldkamp fully explain the issue.
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