Rabbi Abraham Cooper: Trust but Verify in Post-Sanctions Syria
In his thought-provoking opinion piece for The Media Line, Rabbi Abraham Cooper takes readers inside an extraordinary and cautiously optimistic moment in Middle East diplomacy: the lifting of US sanctions on Syria and a face-to-face encounter with Syria’s new president, Ahmed al-Sharaa—a former jihadist who now claims to be leading his country toward unity and peace.
Cooper, joined by fellow activist Rev. Johnnie Moore, first met Syria’s Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani in New York. When they traveled to Damascus weeks later, they encountered a capital desperately in need of investment—and a president eager to convince the world he’s not the same man he was two decades ago. Al-Sharaa spoke passionately about building a single national army, protecting religious minorities, and even reducing tensions with Israel, though he avoided explicitly backing Syria’s entry into the Abraham Accords.
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Yet questions remain. Cooper doesn’t sugarcoat the risks. The government can’t control its own territory, Druze communities remain isolated, and Syrian Christians worry about creeping Islamization in their schools. There’s real concern that promises could vanish, as they did in Afghanistan when the Taliban reversed course after sanctions were lifted.
Now, with President Donald Trump’s executive order officially ending the sanctions, all eyes are on what comes next. Israel faces a strategic choice, and so does Washington. Will this be a Camp David moment—or a misstep waiting to happen?
Rabbi Cooper’s firsthand observations raise the stakes and humanize the dilemma. Read the full article for an inside look at what al-Sharaa is saying, what Syrians are hoping, and why Cooper says this is a moment to “trust but verify.”
