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Gaza conflict reignites violence in Syria

4 June 2024

 

Since fighting began in the Gaza war in October, Syria’s civil war has been pushed even further down the regional agenda, threatening to turn a largely frozen conflict into a forgotten one.

The intensity of the fighting, which entered its 14th year in March, has atrophied into a near stalemate in recent years, with the regime of President Bashar Al Assad controlling around 70% of the country, while a medley of rebel groups, Turkish forces and Kurdish and Arab militias hold a patchwork of territories across the north and east.

However, the battle between Israel and Hamas has threatened to reignite the Syrian war in new ways.

Assad has been doing his best to avoid getting involved in any regional escalation, but that has not always been easy, with the Israeli attack on the Iranian embassy in Damascus on 1 April, in particular, raising the risk of Syria becoming a battleground.

Over the past decade, there have been numerous Israeli attacks in Syria against the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corp’s Al Quds force as well as Tehran-backed militias, but the rate of attacks has increased since the Gaza war broke out.

Expanding violence

In March, the UN’s Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Syria issued a report which said the country has been suffering the worst wave of violence since 2020. “Since October, Syria has seen the largest escalation in fighting in four years,” said commission chairman Paulo Pinheiro at the time. “Syria … desperately needs a ceasefire.”

That analysis has been backed up by the US-based Armed Conflict Location and Event Data (ACLED) project, which recorded 201 incidents linked to Israeli attacks in Syria involving 236 deaths between October 2023 and March 2024, the highest number since it began tracking the civil war in 2017.

Assad has several reasons to want to avoid being drawn further into conflict with Israel, not least that his own forces are stretched and weakened after years of fighting.

Damascus has also not forgotten that Hamas broke ties with Assad during the Arab Spring, with the Palestinian group’s leader, Khaled Mashal, leaving Damascus in early 2012. Relations were only restored a decade later, when a Hamas delegation travelled to the Syrian capital, but they remain strained.

In contrast to the threat of escalation as a result of Gaza, the Syrian civil war itself has been largely stagnant since 2020, when Damascus abandoned its attempt to recapture the Idlib governorate in the northwest. Since then, the frontlines have stayed largely the same, but the country is far from being at peace and there is the constant threat of fresh fighting breaking out.

In October last year, a drone strike on a military graduation ceremony in the government-controlled city of Homs killed 80 people and wounded 240. In response, government forces launched an offensive against groups in the northwestern Idlib province, where Tahrir Al Sham (a militant group that emerged in 2017 out of several others) and the Turkish-backed National Liberation Front have their strongholds.

In April this year, suspected members of the Islamic State group killed 22 pro-government fighters of the Quds Brigade near the town of Sukhna in central Syria. There were similar attacks the following month.

Diplomatic overtures

Regional powers, including some in the Gulf, have urged Syria to resist being drawn into the Gaza conflict. Relations between Damascus and several Gulf capitals have been improving over the past few years, although the momentum behind that process appears to be slowing down.

Assad was in Bahrain in mid-May to attend the Arab Summit – the second such gathering he has been at since Syria was re-admitted to the organisation in 2023 following a diplomatic push by Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

Among the other signs of diplomatic re-engagement, the UAE’s ambassador to Syria, Hassan Ahmed Al Shehi, took up his post in February, and in late May, Saudi Arabia named Faisal Al Mujfel its ambassador to Damascus – its first senior envoy there for 12 years.

The diplomatic outreach by the Gulf countries is motivated in large part by a desire to put pressure on Damascus to restrict the flow of the illegal drug Captagon into their markets, but there has been little sign to date that the Assad regime is willing to end that trade – which, by some measures, is now the largest part of the Syrian economy.

There are problems with other regional powers too, not least Turkey, which maintains control over two areas of northern Syria along their common border, from where it is trying to neutralise the threat of the People’s Defence Units (YPG), the Kurdish group at the core of the Syrian Democratic Forces now in control of some 20-25% of Syrian territory in the northeast of the country. Ankara views the YPG as a terrorist group due to its association with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which is banned in Turkey.

“What Damascus wants of Turkey is a full withdrawal; Turkey leaving and moving all its troops from Syria,” said Dareen Khalifa, senior adviser for dialogue promotion at the International Crisis Group, at the same Chatham House event.

“What Turkey wants of Damascus is preventing a new wave of refugees, crushing the Kurdish-led YPG forces and so on. It wants things from Damascus that Damascus can’t really deliver on. So, I think that deadlock is going to continue.”

That looks to be true of the wider civil war, too, with little sign that the Assad regime or the various rebel groups have the ability to force significant changes on the ground.

Less clear is how the situation in Gaza, and the associated Israeli attacks and provocation against Iranian groups on Syrian soil, could yet affect the ongoing conflict in Syria in less predictable ways.

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Dominic Dudley

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    26 June 2026

     

    The Iranian drone strike on Kuwait International airport on 3 June was a reminder of the severity of the threat that Gulf aviation has faced. The attack caused significant structural damage to Terminal 1 and wounded several individuals. It was the third drone strike on the hub in recent months.

    Kuwait has not been alone. After the conflict erupted on 28 February, Iranian strikes targeted some of the region’s most important aviation infrastructure. Dubai International airport, Zayed International airport in Abu Dhabi and Hamad International airport in Doha have all been hit. The attacks caused unprecedented disruption: between 28 February and 5 March alone, more than 15,000 flights were cancelled across seven major regional airports, affecting over 1.5 million passengers. 

    Although the Gulf’s national carriers have resumed services, many international airlines have yet to return.

    Aviation is crucial for the region. The sector is one of the most important drivers of economic growth across the GCC. In Dubai, it contributed an estimated AED137bn ($37bn), or 27% of GDP, in 2024 and supported 631,000 jobs. Those figures are expected to rise to AED196bn and 816,000 jobs by 2030. In Saudi Arabia, Vision 2030 targets 330 million annual passengers, connectivity to more than 250 destinations and air freight capacity of 4.5 million tonnes a year. The sector’s economic contribution is targeted to reach $74.6bn by 2030, up from $21.3bn.

    Sector deteriorating

    The financial community has been quick to update its assessment of the sector’s prospects. Fitch Ratings revised its global airport sector outlook from ‘neutral’ to ‘deteriorating’ in early June. The agency said the conflict has increased uncertainty over regional airspace availability, airline operations and travel demand, with implications for route stability and traffic quality.

    Fitch’s assessment is a warning sign for the Gulf. The region’s major airports have built their business models on international connectivity, long-haul flying and transfer traffic – precisely the categories Fitch identifies as most exposed to rerouting risk and weaker visibility on demand. Gulf hub operators also face the prospect of further airspace restrictions affecting routes linking Asia, Europe and Africa.

    The knock-on effects extend beyond airline revenues. Transfer passengers are also the highest-spending travellers in duty-free, retail and food and beverage outlets. Fitch noted that some Asia-Pacific airports have already begun benefiting from the redistribution of transit and long-haul traffic away from disrupted Gulf hubs.

    The global body representing airlines, the International Air Transport Association (Iata), was equally downbeat when it released its latest financial outlook on 8 June. The organisation now expects the global airline industry to achieve a combined net profit of $23bn in 2026 – roughly half the $41bn previously projected and about half the $45bn estimated for 2025. The net profit margin is forecast at 2%, compared with the earlier projection of 3.9% and last year’s 4.2%. Net profit per passenger is expected to be $4.50, down from $9.10 in 2025.

    “War-related disruptions in the Middle East and rising fuel costs have shifted the outlook for airlines to the worse,” said Willie Walsh, Iata’s director general. “At the regional level, all are in the black but with sharply reduced financial performance, with the exception of the Middle East. The Gulf carriers face operational uncertainty following a near complete shutdown of airspace at the outbreak of the war. These carriers are doing an amazing job maintaining connectivity, but major financial impacts are unavoidable.”

    Fuel costs are a key part of the problem. Jet fuel prices are expected to average $152 a barrel for the year – an increase of almost 70% on the $90-a-barrel average recorded in 2025. The crack spread, or the premium for jet fuel over Brent crude oil, is expected to average $57 a barrel, an historic high. Total fuel costs for the global airline industry are forecast to rise by nearly 40% from $252bn in 2025 to $350bn in 2026. This is based on an expected average Brent crude oil price of $95 a barrel for the year, up 37% from $69 in 2025. Overall, industry operating expenses are expected to grow by 13% to $1.117tn, outpacing total revenue growth of 9.4% to $1.165tn.

    Fitch also raised concerns about the availability of jet fuel in Europe, noting potential disruption to Middle Eastern supply chains. While the agency expects European fuel reserves to cover the summer months even if the Strait of Hormuz remains effectively closed, it cautioned that winter operations could prove more challenging if the disruption persists. Higher airfares and fuel surcharges could further weigh on near-term demand – a headwind for Gulf airports that have benefited in recent years from the restoration of long-haul leisure travel following the Covid-19 pandemic.

    The insurance market adds another layer of complexity. Aviation policies typically grant insurers the right to cancel cover during active conflict, and the terms on which cover is being extended in a region that has seen airports repeatedly targeted are likely to be materially more expensive than before.

    Jet fuel prices are expected to average $152 a barrel for the year – an increase of almost 70% on the $90-a-barrel average recorded in 2025

    Carrier optimism

    The Gulf’s airlines are more optimistic about the future. Abu Dhabi’s Etihad Airways said in early June that it is operating at 90% of its pre-war available seat kilometres – the key industry capacity metric – and that by 15 June the airline will surpass 100%. Planes are 84% full, and crucially, fares are back at pre-war levels. Officials at the airline say that demand for transit through Abu Dhabi from Paris to Asia is running so strongly that the airline is laying on two of its A380 aircraft a day on that corridor from July. 

    While the expectation in the industry outside the Gulf had been that carriers such as Etihad and Emirates would need to discount heavily to entice passengers back after the ceasefire, Etihad has said that it does not expect prices to come down.

    The airline will not be entirely unscathed. Etihad had been on course to deliver a 10% operating margin in 2026, up from 8% in 2025, but that target will now be missed. The airline was badly hit in March, April and May and will not be fully back on track until August.

    Dubai’s Emirates Group released its 2025-26 annual results in May, which confirmed the airline’s status as the world’s most profitable carrier for the reporting year. The group posted a record profit before tax of AED24.4bn ($6.6bn), up 7% year-on-year, on revenues of AED150.5bn, also a record. 

    Unprecedented situation

    The context is important: the results cover the financial year to 31 March 2026, meaning only the final month of March was affected by the conflict. For the first 11 months, the group was surpassing its targets every month. March then brought what Emirates’ chairman and chief executive Sheikh Ahmed Bin Saeed Al-Maktoum described as an “unprecedented situation”. Emirates was flying just 58% of its capacity by 31 March.

    Despite the disruption, the results illustrate the depth of the financial cushion the group has built. Emirates also announced a 20-week salary bonus for employees – far exceeding the 13-week payout that had been linked to performance targets. For the year ahead, Sheikh Ahmed said Emirates would continue taking aircraft deliveries and pressing ahead with its retrofit programme, without resorting to “knee-jerk cost control measures”. The group has hedged its fuel exposure through to 2028-29. “Our fundamentals are strong,” he said.

    On 8 June, Riyadh Air – the airline backed by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund – announced five new destinations: Cairo, Dubai, Jeddah, Madrid and Manchester, coinciding with the arrival of its first three Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner aircraft. The airline also moved up its inaugural London flight from 1 July to 10 June. 

    The airline will play a key role in delivering Saudi Arabia’s ambition to develop Riyadh into a global aviation hub and to position the kingdom as a major connecting point between East and West. The carrier has set a target of connecting Riyadh to more than 100 destinations worldwide by 2030. Pressing ahead with new routes and aircraft deliveries amid regional turbulence sends a signal that Saudi Arabia’s aviation ambitions are not for deferral.

    Future direction

    Looking ahead, there appears to be diverging fortunes for the sector. Globally, analysts say point-to-point leisure airports are typically better positioned than large hubs reliant on transfer traffic and international corridors, and this may also play out across the Middle East. Airports with a large share of local origin-and-destination demand may prove better insulated compared with the major connecting hubs whose business models depend on stable long-haul routings. 

    For the Gulf’s flagship hub carriers, including Emirates, Etihad and Qatar Airways, state ownership and strong backing mean that the question is less about survival and more about how long it will take to restore the full confidence of international airlines and their passengers. 

    Much remains uncertain. A ceasefire is in place and, as Sheikh Ahmed noted in the Emirates annual report, there are hopes for “a clear resolution to the hostilities soon, and a return to market stability”. But the drone attack on Kuwait shows that the threat from Iran to the region’s aviation infrastructure has not been neutralised. The coming months will be crucial in determining the long-term trajectory of Gulf aviation. 

    Dubai and Riyadh reaffirm airport ambitions

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  • Kuwait prepares to retender fuel depot project

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  • Etihad Rail to begin passenger rail operations from 30 June

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    Abu Dhabi’s Etihad Rail is set to begin passenger rail operations on 30 June 2026, launching an introductory operational phase on the Abu Dhabi-Fujairah route. Tickets are already on sale through the operator’s digital platforms.

    The passenger roll-out marks a major milestone for Etihad Rail, the developer and operator of the UAE’s National Rail Network. Established in 2009, the company was tasked with delivering a roughly 900-kilometre railway linking key cities, ports and industrial hubs from Ghuwaifat to Fujairah on the eastern coast.

    The launch comes less than five years after the UAE announced its ambition to create a national passenger railway under the country’s “Projects of the 50” programme, which aims to support economic diversification and sustainable development.

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    • 30 December 2026: Services extend to Al-Dhafra stations
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    Customers can book tickets up to four weeks before travel. Tickets for new destinations will be released in line with the phased roll-out.

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    • Al-Mirfa Station
    • Al-Sila Station
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    For the initial Abu Dhabi–Fujairah service starting 30 June, Etihad Rail said fares will start from AED55 for Comfort class and AED120 for Premium class. The operator added that future fares and routes will be announced separately.

    The operator will offer two travel classes:

    • Comfort: guaranteed seating, Wi‑Fi, power at every seat and luggage space
    • Premium: wider reclining seats, extra legroom and complimentary refreshments

    Within each class, passengers can choose from three fare types based on flexibility:

    • Saver: lowest fare for fixed plans; available only via the app, booking website and contact centre
    • Value: includes complimentary seat selection and ticket changes
    • Flex: includes seat selection, ticket changes and refunds

    Etihad Rail said introductory fares are designed to encourage early uptake and will be available for a limited period, with pricing expected to transition “towards a more advanced fare structure and, ultimately, a broader fare framework” as the service matures.

    Etihad Rail’s passenger trains will have a maximum speed of 200km/h and, once fully operational, each train will carry up to 400 passengers, with an expected annual ridership of about 10 million.

    The journey times are as follows:

    • Abu Dhabi to Fujairah: 105 minutes
    • Abu Dhabi to Dubai: 57 minutes
    • Dubai to Fujairah: 69 minutes

    Train features include generous legroom, Wi‑Fi, power at every seat, foldable tray tables, overhead storage, space for larger baggage and accessibility provisions. Station features include clear signage, comfortable waiting areas, staff assistance, accessibility features and parking.

    Etihad Rail said the onboard experience is designed around “comfort and time well spent”, enabling passengers to work, relax or switch off in a “calm and spacious environment” with guaranteed seating, Wi‑Fi and charging points.

    Etihad Rail’s network currently supports freight operations across 11 terminals and four major ports, underpinning supply chain efficiency, emissions reduction and national connectivity.

    The company also pointed to the broader economic value of the UAE Railway Programme, stating that it creates opportunities worth AED200bn, while passenger rail is expected to generate around AED91bn in economic and social benefits over the next 50 years, driven by faster, safer and more efficient travel.

    Etihad Rail also differentiated the new passenger service from the UAE’s future high-speed rail plans, saying passenger rail is intended to connect more communities across the country with an affordable and comfortable service, while high-speed rail is being designed for “very fast journeys between central points of our major cities”, describing the two as “different products and services designed for different types of journeys”.

    https://image.digitalinsightresearch.in/uploads/NewsArticle/17448681/main.jpeg
    Yasir Iqbal