Istanbul: In recent months, as supplies of aid, money and weapons to Syria's opposition have dwindled, it had clung to the hope that ongoing international political support would prevent an outright victory for Bashar al-Assad and his backers. Not any more.
An announcement earlier this week by Jordan – one of the opposition's most robust supporters – that "bilateral ties with Damascus are going in the right direction" has, for many, marked a death knell for the opposition cause.
Within the ranks of the political opposition, and regional allies, the statement was the opening act of something that all had dreaded: normalisation with a bitter foe. And without anything much to show for it.
Emphasising his words, Jordanian government spokesman Mohammad al-Momani said: "This is a very important message that everyone should hear." And indeed, the about-face in Amman was quickly noted in Ankara, Doha, and Riyadh, where – after seven and a-half years of war – states that were committed to toppling the Syrian leader are now resigned to him staying. Returning from a summit in the Saudi capital last week, opposition leaders say they were told directly by the foreign minister, Adel al-Jubeir, that Riyadh was disengaging. "The Saudis don't care about Syria anymore," said a senior western diplomat. "It's all Qatar for them. Syria is lost." In Britain too, rhetoric that had demanded Assad leave the Presidential Palace, as a first step towards peace, has been replaced by what Whitehall calls "pragmatic realism". The foreign secretary, Boris Johnson, last week couched Assad's departure as "not a precondition. But part of a transition."
Rex Tillerson, the US secretary of state, has openly delegated finding a solution to Syria to Russia.