The Syrian American Council is proud to support the #BlacklistIRGC campaign to designate the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps and its affiliated militias in Syria and throughout the region as foreign terrorist organizations.

Not only is the IRGC repressing its own people, but it is also spreading chaos and terror throughout the region especially in Syria where it has been directly involved in supporting the brutal Assad regime which has killed hundreds of thousands of Syrians. As President Donald Trump told the Riyadh Summit last month, Iran’s support of terrorism throughout the region has “fueled the fires of sectarian conflict and terror.”

The IRGC has deployed at least 5000-8000 fighters to Syria in addition to thousands of Hezbollah fighters and tens of thousands of Iranian-backed extremist militias including Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba, Fatemeyoon, Zainabeyoon, and ‘Asaib ahl al-Haqq. These forces have been involved in acts of terrorism, war crimes, crimes against humanity, the siege of civilian populations, and sectarian cleansing throughout Syria.

In a piece, yesterday in The Tower, SAC Policy, and Advocacy Officer Shlomo Bolts has warned that for the first time since the Islamic Revolution of 1979, Iran is on the verge of acquiring a direct land link to the Mediterranean Sea and southern Lebanon through Syria.In the past week alone, militias backed by the IRGC Quds Forces have moved to attack U.S. forces and allied Syrian opposition forces fighting ISIS near the al-Tanf border crossing between Syria and Iraq. We thank coalition forces for their bold action in repeatedly striking these Iranian-backed forces as they attempt to create a land bridge between Syria and Iraq. Yet the question remains why such militias are not designated as terrorist organizations despite being affiliates of the Quds Forces, and closely linked with Hezbollah.

As Syrian Americans, we endorse the calls of the Syrian Opposition’s Higher Negotiation Committee, the Syrian Opposition Coalition, and the Iranian opposition, for the UN, US, and the EU to designate the IRGC and the militias it supports in Syria as terrorist organizations internationally. We also commend efforts by the U.S. Senate to move bipartisan legislation this week that will impose sanctions on the Iranian regime including terrorism-related sanctions on the IRGC. We urge Congress to go further and pass bipartisan legislation in the House and Senate to designate the entire IRGC and its affiliated militias in Syria as foreign terrorist organizations. 

For further information on Iran's negative role in Syria and options for policymakers please see ‘They Burned Everything': Iran, Hezbollah, and War Crimes in Syria by SAC Government Relations Director Mohammed Ghanem and Policy and Advocacy Officer Shlomo Bolts in The Tower as well as SAC's policy report NO GOING BACK Forced Displacement in the Syrian Conflict.