Since taking power in December 2024, Syria’s interim government has maintained a façade of inclusivity to project an image of broad national consensus and political legitimacy. Interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa’s largely Islamist government has made sure to include a few individuals from minority communities at the ministerial level. In practice, however, this appearance masks a governing structure that is exclusionary.
[Cabinet] individuals do not represent the interests of the communities they come from, contradicting the Syrian government’s claims of inclusivity and fair representation.
Syria’s current 23-member cabinet includes four ministers from minority communities: a Christian woman, a Druze, a Kurd, and an Alawi. Al-Sharaa insists that his cabinet appointments are based on merit rather than ethnic or religious affiliation. Regardless of their qualifications, these individuals do not represent the interests of the communities they come from, contradicting the Syrian government’s claims of inclusivity and fair representation. For example, the ministry of education, headed by the Kurd Mohammed Turko, recently banned Kurdish language lessons at schools in Afrin—Turko’s hometown—and even classified Kurdish a foreign language. Amjad Badr, the Druze minister of agriculture, did not condemn the massacres carried out by government forces and allied militias against the Druze community in July 2025, including members of his own clan. His silence prompted the clan to disown him. Similarly, members of the Alawi community voiced outrage at Yaarub Bader after he accepted a position in al-Sharaa’s cabinet as minister of transport, just days after government security forces and affiliated armed groups perpetrated massacres against the Alawi community in March 2025.
Tokenism is hardly new to Syria. Under both Hafez and Bashar al-Assad, the regime appointed a small number of individuals from minority groups to senior positions not as a reflection of genuine power-sharing and inclusivity, but rather, to project a false image of pluralism and broaden legitimacy. These individuals rarely held real authority. Instead, their presence served to reinforce the Baathist narrative of national unity.
Other authoritarian and ruling parties across the Middle East have long employed similar practices. Iran’s clerical regime, for example, has often invoked its small Jewish community for propaganda purposes, using it to counter accusations of antisemitism and to challenge Israel’s narrative. Tehran has even ensured that a Jewish representative occupies a seat in the country’s parliament. In reality, however, Iranian authorities continue to subject Jews and other religious and ethnic minorities to systematic discrimination and tight state control. During the Twelve-Day War in June between Iran and Israel, Iranian officials summoned and interrogated dozens of local Jews because of contact with relatives in Israel.
Similarly, the Kurdistan Democratic Party—the dominant force in Iraqi Kurdistan—has used the inclusion of Christian figures to bolster its image of pluralism and political openness, even as real decision-making power remains concentrated in the party’s core leadership and Kurdish officials often seize Christian properties. Yet this projection of inclusivity contrasts with the party’s intolerance toward dissenting voices from Kurdish activists and journalists.
Addressing the concerns and interests of the different communities requires constitutional guarantees, something the current interim constitution fails to provide.
In the Syrian context, tokenism also functions as a tool to advance al-Sharaa’s agenda at the international level. During his recent visit to Washington, al-Sharaa met with Representative Brian Mast, a Republican from Florida who is skeptical about supporting the full removal of the Caesar Act sanctions against Syria. A Syrian-American couple of Kurdish descent facilitated the meeting. Both in the Unted States and back home, supporters of the Syrian government seized this as an opportunity to showcase al-Sharaa’s appeal across ethnic, sectarian and religious lines. However, the couple does not necessarily identify as Kurds, nor have they advocated for Kurdish rights. In fact, the husband, Tarek Naemo, said in a recent interview on Syrian state channel that if his Kurdish background ever conflicted with his Syrian nationality, he would renounce the former. Tarek and his wife, Jasmine, are Damascene Kurds. They epitomize what Kurds in Syria and Iraq call Arabized Kurds: individuals and families who have assimilated into Arab culture. Successive regimes in both countries have leveraged such individuals to weaken and undermine the broader Kurdish national movement.
If al-Sharaa is genuinely committed to political pluralism and inclusivity, he would engage with representatives of Syria’s diverse communities, including the Kurds, Druze, Christians and Alawis, rather than including token figures in his government. More importantly, addressing the concerns and interests of the different communities requires constitutional guarantees, something the current interim constitution fails to provide. Since Syria is still in a transitional phase, there is time to rectify the many mistakes made in recent months—provided there is the political will to do so.
