The US Treasury Department said Monday it would pause enforcement of Caesar Act sanctions for six months, replacing an earlier waiver issued in May.
The move, framed as a gesture of “sanctions relief,” effectively softens the punitive framework that has strangled Syria’s economy for years under the guise of civilian protection.
According to the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), the suspension halts new Caesar Act sanctions except those involving Russia or Iran — a deliberate exemption preserving Washington’s leverage while projecting selective leniency.
The agency said restrictions will remain on what it labeled “the worst of the worst,” including former president Bashar al-Assad and his circle, even as the State Sponsor of Terrorism designation undergoes review.
“The United States remains committed to supporting a stable, unified, and peaceful Syria,” the Treasury claimed — rhetoric long used to justify coercive policies that deepened Syria’s humanitarian collapse.
The Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act, passed in 2019, was central to Washington’s campaign of economic warfare against Damascus.
It isolated Syria from international finance and investment, prolonging post-war recovery and dissuading reconstruction efforts.
That pressure campaign effectively ended with the fall of Assad last December and the rise of former al-Qaeda commander Ahmed al-Sharaa.
The shift comes as Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani announced that the US has lifted all legal restrictions on the Syrian embassy in Washington — a complete reversal of the 2014 Obama-era closure.
“This decision restores Syria’s ability to freely carry out its diplomatic role in the US,” al-Shaibani said on X, celebrating what he described as a “strategic victory for Syrian sovereignty.”
The announcement coincided with al-Sharaa’s unprecedented visit to Washington, where he met US President Donald Trump, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and Vice President JD Vance — the first such visit by a Syrian head of state since 1946.
The visit capped a stunning reversal of US rhetoric toward Damascus.
Trump hailed al-Sharaa as “a very strong leader,” pledging to “do everything we can to make Syria successful.”
He described the Syrian president as “a tough guy from a tough place,” lauding his ties with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and suggesting Syria could become “a big part of the Middle East that works.”
Despite the conciliatory tone, Washington’s sudden embrace of a figure once hunted by its own forces underscores a deeper strategic calculation.
Al-Sharaa, a former al-Qaeda commander once targeted by a $10 million US bounty, has become a convenient partner for a White House eager to rewrite its failures in Syria and reassert influence in the region.
The Trump administration’s decision to relax sanctions and reopen diplomatic channels marks a historic climbdown — an implicit admission that Washington’s decade-long campaign of isolation, bombardment, and regime change failed to bend Syria to American control.
For Damascus, the easing of sanctions and restoration of diplomatic presence in the US represent more than symbolic victories — they signal the slow unraveling of Washington’s coercive order in the Middle East.