You're listening to Robert Wright's Non-Zero Podcast.

Hi, Josh.

Hi, Bob.

How you doing?

Very well, indeed.

I'm in Vermont.

This is my little vacation time.

But, of course, I've been

working on Syria every day.

Yeah, sorry to interrupt your vacation. I guess it seems have gotten you in a state of mind

where you stoically endured some tech issues I inflicted on you for the last 15 minutes.

I appreciate your sticking around. Let me introduce

this. I'm Robert Wright, publisher in Nanzar Newsletter. You are Joshua Landis, a professor at the

University of Oklahoma, and director of the Center of Middle East Studies and a fellow at the Quincy

Institute. You are, I would say, one of America's foremost experts on Syria.

And that's what we're going to talk about.

Inevitably, we'll wind up talking about some other countries, including Israel and Iran.

But just to set this up a little, so last time you were on, which was, I don't know, six, seven months ago, in the wake of the fall of the Assad regime, and its displacement by a, you know, I guess you could say rebel coalition, but very clearly led by a guy who's now called Ahmed al-Shara and who is now the president.

You were, I would say, very guardedly optimistic about the prospects of Syria.

First of all, becoming, being a unified, cohesive state that was more or less stable,

an ethnically inclusive state, possibly, notwithstanding

the jihadist past of the current leader, which he claims to have put behind him.

...