The Gulf state consistently maintained a firm position against the former Assad regime.

Qatar is “the only Arab country” that continued standing by Syrians a year after the liberation of Damascus from the Bashar Al-Assad regime in December last year, Syria’s Foreign Minister Asaad Al-Shaibani told Doha News on Sunday.

“Qatar is the only Arab country that continued to stand by Syrians until the very last moments. Certainly, we thank Qatar for its humanitarian and moral stance and it also has a very important and significant role in the issue of reconstruction,” Al-Shaibani said on the sidelines of the Doha Forum.

Assad’s fall last year, during the previous Doha Forum, shifted many discussions toward the region’s rapid developments.

Assad fled Damascus for Moscow following a surprise offensive by Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham, marking a pivotal moment for Syrians living under the oppressive regime for decades.

Qatar has consistently maintained a firm position against the former regime, a stance adopted following the brutal crackdown on peaceful pro-democracy demonstrations that began in 2011.

Qatar had closed its embassy at the time and was the first to establish the diplomatic mission for the opposition in its capital, Doha.

The Gulf state had maintained its position despite a wave of regional normalisation in 2023 that saw the Arab League reinstate Syria’s membership in the bloc.

Hind Kabawat, Syria’s Minister of Social Affairs and Labor, told Doha News at the Doha Forum that Qatar “never gave up” on her country.

“Thanks to Qatar for being with us for the last 14 years, they never gave up on us and we’re very grateful today,” Kabawat said.

The Syrian minister recounted the moment she received the news about Assad’s fall last year, during which she was in Qatar.

“It’s very emotional by the way[…]We were advocating to topple the regime and today we’re here to build a country, to build a state. My feeling is not happy. It’s beyond joy,” Kabawat said.

“Today, we want to start building our country. Syrian women and men from different religions, from different ethnic groups, need to be united and think about the future[…]We can build a country which contains everybody,” she added.

When questioned at the close of the interview about whether the well-known Syrian chant, “one, one, one, the people of Syria are one,” was still being heard on her country’s streets a year later, Kabawat became emotional.

“Forever. One, one, one, the people of Syria are one. Indeed, we are together forever. Nobody can divide us,” she tearfully said as she repeated the chant to the rest of the attendees.

Notable milestones since Assad’s fall

On December 23, 2024, a high-level Qatari delegation led by Minister of State at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Mohammed Al-Khulaifi, met with Syrian President Ahmed Al-Sharaa at the presidential palace in Damascus.

The delegation was the first from Qatar to visit the country in more than a decade.

A Qatari official had told Doha News on the same day that a technical aviation team from Qatar accompanied the delegation to assess the readiness of Damascus Airport to resume operations.

Qatar Airways then became the first flight to land at the airport on January 7 this year after the airport’s operations returned to normal with Doha’s support.

The Gulf state had also dispatched its first direct aid flight to Damascus International Airport on December 30, 2024, which carried vital humanitarian aid.

Qatar’s Amir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani then visited Syria on January 30 in what marked the first such visit by an Arab leader to the country since Assad’s ouster. Al-Sharaa then visited Qatar on April 16 in his first visit since taking office.

March saw Qatar launch a new initiative to alleviate Syria’s severe power shortage by supplying 400 megawatts of electricity daily to the Deir Ali power plant through Jordan under Sheikh Tamim’s directive.

Later in May the Syrian government and a consortium of international companies led by Qatar’s UCC Holding signed a memorandum of understanding to develop major power generation projects valued at approximately $7bn (around QAR 25.4bn).

The consortium also included American and Turkish companies.

In August, Syria signed another MoU with a five-company consortium worth more than $4bn (around QAR 14.5bn) to redevelop and expand Damascus International Airport. Qatar’s UCC Holding led the consortium, which included American and Turkish companies.

June then saw the announcement of Qatar and Saudi Arabia over jointly funding salaries for public sector employees in Syria for three months, a month after they announced their commitment to settle Syria’s outstanding arrears of $15m (around QAR 55m) to the World Bank.

The lifting of U.S. sanctions last month by President Donald Trump further encouraged global engagements with Syria.