By Vittorio Maresca di Serracapriola and Natasha Hall
Analytical Brief: February 2026
Contents
1. The Origins of the Syria Accountability Act
On 12 December 2003, President George W. Bush signed into law the Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Restoration Act (SAA). The legislation sought to pressure the Syrian government to end its military presence in Lebanon, halt support for designated terrorist organizations, cease the development of weapons of mass destruction, and stop activities viewed by US policymakers as destabilizing to US interests in Iraq and the broader Middle East.
These activities included facilitating the transit of foreign fighters into post-invasion Iraq; providing material support to remnants of Saddam Hussein’s Baathist network; transferring weapons to Hezbollah; hosting Palestinian armed groups linked to attacks against Israel; and pursuing chemical, biological, and missile capabilities in violation of international norms.
Congress passed the legislation by overwhelming majorities, voting 89–4 in the Senate and 408–8 in the House, reflecting a rare consensus between Democrats and Republicans. The Act instructed the President to impose new sanctions on Damascus to “hold Syria accountable for the serious international security problems it has caused in the Middle East.”
The Act organized these concerns across four domains.
- Terrorism: Congress accused Syria of providing safe haven to Palestinian rejectionist groups and of sustaining Hezbollah through arms transfers and logistical support, thereby undermining US objectives in the Middle East peace process.
- Lebanon: The Act highlighted Syria’s continued military and intelligence presence in Lebanon, dating back to its 1976 intervention, as incompatible with the 1989 Taif Accords and Lebanese sovereignty.
- Weapons of mass destruction: Lawmakers asserted that Syria possessed one of the most advanced chemical weapons programs in the Arab world, including stockpiles of sarin and research into VX nerve agents. The Act also cited Syria’s ballistic missile inventory and its refusal to adopt the IAEA Additional Protocol, despite its formal adherence to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
- Iraq: Congress accused Damascus of supplying military materiel to Saddam Hussein’s forces ahead of Operation Iraqi Freedom, enabling foreign fighters to cross into Iraq, and retaining approximately USD 200 million in frozen Iraqi assets. US estimates suggested Syria had earned up to USD 3 billion through sanctions-busting trade with Iraq.
The Bush administration initially opposed the legislation, citing concerns over executive prerogative and Syrian cooperation with the US against al-Qaeda. Despite these concerns and then-Syrian Foreign Minister Faruq al-Shara’s overtures that Damascus was willing to meet logical and realistic US demands, Congress moved quickly.
The shift coincided with growing Israeli pressure on Congress and on newly appointed senior US officials aligned with a more confrontational regional posture. In September 2003, David Wurmser, a long-time advocate of a hard-line US–Israeli approach toward Syria, moved into Vice President Dick Cheney’s office with responsibility for Middle East policy, reinforcing a more hawkish posture within the administration.
Congressional rhetoric escalated in parallel with heightened Israeli security concerns and intensified debate on Syria. Lawmakers accused Syria of harboring terrorists and a suspected training site near Damascus, a charge that intensified following Israel’s October 2003 air strike near Damascus after a Palestinian Islamic Jihad suicide bombing in Israel. The strike marked a turning point in congressional debate, allowing supporters of the Act to argue that diplomatic engagement had been exhausted and that sanctions—understood as a coercive instrument rather than negotiated diplomacy— were the necessary next step.
2. What the SAA Entails
The Syria Accountability Act sought to apply sustained economic and political pressure on Damascus to compel former President Bashar al-Assad’s government to alter policies viewed by US lawmakers as destabilizing.
The Act mandated an immediate ban on US exports of items on the US Munitions List and the Commerce Control List of dual-use items.1 It further required the President to select and impose at least two additional sanctions from a statutory list.
While the Act allowed the President to waive certain measures on national security grounds, it tied broader sanctions relief to stringent certification requirements. To lift sanctions fully, the President would need to certify to Congress that Syria had ceased supporting terrorist groups, withdrawn all military and intelligence personnel from Lebanon, halted the development of ballistic missiles and weapons of mass destruction, and complied with relevant UN Security Council resolutions.
In May 2004, President George W. Bush implemented the mandatory arms and dual-use export bans and selected two additional sanctions: a prohibition on most US exports to Syria other than food and medicine, and a ban on Syrian aircraft operating in US airspace. Other sanctions authorized under the Act—such as restrictions on US investment—remained available but were not imposed at that time.
In practice, the Act’s limited impact on bilateral trade reflected the modest volume of US–Syrian commerce. US–Syrian trade was already constrained by Syria’s designation as a State Sponsor of Terrorism. In 2002, US exports to Syria totaled USD 274 million, while imports amounted to USD 170 million. Much of this trade, particularly food exports, fell outside the scope of the sanctions. Industry groups noted that only a small number of US firms, primarily in energy and agriculture, faced meaningful exposure.
The Act also imposed reporting obligations. Beginning in June 2004, the Secretary of State was required to submit annual reports to Congress assessing Syria’s compliance, its links to terrorist organizations, and US efforts against Hezbollah.
3. Removal Process
The Act granted the President broad waiver authority. Under Section 5(b), the President could suspend certain sanctions for renewable six-month periods if doing so served US national security interests, provided that the administration reported its justification to Congress.
At the same time, the legislation established a structured review process. Until Syria met the statutory conditions for sanctions removal, the Secretary of State was required to submit annual reports to Congress assessing Syria’s compliance. The Act also mandated assessments of any connections to the 11 September 2001 attacks, as well as reporting on Syrian-based terrorist groups and US counterterrorism efforts.
On June 30, 2025, President Trump published Executive Order 14312, titled “Providing for the Revocation of Syria Sanctions”. Through the order, he waived the application of subsection (a)(1) with respect to items on the Commerce Control List only. Subsection (a)(1) prohibits the export of any item—including the issuance of export licenses—listed on the US Munitions List or the Commerce Control List of dual-use items under the Export Administration Regulations.
President Trump also waived subsection (a)(2)(A) of the Syria Accountability Act, which prohibits the export of US products to Syria other than food and medicine. Finally, he directed the Secretary of State to submit to the appropriate congressional committees the report required under Section 5(b), explaining the reasons for the waiver determination.
4. Why the SAA Should Be Repealed
The Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Restoration Act (SAA) was designed as a coercive instrument aimed at a centralized Assad-era state characterized by military occupation, proxy warfare, and non-compliance with international norms. Much of that political and security configuration has since changed.
The four certification requirements set out in the Act must be assessed against present conditions, several of which have materially changed due to structural shifts in Syria and the region.
First, Syria completed the withdrawal of its military and intelligence forces from Lebanon in April 2005 and no longer maintains forces on Lebanese territory. Following the UN Security Council’s call for the withdrawal of all foreign forces under UNSC Resolution 1559, Syria carried out a staged pullout, with the last uniformed troops leaving Lebanon on 26 April 2005. The UN verification mission’s report on the full and complete withdrawal of Syrian forces concluded that it found “no Syrian military forces, assets or intelligence apparatus in Lebanese territory” and determined that Syrian troops and military assets had been “fully and completely withdrawn.”
Second, the alignment that characterized Syrian–Hezbollah and Syrian–Palestinian faction relations under the Assad government has materially shifted. Since December 2024, the transitional authorities in Damascus have pledged to sever Hezbollah’s reliance on Syrian territory as a smuggling corridor and have demonstrated clear determination to disrupt Hezbollah’s smuggling networks, ramping up border security and intercepting weapons shipments.
In parallel, reporting indicates that the new leadership has taken steps such as expelling factions of Hamas and the PFLP, arresting senior Palestinian Islamic Jihad figures, and refraining from renewed engagement with Hamas. These measures mark a departure from the Assad-era framework in which Palestinian armed groups maintained offices and operational latitude in Damascus. These developments substanitally alter the factual predicate underlying the Act’s terrorism certification requirement.
Third, Syria has resumed structured engagement with international monitoring bodies on weapons of mass destruction. The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) re-established its mission in Syria in October 2025 following renewed engagement with the transitional authorities. Since then, the continuous OPCW mission presence in Syria has enabled ongoing site visits, sampling, and coordination. According to the OPCW Director-General’s latest report, Syrian authorities have facilitated deployments to suspected chemical weapons-related locations and supported the collection of environmental samples, while monthly reporting obligations have continued. At the same time, the Secretariat has made clear that outstanding declaration issues remain and that verification work is ongoing under UN Security Council Resolution 2118. While the chemical weapons file is not fully resolved, the enforcement framework has shifted from isolation and obstruction toward sustained, monitored verification.
In the nuclear domain, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) report on renewed safeguards engagement notes that in June 2025 the Syrian authorities granted access to relevant sites, facilitated additional environmental sampling, and resumed regular verification activities under the NPT Safeguards Agreement. Meanwhile, following the December 2024 transition, Israeli air strikes reportedly resulted in the destruction of most strategic weapons stockpiles, including Scud and cruise missiles, production facilities, and military aircraft. Although independent verification of the full extent of the damage remains limited, publicly available reporting suggests that Syria’s pre-transition strategic weapons infrastructure has been significantly disrupted. Together, these developments suggest that the military capabilities underpinning the Act’s original coercive rationale have materially changed.
Fourth, the regional framework that shaped the Act’s security rationale has fundamentally changed. The 2003 removal of US sanctions on Iraq marked the end of the sanctions architecture directed at Saddam Hussein’s government, and Syria is no longer positioned as a conduit for destabilizing a sanctioned Iraqi state. Today, the cross-border threat landscape looks markedly different. ISIS is the principal concern. Under President Ahmad al-Sharaa, the Syrian government has joined the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS, becoming its 90th member. Recent statements from Coalition partners, including the US–Saudi statement of the Global Coalition Small Group (February 2026), emphasize continued coordination with Damascus and Baghdad to prevent an ISIS resurgence, underscoring that Syrian territory is now treated as part of a containment and stabilization strategy rather than a permissive rear base.
The SAA has become the primary remaining US sanctions statute associated with Syria, and its persistence—despite repeated waivers—continues to deter investment, constrain financial engagement, and complicate diplomatic and economic re-engagement. Repealing the Act would not reward non-compliance; it would acknowledge that the statute’s core conditions have been met or rendered obsolete by structural change and remove a legal and reputational overhang that no longer advances US policy objectives.
5. What’s Next
Senator Jeanne Shaheen’s bill, S 3172 (119th Congress), proposes a clean repeal of two statutes: the Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Restoration Act of 2003 (Public Law 108–175) and the Syria Human Rights Accountability Act of 2012 (Title VII of Public Law 112–158). It was introduced on 10 November 2025 and referred to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Rather than relying on renewable presidential waivers, Shaheen’s bill would remove the statutory basis for the sanctions entirely, thereby reducing legal ambiguity and over-compliance while preserving targeted tools for accountability.
- The US Munitions List is a catalog of defense-related articles, services, and technologies—such as weapons, ammunition, and military hardware—controlled under the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR). The Commerce Control List covers commercial commodities, software, and technology subject to export controls under the Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS), including certain dual-use items.