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LONDON: Two members of Congress visited the Syrian Arab Republic as part of efforts to permanently repeal US sanctions placed on the country during its civil war.

Democratic Sen. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire and Rep. Joe Wilson, a Republican from South Carolina, met with Syria’s transitional president, Ahmed Al-Sharaa, in Damascus on Monday along with other top officials.

They said ending the sanctions placed on the regime of former leader Bashar Assad is crucial to allow the country to recover from years of conflict, and to attract outside investment.

“A Syria that can stand on its own after ridding itself of the Assad regime will be a cornerstone for regional stability in the Middle East,” Shaheen said in a statement. “America is ready to be a partner to a new Syria that moves in the right direction.”

She added: “There is a long way to go, but it’s very positive and the potential is really amazing. The people that we met with were hopeful about the future.”

Wilson told reporters in the US: “I, over the years, have been working with the Syrian-American community, and they’ve always had a dream that one day Damascus would be free, and I believe it has come.”

In May, US President Donald Trump announced a temporary suspension of sanctions placed on Syria for 180 days.

They applied to a raft of measures under the Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act, which came into force in 2019 affecting the country’s energy, financial and construction industries.

While Trump can extend the pauses on sanctions, new legislation is required to curb them permanently, ending uncertainty about Syria’s economic future.

Shaheen and Wilson intend to do so via the upcoming annual National Defense Authorization Act, adding legislation to the bill that relates to foreign and military policy.

The lifting of sanctions on Syria previously met with some resistance in Congress, with Republican Sen. Jim Risch, chair of the Foreign Relations Committee, saying in February: “Too much (US) engagement too soon could create more security dilemmas, but no or too little engagement could give Russia and Iran the ability to wield substantial influence again and also signal the US has no interest, which would be an incorrect assumption.”

However, in April he wrote a letter with Shaheen, the most senior Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee, to Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent saying the federal government should “remove barriers to expanded engagement with the Syrian interim government.”

Trump met Al-Sharaa in May in ��������, calling him a “fighter” and a “tough guy” with a “very strong past.” Al-Sharaa is expected to address the UN General Assembly in New York next month.

DOHA: Gaza mediator Qatar said Tuesday that it was “still waiting” for Israel’s response to a proposal for a truce and hostage release deal in the Palestinian territory after Hamas agreed to the framework more than a week ago.
Qatar and Egypt, along with the United States, have been mediating indirect ceasefire negotiations throughout the Gaza war, but despite sealing two temporary truces, the successive rounds of talks have repeatedly failed to bring a lasting end to the conflict.
The latest proposal put forward by mediators involves an initial 60-day truce and staggered exchanges of hostages for Palestinian prisoners, but Israel has appeared reluctant to budge from its demand that all the hostages being held at Gaza be freed at once.
“We are still waiting for an answer” from Israel, Qatari foreign ministry spokesman Majed Al-Ansari told a regular news conference on Tuesday, adding: “The statements that we are hearing right now do not fill us with confidence.”
Last week, Hamas said it had accepted the new ceasefire proposal following a round of talks in Cairo.
The proposal followed the contours of a deal first proposed by US envoy Steve Witkoff, with Qatar saying it hewed closely to a version previously approved by Israel.
However, as mediators were awaiting Israel’s response to the new proposal last week, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced he had given instructions for new negotiations seeking “the release of all our hostages and the end of the war under conditions acceptable to Israel.”
In the same remarks, Netanyahu doubled down on plans for the Israeli army to launch a new offensive to capture Gaza City.
Ansari on Tuesday said mediators did not “take seriously” any announcements outside the negotiation process itself.
“The responsibility now lies on the Israeli side to respond to an offer that is on the table. Anything else is political posturing by the Israeli side,” he said.
Referring to the Gaza City offensive, he added that Qatar did not see a “positive trajectory coming out of this escalation on the ground.”