Syria considers joining Mecca defense pact

Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani said on October 31, 2026, at the Manama Dialogue in Bahrain that discussions are underway to evaluate Syria's entry into the Mecca alliance of Saudi Arabia, Türkiye and Pakistan. The pact, signed in early August, treats an attack on one member as an attack on all. Shaibani said Syria forms part of regional security and stands with any framework that protects it; he added that Syrian territory has been subjected to more than 1,000 Israeli attacks in less than two years, killing dozens, and asked how calls for border control and state-only weapons can be justified while sovereignty is violated daily. He called for a return to the lines existing before the Assad regime's fall on December 8, 2024, full implementation of the 1974 Disengagement Agreement, and cited UN Security Council Resolution 497 on the Golan Heights. The UN has described Israel's buffer-zone presence as a violation of that agreement. CONTESTED: No factual dispute found. One source dates the signing to August 7; another says early August. Pakistan's Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry told Reuters new members sharing a collective-deterrence vision are welcome. No formal application or decision has been announced. Saudi Arabia activated the pact in October after Houthi ballistic-missile strikes; Türkiye, Saudi and Pakistani delegations met Iranian officials in Tehran on October 26.