One of the few reliable features of the Middle East for many decades, aside from the enduring intractability of the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, has been the vicious enmity between Syria and Iraq, which reached its apogee when the late Hafez al-Assad and the defenestrated despot Saddam Hussein controlled rival branches of the purportedly Arab nationalist Ba'ath party.

When Damascus and Baghdad restored diplomatic relations yesterday, therefore, it seemed like a modestly positive move. Perhaps Syria was now responding to invitations to become part of the solution in Iraq, the most wilfully optimistic analysis went. As part of the problem, Damascus has funnelled foreign jihadis into the Sunni-led insurgency in west and central Iraq, as well as fighters from Hizbollah, Lebanon's Shia Islamist movement, into Moqtada al-Sadr's Shi'ite militia in east Baghdad and southern Iraq.