Syrian children wait to receive food from Turkish aid agencies, Bab al-Salam, Syria, December 2012
Ahmed Jadallah / Reuters

Last December, U.S. President Donald Trump adopted extraordinarily tough and wide-ranging new sanctions against the Syrian government and its supporters. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and other senior officials have been subject to U.S. sanctions since 2011, but the new measures, which took effect in mid-June, are sweeping: they apply to anyone, Syrian or non-Syrian, who aids or does business with the Assad regime or with any entities it controls.

The policy has earned praise in some quarters—compared to many Trump-era Middle East actions, it is at least coherent. But it fails to advance any core American interests. Moreover,

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