An American businessman is trying to build a bridge between Trump and al Sharaa!

Amid continued US caution on the Syrian issue, American businessman Jonathan Bass has emerged as a new player seeking to reconnect the broken relationship between Syria and the Trump administration.

Bass, who heads Argent LNG, a Louisiana-based natural gas company, recently met with Syrian transitional President Ahmad al Sharaa in Damascus.

During a four-hour meeting at the presidential palace, Bass presented a plan to develop Syria’s energy sector through partnerships with Western companies and proposed establishing a Syrian oil company that would later be listed on US stock exchanges.

Ahmad al Sharaa welcomed the proposal, provided it begins by easing Western sanctions imposed on his country.

The Wall Street Journal reported that al Sharaa dispatched the Minister of Energy to accompany Bass to Istanbul, a move that confirms his seriousness.

He also expressed his desire to meet with Trump and present his reconstruction plan, which some have described as a modified version of the “Marshall Plan,” focusing on giving priority to American and Western companies while curbing Chinese and Iranian influence.

Bass, known for his support for Trump’s policies, even his controversial ones, appears to be working to gain the trust of the US administration, especially in light of al Sharaa’s continued designation on the terrorist list despite the cancellation of the $10 million reward previously allocated for his arrest.

For its part, the new Syrian government has begun taking steps to open informal channels with Washington, by pursuing militants and engaging in unannounced negotiations with Israel to reduce tensions.

It has also expressed its willingness to conclude agreements that would allow American companies to operate in the oil and telecommunications sectors.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Washington has put forward a list of demands to explore the possibility of easing sanctions, including pursuing Palestinian armed groups, cooperating on the issue of missing Americans, and allowing the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons to verify the country’s chemical weapons stockpile.

An official source in the Syrian Foreign Ministry confirmed to the newspaper that his country seeks to build a strategic relationship with the United States based on mutual interests, especially in the energy and economic sectors.

These moves are part of a broader effort to rebuild destroyed infrastructure and revive the oil sector, which generated approximately $4.2 billion annually before 2010.

While Trump’s position on Syria remains ambiguous, statements by his special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, revealed that Washington has begun to hint at a shift in its view of al Sharaa, considering him a different person than he was before.

While some US military leaders believe that supporting the new Syrian government could reduce the influence of ISIS and enable a gradual withdrawal of US forces, the success of these efforts remains contingent on Damascus’s ability to convince Washington that it’s no longer a breeding ground for extremist groups.