Turkey and Qatar are emerging as brokers and kingmakers in Syria, filling the void left by the collapse of Iranian influence in the pivotal country and raising the prospect of a realignment of the Arab Middle East.

While they have their own ambitious interests to pursue, both see an opportunity to use Syria to revive a common regional agenda: support for popular democratic movements and Islamist political parties.

Observers say Ankara’s immediate goal is to weaken Kurdish elements in Syria, and secure a more stable military footprint. Qatar, isolated and boycotted by its Gulf Arab neighbors not long ago, is now a key Syria mediator while also facilitating Israel-Hamas ceasefire talks.

“Qatar is poised to play a crucial role in Syria’s political, diplomatic, and economic future. This involvement … solidifies its reputation as a stabilizing force in the region,” says Ali Bakir at the Atlantic Council.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan “is a winner in the geopolitical sense because until the very end, Turkey continued to sponsor the Syrian opposition. He gambled,” says Batu Coşkun, a Turkey analyst. “Now there is an expectation [that] Turkish influence will increase,” he says, “politically, militarily, and economically.”

The Syrian people’s toppling of the Assad regime is creating a new axis of power in the Middle East.

After years in which Turkey and Qatar backed what had been written off as the losing side in Syria’s civil war, the two nations are now geopolitical winners, filling the void left by the collapse of Iranian influence in the pivotal country.

Their sudden emergence as brokers and kingmakers in Syria raises the prospect of a realignment of the Arab Middle East.

Turkey and Qatar have their own specific and ambitious interests to pursue in Syria, analysts say. At the same time, both see an opportunity to use Syria to revive a common regional agenda: support for popular democratic movements and Islamist political parties.

Since the fall of Bashar al-Assad, Turkey and Qatar have been the most active foreign governments in Syria: Turkish intelligence chief İbrahim Kalın was in Damascus Friday; a Qatari government delegation visited the capital Sunday and reopened its embassy Tuesday.

At a gathering in Doha last week with the foreign ministers of Iran and Russia, the main outside backers of the crumbled Assad regime, the Turkish and Qatari foreign ministers worked behind the scenes to ensure a bloodless transition of power.