the State Department, officials tell the Back Channel.

William Danvers, former Senate Foreign Relations Committee staff director and a former Clinton and Obama administration national security official, had some medical concerns, but is apparently cleared to ease back into work. His role appears to have shifted however from deputy chief of staff to other assignments, officials said. Danvers declined to comment.

The top US diplomat on Syria Robert Ford plans to step down this summer, several US officials tell the Back Channel.

Ford, who was confirmed as US Ambassador to Syria in 2011 after serving there since 2010 under a recess appointment, saw his job transformed by the unrest that has long since escalated into a full scale civil war. Earlier this month Ford traveled into Syria from Turkey with aUS ambassador to Lebanon, two sources tell the Back Channel.

Hale, a former US Ambassador to Jordan and career foreign service officer, has served as the US special envoy on Middle East peace since the departure in 2011 of George Mitchell, for whom he served as deputy. Hale would succeed Maura Connelly, who has served in Beirut since 2010, and who is expected to spend a year as a fellow at a Washington think tank, sources speaking not for attribution told the Back Channel. We were unable to reach Hale Tuesday.

The Back Channel reported in February that longtime John Kerry foreign policy advisor and former Senate Foreign Relations Committee chief of staff Frank Lowenstein had moved into Hale’s office and was working as a senior Middle East advisor to