"Go home safely, what happened will never happen again."
– Abu Muhammad al-Julani speaking to the families of those killed in Nowruz celebrations
Surrounded by his private guard, Abu Muhammad al-Julani, leader of Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham, arrived in the Jindires area of Aleppo countryside in northern Syria on Tuesday, March 22, after an attack by gunmen targeted Kurdish civilians celebrating Nowruz, killing 5 people. During this visit, al-Julani wanted to appear as a strong man capable of protecting residents who complain about rival factions, and who buried their relatives under the protection of Tahrir al-Sham fighters after a complaint they addressed to the leader of Tahrir al-Sham to protect them from the perpetrators.
In essence, this visit goes beyond its symbolic nature, revealing the features of a new political scene in which al-Julani, a former al-Qaeda man in Syria, is trying to play a role akin to a "small de facto state" in northern Syria, whose people are made up of people of different sects, ethnicities, religions and orientations and whose territory is effectively subject to temporary protection from the oppression of Assad and his allies, a major shift that should not go unnoticed, not only in the march of al-Julani, but in the nature of the "project" adopted by HTS Same.
"Al-Nusra" first. Then "Open" and "Edit"
Immediately after the outbreak of the Syrian revolution, the armed Islamist organizations were not much interested in this event, because the protests proceeded in a peaceful path at the beginning, as is the case in Egypt and Tunisia, where the revolution raised a number of slogans demanding freedom and democracy. But after the bloody and violent response of the regime of Bashar al-Assad, many Syrian revolutionaries went to raise arms in defense of themselves against the massacres of the regime and its allies, and here the revolution met these organizations from the gate of raising arms, so the Islamist-oriented fighters moved from an undesirable component to a welcome component given its combat experience.
Following this transformation, various factions that took up arms under the slogan of "fighting Assad" emerged, and Jabhat al-Nusra emerged in 2011 as an offshoot of the Islamic State, which began operating in Iraq under al-Qaeda's command. But by mid-2013, discord broke out and the Front broke away from the Islamic State in Iraq, pledging allegiance to Ayman al-Zawahiri, the leader of al-Qaeda alone, before differences between al-Qaeda and the Islamic State later worsened and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) was established as a completely independent organization from al-Qaeda.
Within three years thereafter, al-Julani announced a complete break from al-Qaeda and changed the name of his organization to Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, which quickly merged with a number of armed factions, such as the Nour al-Din al-Zenki Movement, Liwa al-Haq, Ansar al-Din Front, and Ansar al-Sunna, forming HTS on January 28, 2017.
Al-Julani's photo as broadcast by the Al-Manara Al-Bayda Foundation of the Al-Nusra Front.
HTS founders chose Hashem al-Sheikh (Abu Jaber), the former leader of Ahrar al-Sham, to lead this new formation, but this official leadership hid behind another man no less influential than the "sheikh," Abu Muhammad al-Julani, who has a large military presence, and who assumed full leadership in October 2017. Since his emergence, al-Julani has played a pivotal role in the Syrian conflict, and has managed to forge strong relationships with various local actors, both those who share his ideology and others with whom he shares a "tactical interest." Despite the tendency of many of the factions that formed the commission to scientific and devotional Salafism, this trend was mixed with the "jihadist" character centered on confronting the tyrant represented by Bashar al-Assad, as well as the discourse of "global jihad" that we see in al-Qaeda and the state.
Despite al-Julani's major disagreement with the Islamic State, the man drew some inspiration from the line of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the group's spiritual father, and set out to build his own project distinct from al-Qaeda's goals in Syria, so divorce between them became an inevitable necessity. Al-Julani changed his goals after the announcement of the establishment of Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, and his movements changed to a long-term strategy instead of temporary tactics, and the man penetrated the Syrian security and military scene more than before, and soon began to play a role beyond the military aspect, establishing a parallel apparatus to control civilian administrative matters in areas under the control of Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham.
The dream of the state and the "stigma of extremism"
Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham has worked to develop its own system and has tried, and still tries, to establish a "state" that governs the areas of northern Syria under its security and social control. Al-Julani issued five speeches last July outlining his goals and accompanying a number of his moves, such as his meeting with the cabinet of the Syrian Salvation Government and his opening of a project to pump water from Ain al-Zarqa to the plain of al-Roj.
During these speeches, al-Julani offered new details about his vision, as well as HTS's plans to better develop the areas it controls. One of his most exciting proposals was to connect the territory controlled by HTS to the outside world, thereby linking the HTS regime to the global economy. Al-Julani aims to "build a society that can do its own and protect itself without being blackmailed through aid or international negotiations that often humiliate the Syrian people," he said.
HTS has established itself on the ground as the most powerful faction in northwestern Syria, and has shown a pragmatic treatment of opposing factions, oscillating between negotiated peacefulness and violent repression. (Reuters)
According to what is announced, Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham is working in building its "state" on several axes: the first is agriculture, by developing a strategy that benefits farmers and achieves food security with the possibility of exporting the surplus. The second is industry, by facilitating laws to develop industry in Idlib and develop the appropriate environment for it by providing technical services, electricity and real estate management. The third is the provision of public services, including street cleaning, garbage removal and the provision of electricity, which is constantly marketed. Moreover, a margin of freedom is granted to civilians who criticize social and service conditions in this area, where cameras on a number of occasions have shown Golani talking to people in the street to listen to their complaints. On the military level, the commission dreams of establishing an integrated ministry of defense and establishing a military college supervised by "the best defected officers", while moving away from the model of military factions in the organization, and approaching the model of the "regular army".
The project to establish the "Golani State" includes not only local policies such as cleaning streets, providing electricity and food sufficiency, but also going through major obstacles, most notably getting rid of competitors, led by the Islamic State, and then obtaining international recognition. This march dates back to March 2015, when the armed opposition led by Jabhat al-Nusra took control of Idlib city and then penetrated deep into Syria before the Russian intervention suppressed this incursion. Fighters who refused to surrender and civilians fleeing coalition bombardment by the Islamic State fled to Idlib and its environs, joining the displaced who had previously arrived in the area, until there was a significant bloc representing part of the Syrian people in that area.
HTS has established itself on the ground as the most powerful faction in northwestern Syria, and has shown a pragmatic treatment of opposing factions, oscillating between negotiated peacefulness and violent repression. Initially, HTS did not consider Islamist factions smaller than its opponents, but allied with it to counter attacks by the Assad regime and its allies. But in 2020, after the fighting with Assad stopped, HTS turned its fire at factions it saw as a threat, such as al-Qaeda's Hurras al-Din group, which consists of former leaders within Jabhat al-Nusra who saw al-Julani's men's behavior as "tantamount to infidelity" even if they did not disbelieve him directly, as ISIS fatwas did.
HTS then targeted other groups that refused to control it and began dismantling a number of armed Islamist groups, such as the "Ghuraba" division led by Frenchman Omar Omsen and the "Jund al-Sham" group led by Chechen Murad Margoshvili. Despite the fading brilliance of the organization, the underground networks of the Islamic State posed a real challenge to Al-Julani and his comrades, as the organization benefited from the lack of coordination between the parties that agreed to fight it.
According to some accounts, ISIS fighters, after being besieged in eastern Hama by the Assad regime in October 2017, made an agreement with the latter to allow them to head towards southeastern Idlib, which is under the control of Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham, provided that the group would attack the al-Julani faction before a sweeping attack by regular forces. However, after the battles ended, Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham not only directed at ISIS cells, but also pointed its guns at opposition factions, led by Ahrar al-Sham, before turning in May 2018 to tracking members of the state organization by launching raids on the group's safe houses, preventing it from recruiting, and publishing a series of videos showing the arrest of its fighters. Despite the ongoing confrontation, Tahrir al-Sham failed to eliminate the group's fighters militarily once and for all, and thus worked to formulate a religious discourse against them, monitor mosques, and hold several courses with the aim of "creating systematic social immunity against the ideas of the Islamic State."
Rida al-Gharb. Highly aware
Hello Golani, Waseem, and what a sweet suit. You can change your dress, but you are still a terrorist. Don't forget the $10 million bonus.
Send us your information about Al-Julani to receive a reward of up to $ 10 million, via Telegram, Skanal or WhatsApp: 0012022941037 pic.twitter.com/owFK5hlaja
— Rewards for Justice English (@Rewards4Justice) February 2, 2021
With extreme pragmatism, Tahrir al-Sham understood that playing any political role in tomorrow's Syria required some degree of consent from Western countries, so HTS tried to distance itself from the "global jihadist movement" by presenting itself as a Syrian national movement that cares only about Syrian affairs and wants to establish relations with neighboring countries and international powers. The Commission is counting on a regional understanding of its new role in the region, especially by Turkey. Some sources say Turkish officials have come to believe that HTS's presence in that area could help contain and eliminate "more militant" Islamist militants, including Islamic State fighters.
However, Western countries do not see HTS, at least so far, as a potential ally, as their former association with IS and their loyalty until recently to al-Qaeda are, in their view, evidence that the change that Al-Julani is trying to promote is only tactical, and therefore some decision-makers in the West believe that HTS can return to its old approach, or at least allow militants to remain in areas under its control, so that northern Syria becomes a safe haven It enables ISIS and al-Qaeda members to regroup and carry out attacks on Western interests.
For his part, Al-Julani continues his attempts to deny the stigma of "terrorism and extremism" attached to HTS, as he established the "Ibaa" media agency through a media team that markets the policies and achievements of HTS through the channels of the Telegram application spread in northern Syria and the "liberated" areas, and the faction also used social networking sites to market some summaries about cities and villages near Idlib, as these summaries talk about historical sites in each region, and the most important events it has witnessed throughout history, with details of its role in the Syrian revolution.
Al-Julani and those with him know that his messages to improve the form and spread reassurance will not be enough for the Western powers, as the balance of power and pragmatism alone favor one party at the expense of another. (Reuters)
At the same time, al-Julani is willing to open up to other religions and sects in Syria: Hay'et Tahrir al-Yaqoubia reopened the church in the Jisr al-Shughour area of Idlib province last August, holding its first mass since the revolution in 2011, prompting angry reactions from some of the "hardest" opponents. Hay'at al-Sham responded in a statement in which it said: "The residents of the towns of western Idlib who profess the Christian religion are part of society and have their rights to live in their homes, practice their work and activities since the beginning of the revolution, enjoy security, and have duties, most notably not to side with the regime and help it, and to abide by public policy in the liberated areas."
Through these steps, Al-Julani is trying to send direct messages to the West, perhaps the most prominent of which is what came in the press interview of the leader of Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham with the American journalist "Martin Smith" in April 2021, when Al-Julani came out in a modern suit far from the military uniform in which he appeared in previous interviews. Al-Julani sent direct messages to the international community protesting the designation of his organization as a terrorist organization and strongly denying his desire to fight the United States and Europe. In the same meeting, al-Julani stressed that Tahrir al-Sham fighters did not hesitate to confront ISIS militarily after the latter derailed, while denying any charges of torture in prisons by his men. By al-Julani, Abdul Rahman Attoun, the general legitimacy of Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham, issued a statement to the Swiss newspaper Le Temp denying that the organization is a threat to the West, demanding that aid be allowed to enter the opposition-controlled area, and that it stand with the remaining last forces against Bashar al-Assad.
Al-Julani and those with him know that these messages, although aimed at improving the form and spreading reassurance, will not be enough for the Western powers, and therefore HTS may rely on the fear of Western countries to revive the Islamic State's project in Syria, especially since the organization has proven its ability to survive despite the blows it has received, and monitoring it inside Syrian territory has become difficult and restricted, especially when it comes to areas outside the northeast of Syria.
On the other hand, Europe fears the collapse of the ceasefire agreement sponsored by Russia and Turkey, because it means new waves of migrants, who stand on the walls of the old continent demanding bread, roof and human rights guaranteed by international conventions. For all these reasons and others, Julani and his men wish that they reach a model that enjoys some kind of acceptance and some international recognition, perhaps like the experience of the Taliban, which returned to rule Afghanistan and was forced by the West to deal with it, with varying levels of acceptance, de facto in the end.