Transformation of Syria rebel leader to be put to the test

FPI / December 12, 2024

Geostrategy-Direct

Soon after Abu Mohammed Al-Golani formed the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) militant group, he took to wearing business attire often instead of his usual military garb.

After HTS toppled Syrian dictator Bashar Assad on Dec. 8, Al-Golani referred to himself with his real name, Ahmad al-Sharaa.

The newly-transformed leader now speaks of protecting religious and ethnic minorities after once insisting there was no room in Syria for the country’s Alawite, Shiite, Druze, and Christians.

Al-Golani's transformation is about to be put to the test as, for the first time in 50 years, how Syria will be governed going forward is an open question.

Russia, Iran, Turkey, Israel, and the United States are all in the mix as a new Syria emerges.

Under his adopted name of Abu Mohammed Al-Golani, the Syrian native forged ties with Al Qaida in 2003, joining jihadists battling U.S. troops in Iraq. He was detained by the U.S. military but remained in Iraq. During that time, the terror organization Islamic State of Iraq, led by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, was formed.

In 2011, a popular uprising in Syria against Assad triggered a brutal government crackdown and led to all-out war.

Now a top operative for Baghdadi, Al-Golani was sent to Syria to establish a branch of Al Qaida called the Nusra Front. The United States labeled the new group as a terrorist organization. That designation still remains in place and the U.S. government still has a $10 million bounty on Al-Golani.

But Al-Golani would ultimately defy Baghdadi’s calls to dissolve the Nusra Front and merge it with Al Qaida’s operation in Iraq, to form the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS. He pledged his allegiance to Al Qaida, which later disassociated itself from ISIS.

In his first interview in 2014, Al-Golani told Al Jazeera that he rejected political talks in Geneva to end the civil war and declared that his goal was to see Syria ruled under Islamic law with no room for the country’s Alawite, Shiite, Druze and Christian minorities.

In 2016, Al-Golani revealed his face to the public for the first time in a video message that announced his group was renaming itself Jabhat Fateh al-Sham — the Syria Conquest Front — and cutting its ties to Al Qaida.

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