The Syrian civil war, which began in 2011 and has been at a standstill since 2020, has seen major developments in recent times. The government of President Bashar al-Assad, who has ruled the Middle Eastern country since 2000, is now reeling from attacks by the rebel group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS). On Sunday (December 8), its members traveled to the capital, Damascus, to celebrate the fall of the regime led by Assad, who is reported to have fled the country.
HTS leader Abu Mohammad al-Jolani said recently The New York Times In an interview, “Our goal is to liberate Syria from this oppressive regime.” What do you know about Jolani? And his group? Let’s explain.
First, what happened in Syria?
Syrian rebel forces opposed to the Assad regime concluded a three-day offensive on the city of Aleppo on November 29. The movement came as a surprise after the conflict was defused following ceasefire talks in 2020.
The combined forces of the Syrian government and its ally Russia have used jets and bombardment in the area, but have failed to regain control of rebel-held territory. The rebel offensive is also the first time since 2016 that opposition forces have taken control of Aleppo city. To recall, the Syrian civil war began around the “Arab Spring” of 2010, which saw many countries in the Middle East and North Africa revolt against authoritarian governments that had been in power for decades.
Foreign governments such as the United States and Russia also responded to the events based on their respective strategic interests.
And what is Hayat Tahrir al-Sham?
HTS, led by Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, was founded in 2011 as Jabhat al-Nusra, al-Qaeda’s branch in Syria. In 2016, it broke off to form Jabhat Fateh al-Sham (JFS), which stands for the liberation of Sham, or the Levant (a sub-region of the Middle East bordering the Mediterranean including Jordan, Syria, Lebanon). Israel and Palestine).
Bashir Ali Abbas, Research Associate, Council of Strategic and Defense Research, New Delhi; wrote in The Indian Express, “By 2017, after merging with several other groups, JFS became HTS, which had a localized operational focus.”
Who is Abu Mohammad Al Jolani?
Jolani, 42, is seen playing a key role in achieving HTS objectives. According to recent profile Financial Times“Zolani capitalized on the recent outreach he had done to tribes, former adversaries and minority groups, brokering surrenders and ordering the protection of minorities.”
HTS leader Abu Mohammad al-Jolani. (Wikimedia Commons)
He was born in Saudi Arabia and later moved to Damascus. Before coming to Syria, Jolani’s grandfather lived in the Golan Heights, an area between Israel and Syria and part of Syria until the 1967 Arab-Israeli War. Since then, Israel has controlled about 70 percent of the region.
At an early age, Jolani began to think about the geopolitics of the region. Around the second intifada, or Palestinian uprising against the Israeli occupation, in 2000, he said, “I was 17 or 18 at the time, and I started thinking about how I could fulfill my duty, to protect the people oppressed by the occupiers. And the aggressors.”
After the United States sent its troops into Iraq in 2003, Zolani also left Baghdad to join the insurgency and later rose through the ranks. In 2013, the US State Department designated him as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist.
What is Jolani’s opinion on the Syrian conflict?
In a rare interview with American media, Zolani spoke to American news outlet PBS in 2021. He discussed the conflict in Syria at length and said, “The conflict in Syria has increased. There is no more conflict between the same people. This has happened in certain countries – because of their policies driven by different interests – it has, unfortunately, become like a mailbox for them. Russia doesn’t really care about the regime, but it uses the regime as an excuse to reach the shores of the Mediterranean with all its natural gas and warm water… They also try to get back on the international scene, after their defeat. The Soviet Union in the early 90s of the last decade.
Jolani said that Iran, which has also supported the Assad regime, “has great interests in the region, interests that go back a long time in history, old history, the interests of the old Persian kingdom, the Persian Empire that existed in the region… They are now trying to restore their former glory.” are trying… The Mediterranean, of course, is very important, and any country with ambition wants to access it… and at the same time, they use the Shia principle to reach their goals and achieve the interests they have sought throughout history.
He said the solution to the conflict “is to address the causes rather than the symptoms. The cause of this problem, this great disaster, is this regime.” Jolani also said that the Syrian revolution has global significance. “First of all, it is an unjustly treated revolution by a tyrant (referring to Assad), who is a criminal and an oppressor, who kills his own people.” He added, “First of all, this region does not represent a threat to the security of Europe and America. This region is not a stage for implementing external actions. That is to begin with. Another thing is some wrong policies adopted by the international community against the Syrian revolution. For example, Bashar al-Assad still has international recognition, even though he has carried out dozens of chemical attacks against his own people…”
Going forward, according to a report in NYT“There are questions as to whether the style of Mr. al-Jolani’s regime – where some conservative Muslim strictures are imposed on the population – will be widely accepted across Syria. He and his group support a government guided by conservative and sometimes radical Sunni Islamist ideology. However, “he has aligned himself with various rebel factions. have formed coalitions, some of which are supported by Turkey, that hold more moderate views.”