HTS chief not solely participant in Syria’s fast-changing future
EPA“They arrived right here nervous concerning the Islamists,” is how one supply described the temper of Arab overseas ministers who flew into Doha on Saturday night for pressing talks aimed toward averting a collapse into chaos and bloodshed in Damascus.
Inside hours, the highly effective Islamist group driving the rebels’ rise to energy reported that they had reached the centre of the Syrian capital.
The chief of Hayat Tahrir-al Shams, Abu Mohammad al-Jowlani, triumphantly introduced “the seize of Damascus”. Now he is utilizing his actual title, Ahmed al-Sharaa, somewhat than his nom de guerre as an indication of his sudden rise to a a lot better nationwide function.
He is sure to play a decisive half in defining Syria’s new order after this sudden beautiful finish to a half century of repressive rule by the Assad household. However the chief of an organisation proscribed by the UN in addition to western governments just isn’t the one pivotal participant on Syria’s quick shifting scene.
“The story just isn’t written but,” cautions Marie Forestier, senior Syria advisor for the European Institute of Peace. She, and different knowledgeable observers who occurred to be attending the annual Doha Discussion board, level out that it was one other insurgent group, just lately named because the Southern Operations room, working with individuals dwelling within the metropolis, who surged into the capital. The ranks of this drive are dominated by fighters from the previous Free Syrian Military (FSA), who labored intently with western powers at the beginning of Syria’s 2011 rebellion,
“The sport begins now,” is how Ms Forestier describes the beginning of this momentous new chapter marked by an explosion of celebration within the streets, but additionally vital questions on what emerges subsequent.
Because the Islamist Hayat Tahrir-al Shams (HTS) pushed ahead with astonishing velocity, going through scant resistance, it sparked a rush by insurgent forces in different areas of Syria in addition to a surge of armed native teams eager to play an element in their very own areas.
“Preventing the Assad regime was the glue that saved this de facto coalition collectively”, says Thomas Juneau, Center East professional on the College of Ottawa’s Graduate Faculty of Public and Worldwide Affairs, who can also be in Doha.
“Now that Assad has fled, continued unity among the many teams that toppled him will likely be a problem,” he says.
The teams embrace an umbrella alliance of Turkish militias referred to as the Syrian Nationwide Military who, just like the HTS, dominated a nook of northwest Syria. Within the northeast, the primarily Kurdish Syrian Defence Forces (SDF) teams have additionally gained floor and will likely be decided to carry on to their beneficial properties.
However HTS’s formidable high-profile chief has seized the highlight. His rhetoric and report at the moment are below scrutiny by Syrians, in addition to in neighbouring capitals, and much past. The commander whose militia first emerged as an Al-Qaeda affiliate broke ranks with the jihadist group in 2016 and has been attempting to shine his picture since then. For years, he is despatched conciliatory messages overseas; now he’s reassuring Syria’s many minority communities they don’t have anything to fret about.
Reuters“There’s a cautious welcome to his messages,” maintains Ms Forestier. “However we can’t neglect the previous eight years of his authoritarian rule and his background.” The rule of HTS, each a political and paramilitary organisation, within the conservative province of Idlib was marked by the institution of a working administration known as the Salvation Authorities, which included restricted freedom of faith, however was additionally marked by repressive measures.
In Syria’s second metropolis of Aleppo, the primary city space seized by HTS in its lightning advance, its fighters have been attempting to show they’re match to rule.
The group has additionally been sending reassuring messages to nations like Iraq that the battle wouldn’t spill throughout their borders. Different neighbours, together with Jordan, fear that Islamist successes subsequent door may galvanise disgruntled militant teams inside their borders. Turkey, sure to play a key function, has its personal worries. It regards the SDF as a terrorist group linked to Turkey’s proscribed PKK Kurdish group and won’t hesitate to intervene militarily and politically, as its carried out for years, if its personal pursuits are threatened.
EPARussia’s overseas minister, Sergei Lavrov, had informed the Doha Discussion board on Saturday that it was “inadmissible” {that a} group he known as terrorists, a transparent reference to HTS, may take management in Syria.
By the night, the UN’s Particular Envoy for Syria, Geir Pederson, informed me there was a “new understanding of a brand new actuality.”
Regional overseas ministers, together with President Assad’s former staunch allies Iran and Russia, left wrong-footed by this spectacular flip of occasions, are nonetheless calling for efforts to forge an inclusive political course of. That is echoed by Mr Pedersen.
“This darkish chapter has left deep scars, however at this time we glance ahead with cautious hope to the opening of a brand new one—one in every of peace, reconciliation, dignity, and inclusion for all Syrians”, he mentioned after his conferences right here in Doha, the place halls full of senior diplomats, students, and officers from the world over are buzzing with the newest information from Syria.
Many observers right here appear reluctant to attract fast conclusions about what sort of rule will emerge in a rustic identified for its variety of Christian and Muslim sects.
“I do not need to go down that line of pondering but,” mentioned one Western diplomat requested about any issues concerning a harsh Islamist-dominated order. “We’re simply getting began with HTS, who’ve led a cold coup.”
Juneau agrees. “For now, it’s good to easily respect the really historic collapse of one of the crucial brutal regimes of the previous a long time,” he mentioned.
