In a lightning campaign lasting a week, the Ba’athist regime of Bashar al-Assad was routed, al-Assad exiled to Moscow, Russian forces expelled from the country, and a new government installed, bringing the thirteen-year Syrian civil war to a surprising denouement. The fact that the new government is led by Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a group with roots in al-Qaeda and its Syrian spinoff, the al-Nusra Front, gave pause to many.
The al-Nusra Front was led by a Syrian jihadi with the nom de guerre of Abu Mohammad al-Julani; his real name is Ahmed Hussein al-Sharaa. Al-Julani traveled to Iraq in 2003 to fight US troops. He was captured by US forces in 2006. From 2006 until his release by Iraqi authorities in 2011, he was a prisoner of war and seems to have moved from the suicide vest guys to the political class during that imprisonment. When he was released,…
