Tag: syria

Black Money, Black Flags: How USAID Paved the Way for Syria’s Militant Takeover

As the designated terrorist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) establishes its proto-government in Idlib, notoriously corrupt NGOs are stepping in to fill the gaps in public services, with some even defecting to work alongside the group.

The United States, which spent two decades and $5.4 trillion overthrowing governments hostile to al-Qaeda, now finds itself in a paradoxical position. Modern al-Qaeda has carved out its own quasi-state in Syria, yet remains on the U.S. list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations. To characterize this as a foreign policy misstep would be reductive; the U.S. has actively facilitated HTS’s conquest of parts of Syria while maintaining its official terrorist designation.

For the past five years, HTS, an al-Qaeda offshoot, has sought to rehabilitate its image. Its leader, Abu Mohammad al-Jolani—a former high-ranking member of both ISIS and al-Qaeda—has led a calculated charm offensive, attempting to rebrand the group from one focused on violence and minority persecution to a more palatable local governance entity.

Since establishing HTS and a proto-government called the Syrian Salvation Government, or SSG, the group’s leader, al-Jolani has expended a good deal of energy talking about topics intended to normalize the idea of a-Qaeda’s statehood; things like ‘institutions,’ and ‘structures.’ This, coupled with al-Jolani’s sudden embrace of Syria’s diverse tapestry of minority groups, has made up the main pillars of the terror group’s rebrand. Al-Jolani himself credits the establishment of quasi-state structures for the group’s sudden success in taking over Syria.

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Privatising Syria: US Plans Post-Assad Selloff

Following the abrupt fall of Bashar Assad’s government in Syria, much remains uncertain about the country’s future – including whether it can survive as a unitary state, or will splinter into smaller chunks in the manner of Yugoslavia in the 1990s. For the time being at least though, members of ultra-extremist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) appear highly likely to take key positions in whatever administrative structure sprouts from Bashar Assad’s ouster, after a decade-and-a-half of grinding Western-sponsored regime change efforts.

As Reuters reported December 12th, HTS is already “stamping its authority on Syria’s state with the same lightning speed that it seized the country, deploying police, installing an interim government and meeting foreign envoys.” Meanwhile, its bureaucrats – “who until last week were running an Islamist administration in a remote corner of Syria’s northwest” – have moved en masse “into government headquarters in Damascus.” Mohammed Bashir, head of HTS’ “regional government” in extremist-occupied Idlib, has been appointed the country’s “caretaker prime minister”.

However, despite the chaos and precariousness of post-Assad Syria, one thing seems assured – the country will be broken open to Western economic exploitation, at long last. This is clear from multiple mainstream reports, which state HTS has informed local and international business leaders it will “adopt a free-market model and integrate the country into the global economy, in a major shift from decades of corrupt state control” when in office.

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Syria’s new leader says all weapons to come under ‘state control’

Two weeks after seizing power in a sweeping offensive, Syria’s new leader Ahmed al-Sharaa on Sunday said weapons in the country, including those held by Kurdish-led forces, would come under state control.

Sharaa spoke alongside Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, after earlier meeting with Lebanese Druze leaders and vowing to end “negative interference” in the neighboring country.

Ankara-backed rebels played a key role in supporting Sharaa’s Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which headed a rebel alliance that seized Damascus on Dec. 8, toppling longtime ruler Bashar Assad.

During a press conference with Fidan, Sharaa said Syria’s armed “factions will begin to announce their dissolution and enter” the army.

“We will absolutely not allow there to be weapons in the country outside state control, whether from the revolutionary factions or the factions present in the SDF area,” he added, referring to the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces.

Sharaa traded in the olive-green military shirt he sported just days ago for a suit and tie during his meetings on Sunday at the presidential palace.

He also said “we are working on protecting sects and minorities from any attacks that occur between them” and from “external” actors exploiting the situation “to cause sectarian discord.”

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US Had Foreknowledge Of HTS Offensive To Topple Assad, Prepped Its Proxies To Join

The US had foreknowledge of the offensive led by the al-Qaeda-linked Hayat Tahrir al-Sham that ousted former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and helped another rebel group join the fight, The Telegraph reported this week.

The report said the US notified the Revolutionary Commando Army (RCA), a US-funded militia based out of a US base at Al Tanf in southern Syria, to “be ready” for an attack that could lead to the end of Assad’s rule.

“They did not tell us how it would happen,” Bashar al-Mashadani, an RCA commander, told The Telegraph. “We were just told: ‘Everything is about to change. This is your moment. Either Assad will fall, or you will fall.’ But they did not say when or where, they just told us to be ready.”

In October, the US brought several other Sunni Muslim militias under the command of the RCA, swelling the force from 800 fighters to about 3,000. All of the fighters are armed by the US, and the US pays their salaries of $400 per month. The US also backs the Kurdish-led SDF in eastern Syria, but the RCA is a separate force.

When the HTS-led force began its offensive from Syria’s northwest Idlib province and advanced south toward Damascus, the RCA headed north.

According to The Telegraph, the US-funded group now controls about one-fifth of Syria’s territory. Mashadani spoke to the paper from a former Syrian government air base that was used by Russia outside of the city of Palmyra.

Mashadani said RCA and HTS were cooperating during the offensive and that the US coordinated the communication between the two groups from Al Tanf. The US has celebrated the overthrow of Assad and made clear it’s willing to work with HTS despite the fact that the group is an offshoot of al-Qaeda and designated by the State Department as a foreign terrorist organization.

The Telegraph report makes clear that the US was aware of the planned HTS offensive. RCA members said the US told them about the opportunity to overthrow Assad in early November, about three weeks before the offensive started. Mashadani said the US wanted his group to capture territory to keep it out of the hands of ISIS, which RCA has helped the US fight in the past.

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Biden Regime to Remove $10 Million Bounty on Syrian Terrorist Leader Abu Mohammad al-Jolani Following Assad’s Overthrow

The Biden regime is set to rescind the $10 million bounty on Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, leader of the jihadist terrorist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), following his pivotal role in toppling Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime.

This decision coincided with al-Jolani’s initial direct talks with U.S. diplomats in Damascus.

Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, now referring to himself by his birth name as Ahmed al-Sharaa (Muhammad al-Jawlani), is the leader of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a Syrian militant group that evolved from the al-Qaeda affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra.

Following the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime, Jolani and HTS now control significant parts of Syria, including the capital city, Damascus.

He remains closely associated with the ANF faction and its al-Qaeda ties, raising questions about governance, stability, and the group’s true intentions.

Al-Jolani has been working to persuade the international media and foreign powers that he has transitioned from a terrorist commander to a statesman, but skepticism remains about whether such a transformation is genuine. Even if his intentions are sincere, HTS does not control all of Syria.

Power is shared with groups like the Syrian National Army (SNA), a Turkish-backed coalition of rebel factions operating primarily in northern Syria.

Now, the Biden regime is set to rescind the $10 million bounty placed under the State Department’s Rewards for Justice program on Abu Mohammad al-Jolan.

However, the U.S. State Department, while lifting the bounty, continues to designate HTS as a terrorist organization.

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The US wants credit for Assad’s ouster

Officials in the Biden administration are taking credit for creating conditions in Syria that enabled opposition forces to overthrow the Syrian government.

Now that opposition forces have ousted Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, administration officials are insisting that longstanding U.S. policies, including actions taken by the Biden administration against Assad’s supporters, made the overthrow of the Syrian government possible. Administration officials deny that they aided Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the U.S.-designated terrorist organization that led the drive to overthrow Assad, but they insist that they facilitated the opposition’s victory, citing years of U.S. efforts to empower the opposition and weaken the Syrian government.

U.S. policy “has led to the situation we’re in today,” State Department Spokesperson Matthew Miller said in a December 9 press briefing, the day after Assad fled the country. It “was developed during the latter stages of the Obama administration” and “has largely carried through to this day.”

White House Spokesperson John Kirby agreed, giving credit to the president. “We believe that developments in Syria very much prove the case of President Biden’s assertive foreign policy,” Kirby said in remarks to the press on December 10.

US policy 

For over a decade, the United States has sought regime change in Syria. Officials in Washington have openly called for an end to the rule of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, the repressive and authoritarian leader who first began ruling Syria in 2000, following decades of rule by his father, Hafez al-Assad.

U.S. efforts to oust Assad date back to 2011, when Syria descended into a civil war. As Assad responded to popular uprisings with violent crackdowns, the United States began supporting multiple armed groups, several of which were seeking the overthrow of the Syrian government.

The Obama administration designed the initial U.S. strategy to oust Assad. Hoping to avoid “catastrophic success,” or a situation in which extremists ousted Assad and seized power, the administration decided on a stalemate strategy. The United States provided opposition forces with enough support to keep pressure on Assad but not enough to overthrow him.

The administration’s goal was “a political settlement, a scenario that relies on an eventual stalemate among the warring factions rather than a clear victor,” U.S. officials explained at the time, as reported by The Washington Post.

The Obama administration came close to achieving its objectives in 2015, when opposition forces began moving into areas around Damascus. With Assad under growing pressure, it appeared that he might lose his grip on power and be forced to negotiate or surrender.

As opposition forces gained momentum, however, Assad received a lifeline from Russia, which intervened to save him. By coming to Assad’s assistance with airstrikes and military support, Russia enabled Assad to turn the tide against the rebels and remain in power.

Following Russia’s intervention, the civil war largely settled into stalemate, which left Syria divided into different areas of control. Assad consolidated his control of Damascus and the surrounding areas with support from Russia, Iran, and Hezbollah. Many opposition forces regrouped in northwestern Syria, where they received support from Turkey. Kurdish-led forces, which were separate from the opposition, carved out an autonomous region in northeastern Syria, keeping another part of the country outside of Assad’s control.

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Pentagon Reveals the US Has More Than Twice the Number of Troops in Syria Than Previously Disclosed

The US has 2,000 troops in Syria, far more than the 900 number the Pentagon has been sharing publicly.

On Thursday, the Pentagon revealed the US has roughly 2,000 troops occupying Syria, more than twice the number it has been disclosing.

For years, the US has said it has about 900 troops inside Syria. Pentagon spokesman Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder said the troops levels have been at 2,000 for a “while,” well before the regime change that ousted former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Since the regime change in Syria on December 8, the Pentagon has been asked repeatedly about the number of US troops in the country and kept repeating the 900 number. Ryder claimed he had just learned that it was significantly higher than he had been saying.

“As you know, we have been briefing you regularly that there are approximately 900 US troops deployed to Syria. In light of the situation in Syria and the significant interest, we recently learned that those numbers were higher, and so asked to look into it. I learned today that in fact there are approximately 2,000 US troops in Syria,” he said.

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Proof that Syrian ‘prisoner’ discovered and freed by CNN crew was one of Assad’s ruthless henchmen as ex-intelligence officer is now missing

A shocking image of the Syrian ‘prisoner’ who was discovered locked up Damascus prison by journalists proves that he was actually one of former dictator Bashar al-Assad’s henchmen who ruthlessly killed and tortured inmates. 

The feigned inmate was found by CNN‘s chief international correspondent Clarrisa Ward and her team while they toured an abandoned detention site last Wednesday.

He was found under a blanket trembling and exclaiming ‘Oh God! There is light!’, in a video that went viral. 

But earlier this week Syrian fact-checking organization Verify-Sy reported that the man in the clip was in fact a first first lieutenant in the Syrian Air Force Intelligence, which served former President Assad.

CNN launched an investigation into the man’s identity and confirmed that he was not a ‘civilian father’ named Adel Gharba, but rather Salama Mohammad Salama. 

Citing local sources, CNN said in a statement Monday that Salama ‘was known for running the Air Force Intelligence Directorate’s checkpoints in the city’ and was accused of ‘having a reputation for extortion and harassment’.

Now, an image, that was shared with CNN by locals and Verify-Sy, shows Salama wearing a sly smirk behind a desk that appears to be inside a government office. 

He is dressed in military uniform, further proving his links to the Assad regime. 

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How the West Rebranded Al-Qaeda’s Jolani

Corporate media is heralding the fall of Bashar al-Assad and the emergence of Abu Mohammed al-Jolani as the new leader of Syria, despite his deep ties to both Al-Qaeda and ISIS.

“How Syria’s ‘diversity-friendly’ jihadists plan on building a state,” runs the headline from an article in Britain’s Daily Telegraph that suggests that Jolani will construct a new Syria, respectful of minority rights. The same newspaper also labeled him a “moderate Jihadist.” The Washington Post described him as a pragmatic and charismatic leader, while CNN portrayed him as a “blazer-wearing revolutionary.”

Meanwhile, an in-depth portrait from Rolling Stone describes him as a “ruthlessly pragmatic, astute politician who has renounced ‘global jihad’” and intends to “unite Syria.” His “strategic acumen is apparent,” writes Rolling Stone, between paragraphs praising Jolani for leading a successful movement against a dictator.

CNN even scored an exclusive, sit-down interview with Jolani, even as his movement was storming Damascus. When asked by host Jomana Karadsheh about his past actions, he responded by saying, “I believe that everyone in life goes through phases and experiences … As you grow, you learn, and you continue to learn until the very last day of your life,” as if he were discussing embarrassing teenage mistakes, not establishing and leading the Al-Nusra Front, Al-Qaeda’s franchise in Syria.

This is a far cry from the first time CNN covered Jolani. In 2013, the network labeled him one of “the world’s 10 most dangerous terrorists,” known for abducting, torturing and slaughtering racial and religious minorities.

Still on the U.S. terrorist list today, the F.B.I. is offering a $10 million reward for information about his whereabouts. Washington and other Western governments consider Jolani’s new organization, Hay?at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), as one and the same as Al-Qaeda/Al-Nusra.

This poses a serious public relations dilemma for Western nations, who supported the HTS-led overthrow of President Bashar al-Assad. And thus, Politico and others report there is a “huge scramble” in Washington to remove HTS and Jolani from the terrorist list as quickly as possible.

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Syria: Will the United States Try to Stop Israeli Militarism in the Middle East?

For the past several decades, the United States and Israel have tried to isolate Syria in the Middle East.  Only U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, after the October War in 1973, tried and succeeded in bringing Syria into the step-by-step peace process negotiations with Israel.  Since then, however, U.S. efforts to negotiate a peace such as the Reagan plan in 1982 or the unsuccessful efforts to arrange an Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon have ignored any role for Syria.  Currently, U.S. tolerance of Israeli military power against Syria complicates the task of reducing the violence and allowing the Syrian rebels to have the time and space to establish a stable government in Damascus.

For most of its history, Syrian authority has been marked by instability due to authoritarian leadership and a diverse population.  The fragmented nature of Syrian society; the absence of a strong national identity; and the debilitating conflict with Israel have contributed to weak governance.  Any Syrian government, particularly the current one that tries to take hold after 14 years of confrontation, will face a difficult geopolitical environment that limits policy options; inhibits risk-taking; and compromises central authority.  The various ethnic divisions, even among the majority Sunni Moslems, will make it difficult to achieve political and economic cohesion.

One hundred years ago, the wife of the British consul described inter-communal relations in a way that still fits: “They hate one another.  The Sunnis excommunicate the Shias, and both hate the Druze; all detest the Alawites; the Maronites do not love anybody but themselves are duly abhorred by all; the Greek Orthodox abominate the Greek Catholics and the Latins; and all despise the Jews.”  The Alawites. who have politically dominated the country in recent times, were singled out for persecution in the past by the Sunni majority,  Most of the population in Syria is Moslem, but 20 percent of the Moslems belong to various schismatic sects.

Today, Syria is in predictable chaos, and the presence of numerous foreign powers adds to the conflict.  Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) have made it particularly difficult for the new regime by launching hundreds of air strikes against Syria, and seizing territory beyond the Golan Heights that provided a sightline to Damascus.  Former Israeli Air Force officers commented on social media that these attacks were carried out as part of an operation based on plans that were drawn up years ago.

Turkey has backed various Syrian rebel groups along the Syrian-Turkish border, and plans to continue the fight against Syrian Kurds based in northeastern Syria, where the Kurds have support from nearly 1,000 U.S. military personnel.  Among the foreign powers in Syria, Turkey has the greatest access and influence with the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which led the fight against former president Bahshar al-Assad.

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