The leader of Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, giving a public speech at the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus, Dec. 8, 2024. (Credit: Aref Tammawi/AFP)
The man, like the organization, intends to show a new face. In recent years, Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, leader of Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the Islamist group spearheading the rebel offensive that toppled Bashar al-Assad on Dec. 8, has been keen to smooth out his image as a jihadist fighter and forge a reputation as a statesman.Syria's new ruler now uses his given name, Ahmad al-Shareh, rather than his nom de guerre. The fact remains that he is still on a U.N. terrorist list, placed there in 2013 when he led the al-Nosra Front, a jihadist group that had just broken away from the Islamic State in Iraq to pledge allegiance to al-Qaeda — from which it broke away a few years later.And HTS remains classified as a terrorist organization by the international institution, as it is in many countries, including the United States, the...
The man, like the organization, intends to show a new face. In recent years, Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, leader of Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the Islamist group spearheading the rebel offensive that toppled Bashar al-Assad on Dec. 8, has been keen to smooth out his image as a jihadist fighter and forge a reputation as a statesman.Syria's new ruler now uses his given name, Ahmad al-Shareh, rather than his nom de guerre. The fact remains that he is still on a U.N. terrorist list, placed there in 2013 when he led the al-Nosra Front, a jihadist group that had just broken away from the Islamic State in Iraq to pledge allegiance to al-Qaeda — from which it broke away a few years later.And HTS remains classified as a terrorist organization by the international institution, as it is in many countries, including the United States, the...