Will the real Mr. Jolani stand up?
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By James M. Dorsey
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Ahmed al Shara, aka Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, would like you
to think he is a changed man.
These days, Mr. Al-Jolani, a 41-year-old one-time Al Qaeda
and Islamic State operative with a $10 million US bounty on his head, no longer
spews jihadist fire and brimstone.
Instead, he preaches pluralism, religious tolerance, diversity,
and forgiveness as his Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) rebels take control of
Damascus, the Syrian capital.
With the departure to Moscow of toppled President Bashar
al-Assad, ending the Assad family’s 54-year hold on Syria, many in the country
and the international community ask which one is the real Mr. Al-Jolani.
In a recent interview, Mr. Al-Jolani, the face of the Syrian
rebels, insisted that his
evolution was natural, “A person in their twenties will have a different
personality than someone in their thirties or forties, and certainly someone in
their fifties. This is human nature,” Mr. Al-Jolani said.
The real Mr. Al-Jolani will likely emerge in the way he
approaches the formation of a post-Assad transition government as well as the
rights, security, and safety of minorities, including those like the Shiite
Muslim Alawites from which the Assads hail and who long supported their brutal
rule.
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Moreover, even those who question the sincerity of his
conversion suggest that Mr. Al-Jolani may be the one rebel commander who can
hold Syria together.
“There is no
local military power to stand (up to) or compete with Jolani,” said an
associate of the rebel leader at the time when he still publicly identified
himself as a jihadist. The former associate warned that if M. Al-Jolani fails,
Syria, like Libya, will become a state torn apart by rival armed militias.
Mr. Al-Jolani “hasn’t changed at all, but there’s a
difference between being in battle, at war, killing, and running a country,”
the former associate said.
He suggested Mr. Al-Jolani’s more moderate and conciliatory
posture stemmed from a recognition that the Islamic State’s sectarian bloodlust
was a mistake.
The former associate said Mr. Al-Jolani "now considers
himself a statesman." He suggested that the rebel leader may follow
through on suggestions that he turn the group into a political party by
transferring its military wing to a reconstituted Syrian military.
Interim Prime Minister Mohammed al-Bashir
Meanwhile, Hayat Tahrir moved quickly to safeguard public
buildings in Damascus and manage the presence of heavily armed factions in the
capital. “We will soon ban gatherings of armed people,” said Ammer al-Sheikh, a
Hayat Tahrir security official.
On Tuesday, the rebels appointed
Mohamed al-Bashir as caretaker prime minister for four-months. It was not
immediaely clear what the next step would be.
Mr. Al-Bashir ran the rebel-led Salvation Government in
their northern Idlib stronghold and, since Hayat Tahrir launched its offensive,
has assisted captured cities, including Aleppo, Hama, and Homs, in installing
post-Assad governance structures.
Beyond ensuring domestic security and stability, Mr.
Al-Jolani will need to secure international support for the reconstruction and
rehabilitation of traumatised and war-ravaged Syria.
To do so, Mr. Al-Jolani and Hayat Tahrir will have to
convince `Syrian minorities, segments of Syria’s majority Sunni Muslims, and
the international community that they have genuinely changed colours and are
not wolves in sheep’s clothes.
A questionable human rights record that has persisted long
after they disavowed jihadism compounds Hayat Tahrir and Mr. Al-Jolani's
reputational problems.
The United Nations accused the group as recently as last
August of resorting to extrajudicial
killings, torture, and the recruitment of child soldiers.
“HTS detained men, women, and children as young as seven.
They included civilians detained for criticising HTS and participating in
demonstrations,” the UN Human Rights Council said in a report.
“These acts may amount to war crimes,” the Council said.
Even so, this week, United Nations special envoy for Syria
Geir Pedersen acknowledged that Hayat Tahrir has sought to address concerns in
recent days.
"The realities so far is that the HTS and also the
other armed groups have been sending
good messages to the Syrian people," Mr. Pedersen said.
"They have been sending messages of unity, of
inclusiveness… We have also seen... reassuring things on the ground,” Mr.
Pedersen added.
Geir Pedersen. Credit: Levant24
Mr. Pedersen was referring to rebel assurances given to
minorities, a pledge not to impose restrictions on women’s clothing, amnesty
for conscripted personnel of Mr. Al-Assad’s military, the rebel’s reaching out
to Assad government officials, and efforts to safeguard government
institutions.
US officials echoed Mr. Pedersen despite the US designation
of Hayat Tahrir as a terrorist organisation.
Against the backdrop of his track
record in recent years in administering the northern Idlib region, the last
rebel-held stronghold in Syria when the
civil war’s battlelines were frozen in 2020, Mr. Al-Jolani has sought to project
an image of tolerance., reconciliation, and ability to deliver public goods and
services.
Rebels shift
to solar power
Mr. Al-Jolani turned Idlib, historically the country’s
poorest province, into its
fastest-growing region, despite his autocratic rule and frequent Syrian and
Russian air attacks.
To Mr. Al-Jolani’s credit, there were no major reports of
attacks on Christians, Alawites, and other minorities or of acts of revenge against
representatives of the Assad regime, including the military, and no mass
looting as Hayat Tahrir fighters took over cities and towns, including
Damascus.
That is not
to say that everything unfolded incident-free.
A Damascus resident reported that unidentified armed men had
knocked on the door of an acquaintance and asked about his religion. A neighbor
returned home to find that armed men had broken down a door and looted his
apartment.
Similarly, a nearby government building was looted despite
instructions from rebel leaders against violating public property. The rebels
imposed an overnight curfew in Damascus to maintain law and order.
Earlier, a man in Hamas told prisoners sitting on the ground
with their hands tied behind them in a video on social media, “We will heal the
hearts of the believers by cutting off your
heads, you swine.”
Meanwhile, with Israel bombing Syrian arsenals of strategic
weapons, including
suspected chemical weapons sites, Hayat Tahrir missed an opportunity to
unequivocally garner trust.
Hayat Tahrir
al-Sham statement on chemical weapons.
The Assad regime used chemical weapons on several occasions
on Syrian civilians.
In the wake of Mr. Al-Assad’s fall, the Organisation for the
Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), the United Nations chemical weapons
watchdog, said it had contacted Syrian unidentified authorities “with a view to
emphasising the paramount importance of ensuring the safety and security of all
chemical weapons-related materials and facilities.”
Hayat Tahrir responded, saying, “We clearly state that we
have no intention or desire to use chemical weapons or any weapons of mass
destruction under any circumstances. We will not allow the use of any weapon, whatever
it may be, against civilians or (allow them to) become a tool for revenge or
destruction. We consider the use of such weapons a crime against humanity,” the
group said.
The group would have done itself a favour by offering to
destroy under international supervision what chemical weapons stockpiles fall
into its hands and/or ask OPCW to assist in searching for such weapons.
Dr.
James M. Dorsey is an Adjunct Senior Fellow at Nanyang Technological
University’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, and the author of
the syndicated column and podcast, The
Turbulent World with James M. Dorsey.
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