Daily Times

Jabhat-Al-Nusra Front, once al-Qaeda’s official branch in Syria, has cut ties with the parent organisation with the approval of al-Qaeda central leadership. Al-Nusra Front is one of the largest and most effective rebel groups in Syria. It controls territory in the north, west and south of the country, and commands approximately 6,000-7,000 battle-hardened fighters. Originally founded by Salafist militants back in January 2012, al-Nusra emerged as one of the strongest forces in the Syrian civil war. Now al-Nusra will be known by a new name, Jabhat-Fateh-Al-Sham (Sham Liberation Front).

This significant development did not just take place suddenly. There has been pressure from within ranks of al-Nusra to break away from al-Qaeda for almost a year, because some of the al-Nusra operatives believed that the al-Qaeda “label” is hampering their cause in Syria. This recently led to a comprehensive debate among the group’s leaders, both locally and abroad, who came to the conclusion that it is the right time to break affiliation with al-Qaeda. Without the al-Qaeda tag and with a new name, Jabhat hopes to change its previous reputation for brutality and start afresh, so that it can be embedded more deeply in the Syrian insurgency.

Despite after announcing divorce with the al-Qaeda, Abu Mohammad Al Julani, commander of al-Nusra, who showed his face for the first time in public, did not break his loyalty pledge to it. There were clear signals he was not abandoning global jihad ideology of al-Qaeda. Julani, dressed as the late al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden once did, in army fatigues and a white turban, vowed to “protect jihad in Syria.” We should not be confused by this maneuver of al-Nusra as it remains as potentially dangerous and as radical as ever. In severing its ties to the parent outfit the organisation is more clearly than ever demonstrating its long-term approach towards Syria, in which it seeks to embed within revolutionary dynamics and encourage Islamist unity to overshadow its enemies.

In this sense, al-Nusra Front (and now Jabhat Fateh al-Sham) tries to differiniate itself from its staunch enemy, the Islamic State, which always acts alone and in outright competition with other rebel factions. Instead of unification the Islamic State always promotes division. This move of al-Nusra Front to project itself as a pure Syrian group is a clear reflection of a new and far more potentially effective method of carrying al-Qaeda’s jihadist agenda, which focused on collective, gradualist, and flexible action.

To explain this strategy in simple words, we can say that al-Qaeda is coordinating its Syrian affiliate’s break-up of ties with its central leadership for the sake of preserving the long-term relevance of the al-Nusra Front and its militant strategic objectives. The ideological ties between al-Qaeda and Jabhat Fateh al-Sham will always remain strong. This move was very cleverly planned, and now a significant portion of Syria’s mainstream opposition will see this as a positive step, and will move to embrace al-Nusra chief Julani’s call for unity. As a result of that, Jabhat Fateh al-Sham will now seek to intensify its long-standing call for large-scale mergers, united front and military coalitions in key areas of the current battlefield.

The most significant potential consequence of this could be a merger of Jabhat Fateh al-Sham with the other prominent militant group, Ahrar al-Sham. Even last year, the al-Nusra, Ahrar al-Sham and several other factions in northern Syria formed a new alliance called Jaish al-Fatah or the Army of Conquest. But later on al-Nusra broke away from Jaish al-Fatah amid reports of tensions with Ahrar al-Sham over its al-Qaeda connections. This modus-operandi of severing ties with parent organisation and still carrying on with its global militant agenda was previously adopted by other al-Qaeda affiliates like al-Shabaab in Somalia and Ansar al-Sharia in Libya, and the al-Nusra is just an another example of that.

By carefully examining the video speech of Julani we can figure out that the principles of the new organisation Jabhat Fateh-Al-Sham are the same as its predecessor, the al-Nusra Front. The first goal for the renamed organisation is to “work toward establishing the religion of Allah, having His sharia (law) as legislation,” and to “establish justice amongst all people, ”in the words of Julani. It will “strive toward unity with all groups,” “to unify the ranks of the Mujahedeen, and liberate the land of Al-Sham from the rule of the tyrant that is Bashar al-Assad and his allies,” Julani further mentioned in his speech. These were the same goals that al-Qaeda is pursuing since the Syrian civil war broke out.

Jabhat in the short term may argue to establish a unified front in the Syrian conflict against President Assad just to get more funding, arms, and breathing space from the US and Russian airstrikes. But in the longer term Jabhat surely has the vision of establishing a Sunni Islamic Caliphate.

The writer is a columnist for the Middle East and Afghanistan-Pakistan region, and Editor of ViewAround, a geopolitical news agency. He can be reached at manishraiva@gmail.com