President Biden plans to bang on a decision on whether to overturn Hayat Tahrir al-Sham’s (HTS) official terror title for President-elect Donald Trump.
Senior U.S. officials who spoke to The Washington Post on Thursday said HTS “must show that they have cleanly disqualified extremist groups, particularly al-Qaeda, before the label can be lifted.” The unnamed official noted that “actions speak louder than words.” The report states:
The Biden administration has decided to retain the terrorist title of Syria’s new Islamist rulers for the rest of President Joe Biden’s term, leaving a critical decision on Hay’s Tahrir al-Sham and its leader Ahmed al-Sharaa to the incoming Trump administration, three U.S. officials familiar with the matter said.
Although Washington had already quickly raised the $10 million bounty that had long been on the head of HTS leader Abu Mohammad al-Julan (or Ahmed al- Sharaa), the name of terror remains.
The jihadist group that replaced Assad’s government after the fall of the longtime leader on December 8 (after which Assad appeared in Moscow) has lobbied in Western capitals to lift U.S.-led sanctions.
The sanctions have destroyed the economy, led to escaped inflation, and currently major cities have only an hour of electricity a day in winter conditions.
But terrorist acts are likely to ensure that most of the sanctions remain against Syria, which mainly harms an already suffering and impoverished ordinary population.
Ironically, from the beginning of the war, the United States had covertly supported radical groups such as HTS, which was ultimately a regime-change operation imposed from outside.
One regional source reviews the background of the following:
Days after the fall of the Syrian government and the rise of HTS, Sharaa urged foreigners who joined HTS to obtain Syrian citizenship, saying they were “part of the movement that led to Assad’s decline and should be celebrated.”
As part of a U.S.-backed covert war against the former Syrian government, ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi sent his deputy, Abu Mohammad al-Julani – Sharaa nom de guerre – from Iraq to Syria in August 2011 and a group of extremist fighters to create the Nusra Front, the official branch of al-Qaeda in Syria.
The Sharaa group, which he later renamed HTS, staged suicide bombings in Damascus in December 2011 and January 2012 before announcing their existence. Thousands of Salafist religious extremists from dozens of countries, including Britain, Belgium, France, China, Chechnya, Tunisia, Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Saudi Arabia, joined Sharaa in the fight against Damascus.
The big question for Syria is: what’s next? It can be directed towards a failed state with no infrastructure, no reconstruction, no resources… Or there is also the likelihood that there will be more civil wars and infighting. There is a possibility, even if it is far away, that the country will be revived by future elections. However, the HTS has announced that there will be no elections for at least four years.
Israel also occupies territory in the south, the U.S. occupies oil and gas areas in the northeast, and Turkey controls much of the north near Aleppo. The situation does not look good at the moment.
