Turkey’s role in shaping Tahrir al-Sham’s future

Ahmed Kamel al-Beheiri

The map of terrorist and militant groups in Syria had undergone great changes in the past seven years, since the start of the Syrian civil war in 2011.

There are different forms of conflict between the different militant and terrorist groups active in Syria. These conflicts are fanned by ideological differences and differences in the interpretation of religious texts. They are also fueled by the different regional sponsorships of these groups.

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Regional sponsor Turkey is now obliged to put the jihadist house in order yet again with the battle for the liberation of the northwestern Syrian city of Idlib proving very close. Tahrir al-Sham, formerly al-Nusra Front, is at the center of ongoing Turkish efforts to restructure the jihadist house in Idlib with the Syrian army getting ready to enter the city with support from Russia.

During the latest summit on Idlib in Tehran, Turkey expressed opposition to the Russian-backed plan of the Syrian army to strike the city and liberate it from militant control.

Turkey also wanted the Syrian army to stage attacks only against Daesh. It wanted all other radical groups in Idlib, including Tahrir al-Sham, to be excluded from the attacks.

Turkey does not want Tahrir al-Sham to be designated as a “terrorist group”. This is why it is putting pressure on the group to restructure itself. It wants the group to change its name and also disengage from some radical organizations and merge into others that are more moderate.

The Turkish demands are polarizing Tahrir al-Sham, according to the group’s media. The same demands have divided the leadership of Tahrir al-Sham into the following two groups:

This group of organization members agrees to changing the name of the organization. It includes those close to the military leadership of Tahrir al-Sham, especially the members of factions that had recently joined in al-Nusra Front. This group tried to pave the road for changing the name of the organization by posting a video of Tahrir al-Sham’s theoretician Abu Ahmed al-Maqdisi. The video dates back to 2016. In it al-Maqdisi calls on organization members not to hold onto names that can incite “enemies” against Tahrir al-Sham.

This is an influential group of Tahrir al-Sham leaders. Its members are opposed to the policies of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. They use quotes by Sheikh Abu Qatadah al-Filistini in which he says that Erdogan works only to serve the interests of the Ottoman state. Al-Filistini adds that the Turkish president does not want the laws of God to be applied as some people claim

Both groups include many radicals. Nonetheless, Tahrir al-Sham will most likely declare a new merger with a new name. The new merger will seek to make the organization avoid being designated as a terrorist organization. It will also seek to give the members of the organization freedom to move into Turkey, in case the Syrian-Russian campaign for the liberation of Idlib succeeds.

This shows that the decisions the leaders of Tahrir al-Sham take today will reflect on the shape of the jihadist map in Syria. The same decisions will also affect the branches of some of Syria’s radical organizations in other countries in the region. This also means that the map of jihadist groups in the region can change. This raises questions on the possible structure of jihadist organizations in the region in the future.