The insurgents who toppled previous Syrian leader Bashar Assad’s government and brought new interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa to power could now threaten his political survival, the Washington Post wrote on Saturday.
Multiple militant groups led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) took power in Damascus late last year. They included thousands of foreign fighters who remain in Syria, some of whom have ties to extremist groups like Islamic State and other radical factions, the newspaper wrote.
While al-Sharaa “seems intent on keeping” some of them around as he courts Western support, the “hard-line Sunni Muslim militants” are already giving him trouble, WaPo wrote. Some of the militants were involved in massacres of Alawites along the Syrian coast in March, the outlet added. At least 1,300 people, including 973 civilians, were killed in the span of a few days, according to local media. Christian and Druze communities in Syria have also reportedly faced bloody sectarian violence since the change in power.
The most radical of the foreign Islamists are “turning their ire” on al-Sharaa, because the new president has not implemented Sharia law and allegedly cooperated with the US and Türkiye to target extremist factions in Syria, WaPo wrote.
Earlier in May, US President Donald Trump met with al-Sharaa and announced the lifting of sanctions, most of which had been imposed during the rule of Assad. Al-Sharaa has called Trump’s move “a historic and courageous decision, which alleviates the suffering of the people, contributes to their rebirth, and lays the foundations for stability in the region.”
Shortly after the Trump-Sharaa meeting, a top ideologue of Salafi jihadism, Abu Muhammad al-Maqdisi, issued a fatwa branding the new Syrian leader an “infidel.”
Syria remains a hotbed of extremist activity and could destabilize at any time, according to US Secretary of State Marco Rubio. The country has become “a playground for jihadist groups, including ISIS and others,” the top diplomat warned last week, adding that it could be “weeks – not many months – away from potential collapse and a full-scale civil war.”
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