Authored by Dave DeCamp through AntiWar.com,
The Salafi jihadist group Hurras al-Din, Syria’s official al-Qaeda affiliate, introduced this week that it was dissolving, saying its objectives have been full following the regime change that ousted former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
“[T]he sons of the Al-Qaeda Jihad group rushed to help the folks of the Levant and help them in eradicating injustice from them till God permitted this Sunni Muslim folks to overcome some of the unjust tyrants of the trendy period,” Hurras al-Din mentioned in an announcement.
The group mentioned al-Qaeda had ordered it to dissolve. “In mild of those developments on the Levantine scene, and by an emir’s choice from the overall command of al-Qaeda within the Levant group, we announce to our Muslim nation and to the Sunnis within the Levant the dissolution of the Guardians of Faith Group (Hurras al-Din),” the group mentioned.
Hurras al-Din shaped in 2018 as an offshoot of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the militant group that led the offensive in opposition to Assad and now guidelines Syria. HTS was beforehand the official al-Qaeda affiliate in Syria when it was generally known as the al-Nusra Entrance, but it surely rebranded in 2016 to realize worldwide help.
Through the years, there have been tensions between HTS and Hurras al-Din, which have been each based mostly in Syria’s northwest Idlib earlier than HTS took Damascus. In 2020, HTS started arresting some senior members of Hurras al-Din. The US had additionally waged a drone battle in opposition to Hurras al-Din and bombed them in Idlib as just lately as August 2024.
Hurras al-Din informed its members to hold their weapons and urged Syria’s new leaders to maintain Sunni Muslims armed.
“We advise them to maintain the weapon within the palms of the Sunnis within the Levant to ensure that a nation to stay carrying weapons in order that no tyrant will enslave it, and no occupier will covet it,” the group mentioned.
Hurras al-Din’s fighters could merge with Syria’s new HTS-led navy, which has appointed overseas jihadists to senior positions. The dissolution announcement got here after HTS’s chief, Abu Mohammad al-Julani, now identified by his actual title Ahmed Hussein al-Sharaa, mentioned there could be no armed teams outdoors of the brand new HTS-led authorities’s management.
Within the meantime, the Pentagon introduced the next improvement:
JUST IN: U.S. Army Kills Senior Operative of Al-Qaeda Affiliate pic.twitter.com/ToVCla0YYB
— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) January 31, 2025
Sharaa, the founding father of al-Qaeda in Syria, was declared the president of Syria on Wednesday. The US, beneath President Biden, helped Sharaa and HTS take over Syria regardless of their al-Qaeda historical past and the truth that HTS is listed by the US as a terrorist group.
