In another development, the leader of Syria’s Al-Nusra Front said in a recording aired Thursday that his group is changing its name, saying it will have no more ties with al Qaeda in an attempt to undermine a potential USA and Russian air campaign against its fighters.
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In a statement exclusively obtained by Al Jazeera, which has been translated into English by Orient News, Jolani declared the “cancellation of all operations under the name Nusra Front”, and the formation of a new group, Jabhat Fatah al-Sham.
Al-Qaeda gave the Nusra Front, its official branch in Syria, its blessing to break ties with the terror group in order to “preserve the interests of Islam and Muslims and protect the jihad of the Syrian people”.
As the BBC reports, Julani announced that his group would be renamed Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, which translates to “Front for the Conquest of Syria/the Levant”, and will have “no affiliation to any external entity”.
Following the start of the war in 2011, al-Qaeda sent Jolani to Syria to establish a branch that could launch attacks against the regime.
Jabhat al-Nusra, aka the Nusra Front, has risen to power amid the Syrian civil war that has dragged on for more than five years. “We certainly see no reasons to believe that their actions or their objectives are any different”.
Al-Qaeda, founded by Osama bin Laden and to which Al-Nusra pledged allegiance in 2013, encouraged the split to protect “the jihad of the Syrian people”.
President Bashar al-Assad, meanwhile, issued a decree offering an amnesty to rebels who surrender over the next three months.
The Nusra Front is the second-strongest extremist group in Syria after its rival, ISIS.
“The Nusra Front was in talks with other Syrian Islamist groups earlier about joining force in an alliance of some sort”, said Aron Lund, a nonresident associate in the Carnegie Endowment’s Middle East Program.
The Iranian spokesman also called on the global community to pay attention to the root causes of terrorism and its outcomes, and to pressure the founders and supporters of terrorist groups into uprooting the inauspicious phenomenon.
If it quits al-Qaida, the Nusra Front loses the brand name that drew many of its fighters to its ranks.
Residents hold a Nusra Front flag during a demonstration celebrating their take over of Idlib and calling for the implementation of the Islamic Sharia law, in Al-Sakhour neighborhood of Aleppo April 24, 2015.
Jolani thanked Al Qaeda for its “noble stance”, which he said would be “recorded in the annals of history with letters of light”. Rather, he said, it “reflects al-Qaeda’s gradualist approach of progressively radicalizing local populations, postponing the establishment of an Islamic state until popular support has been secured”.
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Clapper also said al Nusra is concerned about being targeted by Russian Federation. The last ceasefire brokered by the USA and Russia did not cover Nusra or IS, so Russian warplanes and Assad’s forces continued to battle them, often hitting moderate groups that were part of the truce, including ones backed by Washington and its Arab allies.
