The “Islamic nationalists” of Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS, the “Levant Liberation Organization”), who have become Syria’s new leading force; the Syrian National Army (SNA); Kurdish militias from the country’s northeast; the jihadists of the Islamic State (IS) organization: The Syrian civil war has given rise to a multi-faceted insurgency, whose components often pursue objectives that are antagonistic to each other, operating under the influence of several external parties.
Although HTS has succeeded in imposing its authority, the risk that large-scale hostilities could resume, or even that the still-fragmented country may be partitioned, cannot be ruled out. Nevertheless, on Saturday, December 14, HTS leader Ahmed al-Sharaa, better known by his nom de guerre, Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, promised to dissolve all of the country’s armed groups, including his own, and set up an army based on voluntary conscription.
Who are the protagonists in this complex conflict, following the HTS offensive against Bashar al-Assad’s regime? Now that Syria has brutally emerged out of the almost general oblivion into which it had been plunged by the regime’s reconquest of most of its rebel zones – with the decisive support of Russia, the Lebanese organization Hezbollah and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps – which groups are present in the country?
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