Turkey unleashes jihadist terror on Syria
The government of Turkey is the power behind Al-Qaeda affiliates in Idlib such as the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham.
By Uzay Bulut
JNS
Dec 5, 2024
Turkish-backed jihadist fighters patrol a street in Aleppo on November 30, 2024.
On Nov. 27, jihadist terror groups—led by the Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (Organization for the Liberation of the Levant; HTS)—launched a coordinated attack on Aleppo Governorate in northwestern Syria, cut off the main highway from Damascus to Aleppo, captured and killed dozens of Syrian Army soldiers, promised mass executions and beheadings “in front of TV cameras” and seized control of a military base and several villages.
Meanwhile, the jihadists posted videos on social media showing them capturing several training aircraft in the Kuweires Air Base near Aleppo.
The city of Aleppo is now effectively under the control of jihadist groups. Tens of thousands of Christians, Kurds and other minorities are in danger of extermination. Videos of jihadists abducting Kurdish women have also surfaced on social media.
HTS, part of an alliance of terrorist groups active in Syria and with links to the Islamic State (ISIS) and Al Qaeda, was formerly known as Jabhat al-Nusra and served as Al Qaeda’s affiliate in Syria. The organization is a jihadist group that upholds Sharia law, occupies Syria’s Idlib area and cooperates with the Turkish military and Turkish-backed groups in Syria. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of ISIS, was also involved in HTS’s formation.
In 2018, the U.S. State Department added HTS to Jabhat al-Nusra’s existing designation as a foreign terrorist organization.
Turkish media reports that the jihadist group named “Syrian National Army” (SNA), which calls its ongoing onslaught against Aleppo “Operation Dawn of Freedom,” took control of Kuweires Air Base, as well as three villages and a hill in Tel Rifaat, cutting off the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces’ supply line between Tel Rifaat and Manbij.
Since SNA was first established in 2017 under Turkey’s auspices, Ankara has provided funding, training and military support to it. The organization, previously called the Free Syrian Army (FSA), is essentially a coalition of armed Islamist groups operating in Syria.
Nadine Maenza, the former chair of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), posted on X:
“MISSING FROM MEDIA REPORTS ON ALEPPO: ‘Rebels’ taking city are NOT Freedom Fighters but Turkish-backed Islamists with same ideology as ISIS that target Yazidis, Christians and other religious and ethnic minorities.
“The USCIRF reports they ‘target religious minorities, especially Yazidis, for rape, assassination, kidnapping for ransom, confiscation of property, and desecration of cemeteries and places of worship.’
“USCIRF Factsheet says Hay’s Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) ‘remains a potent source of a Salafi-jihadism that restricts the religious freedom of non-conforming Sunni Muslims and threatens the property, safety, and existence of religious minority groups such as Alawites, Christians, and Druze.’ They also report ‘torture, forced disappearance, rape and other sexual violence, and killing in detention.’
“Expect the same horrific crimes from these Turkish-backed Islamist militias (including HTS) that we have seen from them in other parts of Syria. They learned from the international response to ISIS to not make an immediate public display of this violence.
“…. [A]reas under government control are also horrible as they endure ‘egregious human rights abuses such as arbitrary detention and torture, enforced disappearance.’ The one bright spot in Syria? The Northeast. Read about how they built self-governance that protects religious freedom with half the leaders being women.”
Aleppo and its surrounding areas are home to several ethnic and religious minorities such as Kurds, Christians and Druze. A jihadist takeover means either outright massacres or enslavement for these communities. Reports from the ground show jihadists have started kidnapping Kurdish women. The terrorists are heard telling the kidnapped women: “You are pigs, enemies of Allah. Cover your hair!”
Meanwhile, the jihadist forces are advancing. Mazloum Abdi, leader of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, said his forces are “coordinating with all relevant parties in Syria” to safely evacuate the people of Tal Rifaat and Shahba to Rojava (an area in Syria controlled by Kurdish forces) after attacks by Turkish-backed jihadists disrupted the SDF’s corridor.
The government of Turkey has supported jihadists in Syria since the beginning of the civil war in 2011. Turkey has allowed Islamists to use Turkish territory to cross the border to Syria to join terrorist organizations there. The Combating Terrorism Center at West Point reports on other Syria-related jihad activities in Turkey:
“According to Israel’s military intelligence chief in January 2014, al-Qa’ida-linked groups allegedly have at least three bases in Turkey. A report in al-Monitor suggested that, prior to 2013, alleged fighters were thought to stay at specific hotels, such as the Ottoman and Narin hotels, in the Turkish city of Antakya. In July 2012, a six-minute video titled Turkish Mujahidin Who Are Conducting Jihad in Syria, released by a Syrian opposition organization, showed a group of fighters apparently located in Syria speaking in Turkish and calling for Muslims to fight Syrian government forces.
“One foreign fighter is known as ‘Yilmaz,’ a Dutch-Turkish former soldier providing firearms training to jihadists.”
Turkey has also occupied parts of northern Syria, including Afrin and Idlib, through local jihadist groups. The Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) — which forms an integral part of the US-led fight against ISIS but which the Turkish government lists as a “terrorist organization” — took control of Afrin after Syrian government forces withdrew from the city in 2012. De facto autonomous Kurdish rule was then declared. In 2015, a US-allied group, the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), of which the YPG is a member, was formed.
Turkey has targeted U.S. allies in Syria through military incursions such as the 2018 “Operation Olive Branch” and 2019 “Operation Peace Spring.”
“Operation Olive Branch,” in Afrin began on Jan. 20, 2018, and concluded on March 18, 2018, with the defeat of the YPG at the hands of the Turkish military and its Islamist auxiliaries. Turkey’s Islamist allies in Afrin have since committed many crimes against civilians, especially Christians, Yazidis and Kurds. These crimes include extortion, detention, abduction, rape, torture and murder. Investigative journalist Jonathan Spyer has documented some of these crimes. “[U.S.] State Department, UN and NGO reports cite a pattern of grave human rights violations, assaults and targeting of women,” he wrote.
The U.S. State Department’s “2020 Country Report on Human Rights Practices: Syria” stated:
“ISIS and armed opposition forces such as the Turkish-backed SNA [Syrian National Army], reportedly arrested, detained, tortured, killed, and otherwise abused numerous Kurdish activists and individuals as well as members of the SDF during the year. The COI [Country of Origin Information] reported a consistent, discernible pattern of abuses by SNA forces against Kurdish residents in Afrin and Ras al-Ayn, including ‘[c]ases of detentions, killings, beatings, and abductions, in addition to widespread looting and appropriation of civilian homes.’
“The COI, STJ [Syrians for Truth and Justice], the Violations Documentation Center (VDC), and other monitors documented a trend of TSO [the Turkey-supported opposition] kidnappings of women in Afrin, where some women remained missing for years.”
The government of Turkey is the power behind Al Qaeda affiliates in Idlib such as HTS. According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies:
“In May 2018, the group [HTS] was added to the State Department’s existing designation of its predecessor, the al-Qaeda affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra, as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO). Today, HTS can be thought of as a relatively localized Syrian terrorist organization, which retains a Salafi-jihadist ideology despite its public split from al-Qaeda in 2017.”
A 2021 study by the Middle East Institute details how Turkey and HTS are together occupying and exploiting parts of northwest Syria:
“The most significant shift in HTS economic policy occurred in July 2017, when the group took over the Bab al-Hawa crossing, one of the biggest sources of revenue in NW [northwest] Syria and a particularly strategic acquisition in terms of the relationship with Turkey.”
In January 2018, the Watad Petroleum Company was formed in HTS-occupied northwest Syria and granted exclusive rights to import oil derivatives and gas from Turkey into the area. In June 2020, HTS began replacing the Syrian pound with the Turkish lira, indexing the prices of goods to the lira. The Turkish government, through its massive economic support to the group, thereby became a lifeline for the jihadist HTS.
The capture of Aleppo by Turkey-backed, Al Qaeda-affiliated forces is terrifying news for Kurds, Yazidis, Christians and everyone else whom jihadists perceive as their prey. If one is celebrating the advance of these Islamists invading parts of Syria, one is celebrating the advance of bloodthirsty jihadists who want to establish an Islamic caliphate and would happily slaughter anyone who stood in their way.
Although the first urgent priority of the civilized world should be to eliminate these jihadists, the next goal should be to ensure a democratic federal state, or autonomous regions in parts of Syria that would be ruled and defended by Kurds, Christians and Yazidis together.
Until Christians and other minorities in Syria have autonomy and are armed, they will be vulnerable to the assaults of Islamic extremists. For peace and stability in Syria, self-rule for Christians and Kurds is a must.
Originally published by the Gatestone Institute.
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