Ayman Ahmed
While most informed observers were grappling with these questions, a battle of narratives erupted. One related to the rebranding of the terrorists as “moderate”. The other was between Muslims debating whose interests do the terrorists serve. Both need to be discussed to understand the reality.
First, the rebranding of Abu Mohammad al-Julani, head of Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), that led the assault on Damascus. The US TV channel, CNN was first off the mark. On December 6, Al Julani sat down with CNN journalist Jomana Karadsheh for an exclusive interview to explain his past.
“Julani says he has gone through episodes of transformation through the years,” CNN helpfully wrote on its website. The notorious headchopper and now supposedly moderate terrorist assured Karadsheh “no one has the right to eliminate” Syria’s Alawites, Christians, and Druze. Al Julani’s victims can be forgiven if they do not find such statements reassuring.
The American news portal, The Cradle was so amused by this attempt at transforming the head of HTS head that it put a cheeky headline on its story: “Abu Mohammad al-Julani: Putting lipstick on a pig”!
CNN, however, was not done yet. It released a video of a prisoner “rescued” by its chief correspondent Clarissa Ward at the notorious Sednaya prison. She claimed he was a “rebel fighter” named Adel Gharbal from Homs.
Ms. Ward was so excited about her “discovery” that she tweeted: “In nearly twenty years as a journalist, this was one of the most extraordinary moments I have witnessed.” Except that it wasn’t.
The video went viral on social media. Many viewers celebrated the “courageous” and “remarkable” reporting by the veteran CNN journalist until the fact-checking organisation Verify-Sy punctured Ms. Ward’s claim. Wonder woman did not rescue a “rebel fighter” after all, who allegedly had not seen the sunlight for over three months.
Verify-Sy identified the prisoner as a low-level Syrian intelligence official jailed for corruption and abuse charges. His name is Salama Mohammad Salama. Also known as “Abu Hamza”, Verify-Sy’s report investigated his identity and said that he was a first lieutenant in Syrian Air Force Intelligence. Residents of the Bayyada neighbourhood in Homs identified him as “frequently stationed at a checkpoint in the area’s western entrance, infamous for its abuses.”
CNN, however, is not alone in the massive propaganda campaign against Asad’s abuses, real or imagined, and in whitewashing al-Julani’s horrific past. The BBC assured its readers that the HTS head, designated by the UN, US and the European Union as a terrorist, had “reinvented himself.” Was the BBC’s expression “reinvented himself” a Freudian slip?
Al-Julani had a $10 million bounty on his head but the US State Department announced on December 22 that it had withdrawn the charge against him. On December 15, Secretary of State Antony Blinken confirmed that the US is in direct contact with HTS. British diplomats have also met Al Julani in Damascus.
On December 20, the State department head of Syria desk, Barbara Leaf, and two other state department officials met Al Julani in Damascus. The HTS head had tossed his turban and was now suitably attired in a suit and tie. That a boy!
The London-based Telegraph went even further in projecting Al Julani. It insisted that he is now “diversity friendly.” Perhaps, the world can look forward to Gay Pride parade in Damascus in the not too distant future with Al-Julani himself leading the march wearing a colourful costume.
Talking of colourful costumes, Al-Julani adopted the attire of the Ukrainian clown, Vladymyr Zelenskyy! The two seem to have much in common. Zelenskyy is a zionist Jew. Some people have speculated that Al-Julani may have the same origins. This may be going too far but he has an uncanny resemblance to Theorder Herzl with Al Julani having tossed his turban and trimmed his beard.
Little is known about his past until he suddenly appeared in Iraq after the US invasion in 2003. He joined Abu Mus‘ab al-Zarqawi’s terrorist outfit and was arrested by the Americans and incarcerated in the Bucca Prison Camp in Iraq.
The head of ISIS, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was also at Bucca, dubbed by Craig Whiteside of the US Naval War College as “America’s Jihadi University”. Al-Baghdadi (real name Ibrahim al-Samarrai) was head of the Islamic State in Iraq (ISI). He succeeded Abu Mus‘ab al-Zarqawi’s Al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI).
The name changes are mere labels of convenience. They have always been. HTS comprises some 33 disparate groups cobbled together by Turkish intelligence, MIT, under direction from the US and Israel.
In 2009, the entire inmate population at Bucca prison—some 5,700 men—were released. During their time in Bucca camp, the Americans allowed the terrorists to link-up with other terrorists.
Upon release, Al Baghdadi set up his Al Qaeda branch in Iraq under a new label, the Islamic State in Iraq. Al-Julani served as his deputy. In August 2011, Al Baghdadi sent Al Julani to Syria to open a branch there where an uprising had erupted in March 2011.
A year later, however, Al Julani broke away and pledged allegiance to Al Qaeda head Ayman al-Zawahiri who had succeeded Usama bin Laden. The latter was killed by the Americans on May 2, 2011 in Abbotabad, Pakistan. Al Julani called his outfit Jabhat al-Nusra.
It committed horrific crimes against innocent people in Syria. These included head chopping, organ eating and burning people alive. Sexual slavery was also widely practiced.
Western and Arabian regimes as well as Israel supported the terrorists. When the Syrian government pointed this out, its claim was dismissed. The former Israeli Army Chief Gadi Eisenkot admitted to supplying “light weapons” to terrorists groups, as reported by the Times of Israel, confirming what Syria was saying.
Even reports in the Wall Street Journal admitted that Israel had for years provided humanitarian and medical aid to terrorists in southern Syria. This included bringing Nusra fighters across the border into Israel for treatment.
Similarly, in an interview with The American Conservative, the odd assortment of rebels admitted that Israel had been paying salaries – to the tune of $200,000 per month – for the entire year before HTS troops were expelled from the area by the SAA and fled to Idlib.
With all this is widely known, how is it that some Syrians are still celebrating the takeover of their country by agents of imperialism and zionism. There is no rational explanation for this but some celebrity shaikhs have come to their rescue. They have argued that people cannot be expected to be fully aware of all the political machinations. All they care about is that they have been rid of a brutal dictator.
It would be amusing, if not so dangerous, for these celebrity shaikhs to defend the indefensible. Lack of political awareness among the masses is precisely the argument used by dictators to justify their illegitimate hold on power.
It echoes what the American political theorist, Harold Lasswell said nearly a century ago. In Politics: Who Gets What, When, How (1936)—a work whose title later served as the standard lay definition of politics—he viewed the elite as the primary holders of power. The masses are too ignorant to decide for themselves. That is the job of the enlightened elite to determine what is good for them.
Muslims will pay a very heavy price for this ostrich-like attitude by burying their heads in the sand instead of recognizing the grim reality facing them.
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