Who is Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, this Islamist leader who brought down Bashar al-Assad?

INTERNATIONAL – « Leader Ahmed al-Shareh prostrated himself and kissed the ground. upon his arrival in Damascus. This Sunday, December 8, the leader of the Syrian Islamist rebels, who overthrew the regime of Bashar al-Assad, was welcomed as a hero in the Syrian capital.

Abou Mohammad al-Jolani, or his real name Ahmed al-Chareh, is known to be the leader of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the radical Islamist group at the head of the insurgent coalition at the heart of the news these days. last days. It was she who launched a dazzling offensive in northern Syria on November 27, taking the main Syrian cities one by one before arriving in Damascus.

The highly symbolic arrival of Abu Mohammad al-Jolani in Damascus therefore shed new light on this man, who said this Sunday “ continue to work with determination to achieve the goals of our revolution”despite the hasty departure of Bashar al-Assad. Thus marking the end of half a century of undisputed reign of the Assad clan in Syria. “ The future is ours and we are heading towards victory “, he proclaimed before going to the famous Umayyad mosque in Damascus.

A gradual molt

The leader of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a former branch of al-Qaeda in Syria, had long set himself the objective of overthrowing President Assad, in power since 2000. An objective finally achieved this Sunday when the rebels entered the capital and proclaimed “the free city of Damascus”.

Tall, with a black beard and keen eyes, Abu Mohammad al-Jolani gradually abandoned the jihadist turban that he wore at the start of the war in 2011 for a military uniform and sometimes for a civilian costume. Thus moving from a fundamentalist vocabulary to a word which aims to be moderate to achieve its ends: to bring down Bashar Al-Assad and his regime.

Since the break with al-Qaeda in 2016, he has tried to smooth out his image and present a more moderate face, without really convincing analysts or even Western chancelleries. Who continue to classify HTS as a terrorist group. A specialist in Islamism in Syria, Thomas Pierret speaks of him to AFP as a “ radical pragmatist »recalling its flagrant evolution in recent years.

A transition which is still illustrated since November 27, when he began signing with his real name rather than his nom de guerre.

Distancing yourself from al-Qaeda

Born in 1982, it was only after the September 11 attacks that “The first signs of jihadism began to appear in Jolani's life, and he began attending sermons and secret round tables in the marginalized suburbs of Damascus.”as reported by the Middle East Eye website.

After the American invasion of Iraq in 2003, Jolani joined the fight and the al-Qaeda group in Iraq led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi before being imprisoned for five years. He will have to wait until 2011 to return to his native country and found the al-Nusra front, which will eventually become HTS.

In 2013, he refused to be knighted by Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, future leader of IS, and preferred the emir of al-Qaeda, Ayman al-Zawahiri. A marker of his gradual distancing, which will be further confirmed when he ends up definitively breaking with al-Qaeda, in order to“remove the pretexts put forward by the international community” to attack his organization. Since then, he has continued “on a ridge line his path as a statesman in the making”affirms Thomas Pierret.

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