He was named head of the transitional government on Tuesday by the rebels who came to power in Damascus. Mohammad al-Bashir is now the strong man in Syria, a country battered and fractured by thirteen years of war.
At the head of a “Government of Salvation” in Idleb, this engineer in his forties had already tried to bring some order to the last major bastion of armed opposition to President Bashar al-Assad, now reversed. Born in 1983 in Jabal al-Zawiya, Bashir saw the final attack of the rebels from his province of Idlib where he held the post of Minister of Development before taking, in January, the head of the “Salvation Government” .
According to The Worldcreated in 2017 in the Idlib enclave to provide services to populations cut off from state infrastructure, this self-proclaimed government has its own ministries, administrative departments, judicial and security authorities. Recently, it began to expand into Aleppo, Syria’s second city and the first major city to fall to rebels after their lightning offensive.
A relatively unknown figure among Syrians
Before being given a national role following the takeover of power by the Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) and allied factions, he was a relatively unknown figure among Syrians outside his native region of Idlib.
Trained at the University of Aleppo, Mohammad al-Bashir first studied electrical and electronic engineering but also learned civil and Islamic law at the University of Idlib, according to his biography. He notably worked for the Syrian national gas company before joining the rebel administration in Idlib. Taking charge of a rebel region of around five million people, however, is a very different task from a national leadership role in a country marked by deep divisions.
Jolani’s “Closest”
Bashir appeared for the first time outside the rebel stronghold on Monday, in a suit and tie, his face framed by a beard, in a brief video clip of an interview between Abu Mohammad al-Jolani and former Prime Minister Mohammed al-Jalali, to “coordinate the transition of power”.
Questioned by AFP, Radwan Ziadeh, Syria specialist at the Arab Center in Washington in the United States, described Bachir as “closest” to Jolani and the joint operations chamber of the rebel factions. “But the challenges he faces are truly immense. » And added: “just as the revolution was a revolution for all Syrians, the transition process must be the business of all Syrians in order to guarantee its success and ensure a peaceful transition to democracy. »
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“The general command has entrusted us with the task of leading the transitional government until March 1,” Mohammad al-Bashir said in a statement on Tuesday, reported by television which presented him as “the new Prime Minister”. In the process, a source within HTS told AFP that Bachir would lead “a government responsible for handling current affairs”. This government will assume its functions “until the start of the constitutional process”, she added, indicating that a “new government will then be formed”.
