Rebel leader Abu Mohammed al Jolani, whose group was central to the lightning offensive that toppled decades of dictatorship in Syria this weekend, has spent years trying to distance himself from his former ties to al Qaeda.
Labelled a terrorist by the US, which still has a $10m (£7.8m) bounty on his head, the leader of Hayat Tahrir al Sham (HTS) says he has renounced his past as a hardline jihadi extremist and now embraces pluralism and tolerance.
Now poised to play a major role in the future governance of Syria – a diverse country with a variety of religious minorities – al Jolani’s apparent transformation will be put to the test.
Al Jolani’s real name is Ahmad al Sharaa – it’s what he was known by before he adopted jihad and it is how he has begun referring to himself again, using it as he spoke in Damascus on Sunday.
Now 42, al Jolani was born in 1982 in Syria to a middle class family displaced from the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.
His political views were reportedly shaped by the 2000 Palestinian Intifada and the 2001 September 11 attacks.
When the US invaded Iraq in 2003, al Jolani was one of many Syrians who crossed into Iraq to fight US forces, there establishing ties with al Qaeda.
He was detained by the US military in Iraq and spent time in the notorious Abu Ghraib prison.
In the early 2000s, the extremist Islamic State of Iraq – led by Abu Bakr al Baghdadi – grew out of the remnants of al Qaeda.
Image: Wanted poster issued by the US State Department for al Jolani
Syria uprising
In 2011, a popular uprising in Syria sparked a brutal crackdown by regime forces – a conflict that deteriorated into more than a decade of civil war.
Al Jolani was directed by al Baghdadi to establish a branch of al Qaeda called the Nusra Front. The new group was labelled a terrorist organisation by the US – a designation that remains in place.
His influence grew and he defied orders from al Baghdadi to dissolve his group and merge it with what had become the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.
In his first interview in 2014, he kept his face covered and told a reporter that his goal was to see Syria governed under Islamic law and made clear that there was no room for the country’s Alawite, Shiite, Druze and Christian minorities.
In 2016 he revealed his face to the public for the first time and announced two things: his group was renaming itself Jabhat Fateh al-Sham – the Syria Conquest Front – and it was cutting its ties with al Qaeda.
He was able to assert control over fragmented militant groups and consolidated power in Idlib. He again rebranded his group, calling it Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) – Organisation for Liberating Syria – as it has been known since.
Image: Al Jolani in 2016 discussing battlefield details with commanders in Aleppo. Pic: AP
Few could have predicted what happened next. Secure in his position, al Jolani sought to transform his image. He swapped his military garb for a shirt and trousers.
What’s more, he appeared to renounce some tenets of hardline Islamic law and began calling for religious tolerance and pluralism.
“We don’t want the society to become hypocritical so that they pray when they see us and don’t once we leave,” he said, pointing to the example of Saudi Arabia, where social controls have been relaxed to a degree in recent years.
He gave his first interview to an American journalist in 2021, wearing a blazer and with his short hair gelled back. He argued that his group posed no threat to the West and said sanctions against it were unjust.
“Yes, we have criticised Western policies,” he said. “But to wage a war against the United States or Europe from Syria, that’s not true. We didn’t say we wanted to fight.”
He added that his involvement with al Qaeda had ended, and that even in the past his group was “against carrying out operations outside of Syria”.
Image: Abu Mohammed al Jolani speaks at the Umayyad Mosque. Pic: AP
What happens now?
After decades of ruling Syria, the Assad regime has fallen, in large part because of al Jolani’s fighters.
Following his entering Damascus on Sunday as part of the victorious rebel column, he spoke in the city’s landmark Umayyad Mosque and declared the regime’s defeat as “a victory for the Islamic nation”.
Another senior rebel commander, Anas Salkhadi, said on state TV: “Our message to all the sects of Syria, is that we tell them that Syria is for everyone.”
Dr Burcu Ozcelik, a Middle East expert from the RUSI thinktank, said that al Jolani “sees himself as an inevitable and necessary part of any political settlement”.
“Al Jolani clearly has plans to be a leading actor in Syria, and the moderated, pro-democracy script that he has been drawing upon is testament to his commitment to demonstrate that he can change his stripes.
“The real test will be how committed he is to govern via the democratic playbook, and not just borrow the vocabulary.”
Leaders in capitals around the world are monitoring the events in Syria closely, looking for signs of what sort of government will emerge and what its priorities both domestically and in the volatile region will be.
Whether al Jolani’s claimed rejection of his jihadi past in favour of an apparent policy of pluralism and tolerance is genuine or not will be one of the key questions that observers will be seeking answers to.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has hit out at the US over its “weak” response to lethal Russian attacks on his hometown on Friday.
President Zelenskyy posted a lengthy and emotional statement on X about Russia’s strikes on Kryvyi Rih, which killed 19 people.
Meanwhile Ukrainian drones hit an explosives factory in Russia’s Samara region in an overnight strike, a member of Ukraine’s SBU security service told Reuters.
In his post, President Zelenskyy accused the United States of being “afraid” to name-check Russia in its comment on the attack.
“Unfortunately, the reaction of the American Embassy is unpleasantly surprising: such a strong country, such a strong people – and such a weak reaction,” he wrote on X.
“They are even afraid to say the word “Russian” when talking about the missile that killed children.”
America’s ambassador to Ukraine Bridget Brink had written on X: “Horrified that tonight a ballistic missile struck near a playground and restaurant in Kryvyi Rih.
“More than 50 people injured and 16 killed, including 6 children. This is why the war must end.”
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5:49
Strike on Zelenskyy’s home city
President Zelenskyy went on in his post to say: “Yes, the war must end. But in order to end it, we must not be afraid to call a spade a spade.
“We must not be afraid to put pressure on the only one who continues this war and ignores all the world’s proposals to end it. We must put pressure on Russia, which chooses to kill children instead of a ceasefire.”
Grandmother ‘burned to death in her home’
Oleksandr Vilkul, head of the city’s defense council, said the missile attack, followed by a drone attack, had killed 19 people, including nine children.
“The Iskander-M missile strike with cluster munitions at the children’s playground in the residential area, to make the shrapnel fly further apart, killed 18 people.
“One grandmother was burnt to death in her house after Shahed’s direct hit.”
Russia’s defence ministry said it had struck a military gathering in a restaurant – an assertion rebutted by the Ukrainian military as misinformation.
“The missile hit right on the street – around ordinary houses, a playground, shops, a restaurant,” President Zelenskyy wrote.
Mr Zelenskyy also detailed the child victims of the attack including “Konstantin, who will be 16 forever” and “Arina, who will also be 7 forever”.
The UK’s chief of the defence staff Sir Tony Radakin said he had met the Ukrainian leader on Friday, along with French armed forces leader General Thierry Burkhard.
“Britain and France are coming together & Europe is stepping up in a way that is real & substantial, with 200 planners from 30 nations working to strengthen Ukraine’s long term security,” Sir Tony wrote.
The IDF has admitted to mistakenly identifying a convoy of aid workers as a threat – following the emergence of a video which proved their ambulances were clearly marked when Israeli troops opened fire on them.
The bodies of 15 aid workers – including eight medics working for the Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) – were found in a “mass grave” after the incident, according to the head of the UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs Jonathan Whittall.
The Israeli military originally claimed an investigation found the vehicles did not have any headlights or emergency signals and were therefore targeted as they looked “suspicious”.
But video footage obtained by the PRCS, and verified by Sky News, showed the ambulances and a fire vehicle clearly marked with flashing red lights.
In a briefing from the IDF, they said the ambulances arrived in the Tel Sultan neighbourhood in Rafah shortly after a Hamas police vehicle drove through.
Image: Palestinians mourning the medics after their bodies were recovered. Pic: Reuters
An IDF surveillance aircraft was watching the movement of the ambulances and notified troops on the ground. The IDF said it will not be releasing that footage.
When the ambulances arrived, the soldiers opened fire, thinking the medics were a threat, according to the IDF.
The soldiers were surprised by the convoy stopping on the road and several people getting out quickly and running, the IDF claimed, adding the soldiers were unaware the suspects were in fact unarmed medics.
An Israeli military official would not say how far away troops were when they fired on the vehicles.
The IDF acknowledged that its statement claiming that the ambulances had their lights off was incorrect, and was based on the testimony from the soldiers in the incident.
The newly emerged video footage showed that the ambulances were clearly identifiable and had their lights on, the IDF said.
The IDF added that there will be a re-investigation to look into this discrepancy.
Image: The clip is filmed through a vehicle windscreen – with three red light vehicles visible in front
Addressing the fact the aid workers’ bodies were buried in a mass grave, the IDF said in its briefing this is an approved and regular practice to prevent wild dogs and other animals from eating the corpses.
The IDF could not explain why the ambulances were also buried.
The IDF said six of the 15 people killed were linked to Hamas, but revealed no detail to support the claim.
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1:22
Bodies of aid workers found in Gaza
The newly emerged footage of the incident was discovered on a phone belonging to one of the workers who was killed, PRCS president Dr Younis Al Khatib said.
“His phone was found with his body and he recorded the whole event,” he said. “His last words before being shot, ‘Forgive me, mom. I just wanted to help people. I wanted to save lives’.”
Sky News used an aftermath video and satellite imagery to verify the location and timing of the newly emerged footage of the incident.
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2:43
Aid worker attacks increasing
It was filmed on 23 March north of Rafah and shows a convoy of marked ambulances and a fire-fighting vehicle travelling south along a road towards the city centre. All the vehicles visible in the convoy have their flashing lights on.
The footage was filmed early in the morning, with a satellite image seen by Sky News taken at 9.48am local time on the same day showing a group of vehicles bunched together off the road.
Global financial markets gave a clear vote of no-confidence in President Trump’s economic policy.
The damage it will do is obvious: costs for companies will rise, hitting their earnings.
The consequences will ripple throughout the global economy, with economists now raising their expectations for a recession, not only in the US, but across the world.