Grave consequences await the West if Trump follows through with normalizing relations with Jolani’s new regime.
President Donald Trump has decided to lift American sanctions on Syria. The sanctions imposed by the United States (and many other nations) go back decades, to around 1979, when Washington first labeled the Hafez al-Assad regime a “state sponsor of terrorism.”
From there, sanctions continued to be piled on Hafez’s successor and son, Bashar al-Assad, who was finally deposed from his authoritarian perch in December 2024. The sanctions remained in place thereafter, if only for the fact that the successor government—an Islamist entity derived from the Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) terror group—is little better than Assad.
Meet President Sharaa (Alias Terrorist Leader Jolani)
The new president of Syria is a tall, bearded man named Ahmed al-Sharaa who looks dapper in a fine Western suit (as did Arafat before him), Sharaa is better known by his nom de guerre, Abu Mohammad al-Jolani. In his days as “Jolani,” the Syrian leader instead wore the garb of an Islamist militant, and he led al Qaeda’s franchise group, the Al Nusra Front, that had fought in the brutal Syrian Civil War since 2011.
Throughout the Syrian Civil War, the Al Nusra Front had received weapons and training through a covert ratline linking the brutal Islamist groups fighting against Assad with primarily Turkish, but also Western, intelligence services.
Turkey’s support was completely in line with their government’s overall “neo-Ottoman” policy, intent on restoring its primary role as the dominant power of the Muslim world. For Ankara, supporting groups like Al Nusra made perfect sense. Doing so could yield economic benefits as well: Turkey yearned to build a vast network of lucrative pipelines that would cut through Syrian territory and into Turkey, where the Turkish government would reap windfall profits in the form of natural gas and oil transit fees. Assad’s regime was in the way, both because the Assad family represented the minority Alawite sect of Syria and because they were aligned with Iran, Russia, and to some extent China.
Inevitably, Jolani and a core contingent of his loyal fighters separated from al Qaeda, joined with holdover elements from a hodgepodge of other violent Islamist groups, and formed the HTS terror network. This group received copious support from Turkish intelligence. Indeed, there are several instances of Turkish troops leading HTS in battle against Bashar Assad’s Syrian Arab Army during their final offensive that ultimately ousted Assad from power last December.
Jolani’s Grim Origin Story
As for Jolani himself, his journey reads vaguely like that of some comic book villain’s origin story. He was born in Saudi Arabia, but as a very small child moved to Syria.
While growing up in Syria—a land in which the majority Sunni Muslim population was viciously suppressed by the Assad regime—Jolani was first exposed to the notion of jihad by watching his family in the West Bank’s involvement in the Second Intifada against Israel. When he was old enough, Jolani decided to become a holy warrior himself, and answered the call to jihad by traveling to Iraq to fight the Americans. He joined al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI), itself the precursor to ISIS, and rose swiftly through the ranks. Eventually, he was apprehended by U.S. forces and sent to the notorious U.S. military prison known as Camp Bucca.
Camp Bucca, as it turned out, was a petri dish for Middle Eastern terrorism. Fresh off of the scandalous treatment of prisoners at Abu Ghraib, American authorities gave inmates there relatively more freedom and allowed them to socialize. Within its walls, AQI members met and networked with former officers from Saddam Hussein’s defunct Iraqi Army. These two elements soon fused into one, forming the core of ISIS.
After the United States left Iraq in 2011, the prisoners were gradually released. Rather than retire from the jihad, though, thousands of them traveled to neighboring Syria to take up arms in the uprising against the Assad regime. Jolani was one of them.
The rest, as they say, is history. Jolani’s trajectory from enemy combatant to nominal ally was assured, if only because the Obama administration, in conjunction with the Turkish government (and likely, to some degree, Israel) assessed it was now in the interests of the United States to support Jolani’s group in their bid to oust Assad—and, in turn, do grave damage to Iran and Russia.
Trump Is Feeding the Islamist Beast
Now, under Trump, comes the payoff.
Reports suggest that, at the urging of the Qatari government, the Saudi royal family, and (naturally) the Erdogan administration in Turkey, Trump has agreed to end all sanctions on post-Assad Syria. In his words, he hopes removing sanctions on the explicitly Islamist regime of Syria will help to make it a great, prosperous country.
Yeah, right.
Given Jolani’s history of unapologetic terrorism, removing the sanctions on his new regime in Syria, allowing for Syria to become a colony of Turkey, will lead to one thing: the creation of a Taliban-like terrorist state along the Eastern Mediterranean, bordering Israel, poised to sweep away the last vestiges of America’s order in the Middle East. And from that Eastern Mediterranean redoubt, Jolani’s Islamist regime can plot mass terrorist attacks directed against not only Israel, but Europe, and the United States.
Grave consequences await the West if Trump follows through with normalizing relations with Jolani’s new regime in such a slipshod way.
About the Author: Brandon J. Weichert
Brandon J. Weichert, a Senior National Security Editor at The National Interest as well as a contributor at Popular Mechanics, who consults regularly with various government institutions and private organizations on geopolitical issues. Weichert’s writings have appeared in multiple publications, including the Washington Times, National Review, The American Spectator, MSN, the Asia Times, and countless others. His books include Winning Space: How America Remains a Superpower, Biohacked: China’s Race to Control Life, and The Shadow War: Iran’s Quest for Supremacy. His newest book, A Disaster of Our Own Making: How the West Lost Ukraine is available for purchase wherever books are sold. He can be followed via Twitter @WeTheBrandon.
Image: The White House.
