ISIS terrorists have advvanced further on positions of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (formerly Jabhat al-Nusra, the Syrian branch of al-Qaeda) in northeastern Hama. ISIS captured Huways Shamali, Huways ibn Hadib, Dabah and Hawwas Hill. According to localt sources, the ISIS advance came amid little clashes with Hayat Tahrir al-Sham.
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Is HTS just vacating this area to use ISIS as a buffer, so they can concentrate against SAA elsewhere?
Or they are both actors in the same play, keeping up the ISIS scare to give the US a reason to stay in Syria?
No, they have serious casualties there and so do ISIS. They are fighting.
Well, this would be even better news indeed. That this Jihadist group has splintered off to reform an ISIS group, with more in-fighting in Idlib. HTS is in big trouble for sure. :)
ISIS is desperate to take back some territory… No win situation for ISIS and HTS in Idlib.
The identity of anyone using an IS brand would never be lived down by al-Qa’ed or the SAA and Hezbollah, this is not chicken feed it could be the end of the al-Nurash Front, IS can be negotiated with they are independent players, not so HTS who is now loyal only to MbS, and another thing, had not Brother Baghdadi split the monopoly Zawahiri had on radical Islam, no force could have prevailed against them in the Levant, it was a miracle an act of God.