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On September 6, unidentified gunmen attacked a checkpoint of al-Qaeda-affiliated Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham in the northwestern Syrian region of Greater Idlib.
The attack, which took place in the early morning hours, targeted a checkpoint near the town of Kafar Takharim in the northern Idlib countryside. The gunmen targeted the checkpoint with light machine guns before running away.
“There is no information about any human losses [in the attack],” the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said in a report.
After the attack, HTS’ security forces arrested five militants of a small local armed faction called the Hananu Brigade. The terrorist group suspected that the fighters were behind the attack, but this turned out to be untrue. The militants were released within a few hours.
Last month, foreign jihadists in Syria’s Greater Idlib threatened HTS in an official statement. The jihadists accused the group’s leader, Abu Mohamad al-Julani, of “betraying” and “selling” them, citing the recent arrest of a number of foreign commanders and journalists.
HTS made a many enemies while working to tighten its grip over Greater Idlib. More attacks will likely target the terrorist group and its militants in the upcoming months.
The Muslim Brotherhood has lost it’s key ally HTS and they can’t do anything to repair the relationship, the division has put them on two seperate paths and they’re just getting further and further apart the further down the separate paths they go, smirk. Resolution 2254 has been a major problem for HTS and all the pro Turkish/Syrian Interim Government terrorist factions, they were left out of the Astana agreements and have no legitimate say in Syria’s political future, only the so called moderate opposition were included in the agreement. But HTS is finding a way to overcome that problem thanks to Assad and a new cooperative relationship they have, but the Turkish backed proxies aren’t so lucky, Turkey threw them under the bus to get the deal they did with Russia and Iran and now Erdogan can’t do much to change that, obviously the terrorists who are now now attacking Turkey and trying to force them to reconsider the deal are finding out it isn’t working, dumb terrorists. Erdogan can’t persuade Russia and Iran to change their minds about who’s included in the Astana agreement, if they did it would allow Erdogan to redesignate some of the pro Turkish terrorists back into moderate opposition and then include them in a new Astana agreement, which would effectively solve his current problem ‘nearly’ completely But Assad could easily redesignate HTS and the Salvation Government into a legitimate opposition force with a simple decree, that’s if he wanted to, and strangely just by chance HTS seems to be doing everything they can to change Assad’s mind and persuade him to do just that. Many good deeds deserve a reward and HTS has been doing many good deeds for Assad lately. Not that that means Assad intends on doing what they want him to, but if he doesn’t do it then HTS has taken a big risk in opposing the Muslim Brotherhood, Erdogan, and the Syrian Interim Opposition Government, they’ll be in the same boat the Turkish backed terrorists are if Assad doesn’t reward them in some way. This is the reason the pro Turkish/Syrian Interim Government terrorists are panicking, Turkey, Iran, Russia, the US and the UN are all firmly behind the implementation of resolution 2254, the resolution that gives the Turkish backed designated terrorists no future in Syria, but lucky for them Assad’s been stalling the process for all he’s worth, so they have a little life left for a little while longer. But Assad’s not stalling the process to help the Turkish backed terrorists, he’s doing it to help subvert Turkey and the Muslim Brotherhoods influence over the local population, he wants them out first because they’re the biggest threat to Syria, HTS can be dealt with easily once Turkey’s out of the picture, either politically if it’s workable, or militarily if it’s not. ……
“The second thing Jeffrey is looking for is to “move from discussing the first principles only, which is what the Damascus regime wants, which is their usual propaganda about their sovereignty and fight against terrorists, but rather real progress about talking about constitutional change. That is very important.
Jeffrey also “urged all parties, including the Syrian regime, to continue this process “the Constitutional Committee” and overcome the terrible economic, military, and diplomatic impasses in which they find themselves.”
Second, Jeffrey’s diplomatic actions reflect American interest, as he began a visit to Turkey, on 22 August, to meet with Turkish officials in Ankara to discuss the Syrian file, and UN Security Council Resolution 2254 related to a ceasefire and a political settlement of the situation in Syria, as confirmed by the US State Department in a statement.
Jeffrey and Joel Rayburn, the State Department’s deputy assistant secretary for Levant affairs and special envoy for Syria, will also meet with the representatives of the Syrian opposition and civil society in Istanbul to discuss the latest developments in Syria.
After that, Jeffrey leaves for Geneva for the first time to attend committee meetings and meets Geir O. Pedersen, United Nations Special Envoy for Syria, and representatives of the guarantor countries (Turkey, Russia, and Iran), as well as Syrian opposition members participating in the meetings of the Constitutional Committee.
On the American interest in the committee, the spokesman for the opposition “High Negotiations Committee” and a member of the Constitutional Committee, Yahya al-Aridi, considered that Washington is interested and willing to find a political solution.”
Assad has his own solution for the problem and Turkey’s definitely isn’t included in it. :]