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Syria’s new leader, Abu Mohammad al-Julani, also known as Muhammad al-Jawlani and Abu Muhammad al-Golani, was once subject to a $10 million bounty by the U.S. government, The National Pulse can reveal. His Hayʼat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) organization is a designated foreign terrorist organization regarded as part of the al-Qaeda network.
Al-Julani, born Ahmed Hussein al-Shar’a in Saudi Arabia, is the leading force in Syria following the rapid collapse of Bashar al-Assad’s government, with HTS being the Turkey-backed rebel’s main force. He was formerly allied to the Islamic State in Iraq, and his al-Nusra group was a franchise of al-Qaeda.
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Al-Qaeda released Nusra from this allegiance in 2015, likely for strategic reasons. At the time, al-Qaeda’s then-leader, Ayman al-Zawahiri, said, “The brotherhood of Islam that exists among us is stronger than any passing or changing organizational ties,” instructing al-Julani to integrate his jihadists into the wider anti-Assad movement.
The U.S. government was unconvinced by this rebrand, with