Tahrir al-Sham clashes with weak ISIS in Idlib

Aya Ezz

Northern Syria’s Idlib governorate has witnessed fierce clashes between ISIS and Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), with deaths on both sides, according to reports from the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and the Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA), as well as the Telegram accounts of the terrorist organizations.

According to Baladi News, the clashes took place in the border town of Atma and began when the General Security Service of HTS pursued members of an ISIS cell in the city of Idlib.

The Syrian Observatory confirmed that these clashes are normal, as HTS from time to time launches campaigns and security raids on ISIS hideouts in Idlib with the aim of getting rid of them and because there is no competitor for them in the northern governorate. Sometimes they carry out these campaigns for the purpose of pressuring ISIS elements and forcing them to implement certain goals.

The Observatory stated that the campaign launched by HTS to eliminate ISIS sleeper cells in Idlib is not actually aimed at eliminating them, but rather to re-employ them to serve Turkey and other foreign countries.

It pointed out that HTS leaders claim to liquidate ISIS sleeper cells, but the truth is that they are being transported to new places and entrusted with other tasks, the most important of which is fighting on the fronts against the Syrian army, which is currently happening in the Turkmen Mountains in the Latakia countryside, as well as the western neighborhoods of Aleppo.

The Observatory added that some ISIS operatives who were arrested in recent days were transferred to Turkey to be assigned new tasks in other locations outside Syria, most likely in the Sinai, Libya, Afghanistan and some countries of North Asia.

Syrian political activist Rayan Maarouf said that HTS is currently trying to win Turkey’s friendship and prevent casualties, so it deports a large number of ISIS members to be used in military matters on the Turkish-Syrian borders in order to satisfy Turkey and at the same time preserve its human elements.

Maarouf asserted to the Reference that ISIS has become fragile and weak in Syria, to the point where HTS attacks ISIS dens and kidnaps its members, using them for whatever it desires.