WASHINGTON — After a lightning fast and stunningly successful offensive, Syrian rebels have not only seized control of Aleppo, the second biggest city, but on Sunday they also conquered Damascus, the Syrian capital.
Bashar al-Assad — the wicked and cruel president who killed more than 500,000 civilians and sent millions more fleeing for safety amidst the country’s savage civil war — has fled the country to an undisclosed location, according to a statement by the Russian Foreign Ministry.
Now, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a radical Islamist terrorist organization that used to be known as the “Nusra Front,” is in charge of large swaths of the country.
Abu Mohammed al-Golani, the shadowy leader of HTS who used to be part of al-Qaeda and ISIS, is rapidly emerging as the new strongman.
But no one yet knows his exact intentions.
“Before founding the Nusra Front, Golani had fought for al Qaeda in Iraq, where he spent five years in a U.S. prison,” reports Reuters.
“He returned to Syria once the uprising began, sent by the leader of the Islamic State group in Iraq at the time — Abu Omar al-Baghdadi — to build up al Qaeda’s presence.”
“The United States designated Golani a terrorist in 2013, saying that al Qaeda in Iraq had tasked him with overthrowing Assad’s rule and establishing Islamic sharia law in Syria, and that Nusra had carried out suicide attacks that killed civilians and espoused a violent sectarian vision,” Reuters reported.
As a result, Israeli leaders are worried that HTS will seize control of Syria’s chemical weapons stockpiles.
That’s why the IDF began bombing weapons depots across Syria soon after Damascus fell.
The IDF also began moving tanks and troops to the Israeli-Syrian border to make certain none of the warring factions in Syria make a move against the Jewish state.
Also worried are Syrian Christians and we need to be praying for them — and for all Syrians — without ceasing.
Since the civil war erupted in Syria in 2011, the number of Christians there has plummeted from about 1.3 million to under 600,000.
Some estimates put the number even lower, at about 300,000.
And with jihadists previously affiliated with ISIS surging to power, the danger to however many Christians that remain has just risen exponentially.
ALL ARAB NEWS and ALL ISRAEL NEWS will be monitoring the situation closely and reporting on developments in Syria from a number of angles, including how Christians there are responding to rapidly unfolding events.
