{"id":207282,"date":"2015-12-09T13:06:17","date_gmt":"2015-12-09T13:06:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/jabhat-al-nusra-a-greater-threat-to-syria-than-islamic-state\/"},"modified":"2015-12-09T13:06:17","modified_gmt":"2015-12-09T13:06:17","slug":"jabhat-al-nusra-a-greater-threat-to-syria-than-islamic-state","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/jabhat-al-nusra-a-greater-threat-to-syria-than-islamic-state\/","title":{"rendered":"Jabhat al-Nusra a Greater Threat to Syria Than Islamic State"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\"Unlike<\/p>\n

Unlike the Islamic State, Jabhat al-Nusra actually strikes the Assad regime. (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

There\u2019s no shortage of players acting in bad \u2013 or at least, questionable \u2013 faith in Syria. First, of course, the regime of President Bashar al-Assad; then the Islamic State \u2013 choose your poison. On another level, Russia, the United States, and France.<\/span><\/p>\n

At the <\/span>National Interest, Daniel DePetris<\/span><\/a> writes about a player too often overlooked.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\u2026 with all of the concentration on the Islamic State, another highly significant and dangerous terrorist organization is operating largely under the radar: Jabhat al-Nusra [which] shares the same \u2026 interpretation of Islam as ISIL, despises any and all sectarian groups outside of Syria\u2019s majority Sunni community and has engaged in the same kind of atrocities [as the Islamic State].<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

In fact<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\u2026 some of Nusra\u2019s key commanders were originally members of ISIL\u2019s predecessor group, the Islamic State of Iraq.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

And<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Before the Islamic State was operating on the ground in Syria, Jabhat al-Nusra was carrying out highly lethal terrorist attacks in the heart of the Assad regime\u2019s territory. The first [likely] attack that the international media picked up [was] a double-suicide bombing in front of Syria\u2019s State Security Directorate and an army office in Damascus, killing 44 civilians in the process. In May 2012, another suicide bombing in Damascus claimed 55 lives.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The Islamic State is more interested in attacking other rebel groups, and lately, the West. Whereas Jabhat al-Nusra<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\u2026 continues to specialize in the kinds of attacks that other opposition groups in Syria are either unwilling or incapable of executing: strikes at the source of the Syrian regime\u2019s military power.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

In other words, should the Islamic State be destroyed or the Assad regime toppled, Jabhat al-Nusra will be waiting in the wings.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

This piece was reprinted from Foreign Policy In Focus<\/a> by RINF Alternative News<\/a> with permission. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Unlike the Islamic State, Jabhat al-Nusra actually strikes the Assad regime. (Photo: Wikimedia Commons) There\u2019s no shortage of players acting in bad \u2013 or at least, questionable \u2013 faith in Syria. First, of course, the regime of President Bashar al-Assad; then the Islamic State \u2013 choose your poison. On another level, Russia, the United States, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":207283,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[519],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-207282","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-newswire"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207282","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=207282"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207282\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/207283"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=207282"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=207282"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=207282"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}