After the rapid fall of the Assad regime, the jihadist organization Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) has quickly become the key player in Syria and is evolving towards an ideological refocusing that is “at once Sunni, Islamic, conservative and revolutionary,” according to Swiss researcher Patrick Haenni (European University Institute in Florence, Italy) in an interview with Orient XXI (December 23). Haenni has been a frequent visitor to the HTS’s headquarters in Idlib since 2019 and has had several in-depth conversations with its leader over the years. While nobody can predict how HTS will evolve now that it is in a position of power, and it remains to be seen how it will manage to find the human resources for running the country and ensuring its security (with other armed factions in the country), its case offers important insights about what it takes for a jihadist, radical movement to turn possibly into something else. Originally leading a branch of Al Qaeda, HTS commanders had started engaging in ideological mainstreaming as early as 2017. “HTS is not a movement which has transformed itself as a result of a vast doctrinal revision or deradicalization as some Egyptian or Libyan groups have done,” Haenni explains. “Rather, it has undergone a journey of deradicalization for several years via a succession of tactical adaptations to a new geostrategic or local environment.” After breaking with Al Qaeda, HTS adopted the Shafi’i school of jurisprudence, which was closer to the Sufism of the local populations. In its stronghold of Idlib, it also left in place the lower-level clerics from the local communities.
According to Haenni’s observations, Salafism has thus become partly diluted through interaction with the local population. At the same time, there has been no real ideological updating, if only to avoid antagonizing the group’s most conservative members, who are suspicious about the developments. HTS therefore remains rather vague about its views. “Some define themselves as Sunni conservatives, others as Islamist revolutionaries, still others as political jihadists.” Reading Haenni’s analyses, one can identify some key factors that may help a jihadist movement make significant adjustments. Its leaders must be willing to prioritize practical governance over ideological purity. It needs to turn away from global jihad back to local roots, to local cultural and religious practices, while working with existing social structures rather than trying to overturn them. It has to create governance structures that extend beyond military control, incorporating technical expertise and building institutions that can deliver basic services (as HTS actually managed to do in Idlib during its rule there). It must show its ability to govern diverse populations and move from persecution to protection of religious minorities. It should be willing to work with regional powers (like Turkey in HTS’s case). It has to grant space for multiple interpretations rather than enforcing rigid orthodoxy, while controlling more radical armed groups and ensuring security. It now remains to be seen if HTS will continue on such paths and how it will manage the shift from Idlib to Damascus.
(Orient XXI, https://orientxxi.info/magazine/hayat-tahrir-al-sham-an-ideological-conversion-under-the-microscope,7876)
