Al Qaeda affiliate al-Nusra Front gains ground in Syria

Airstrikes by the U.S.-led coalition against ISIS targeted the Islamist rebel group Ahrar-al-Sham for the first time overnight in Syria, a monitoring group said Thursday.

One airstrike hit the headquarters for Ahrar al Sham in Babsaqa, Idlib province, near the Bab al-Hawa border crossing with Turkey, the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Activist video and photos from the scene claimed to show a large explosion and a building blown into rubble.

Ahrar al Sham is a Sunni Muslim group that is not on the U.S. list of designated terrorist organizations and so far has not been hit by coalition airstrikes.

 

One of the more conservative Sunni militant groups in the rebel alliance, Ahrar al Sham has members that sometimes fight alongside the al Qaeda-affiliated Islamist militant group Jabhat al-Nusra, but against ISIS.

They are not linked to al Qaeda, have not pledged allegiance to al Qaeda, and are not named as a terror group by the United States.

There are mixed opinions on how radical the group is, mostly because its entire leadership was killed in a September blast and the new leadership's intentions are not yet clear, although some observers anticipate a more radical direction.

This may have prompted concern in some quarters that it could become more closely allied to Jabhat al-Nusra, also known as al-Nusra Front, which has been gaining ground in Syria.

However, Ahrar members are also seen by many Syrians as moderates who protect them -- and these strikes, if they did hit Ahrar, risk again confirming the idea that the United States is seeking to benefit the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Children have been reported to have been hit in the strike.

The U.S-led coalition carried out other airstrikes overnight Wednesday to Thursday, including one apparently targeting a vehicle belonging to al-Nusra in Sarmada, a town also in Idlib province on the border with Turkey.

Video posted by activists purported to show a car in flames on the street in Sarmada while people watched it burn.

The coalition also struck the headquarters of al-Nusra Front in the city of Harim, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said, with initial reports indicating that two children were killed and other people were injured.

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