Check out my new article with Charles Lister for Foreign Policy’s Middle East Channel: "The Crowning of the Syrian Islamic Front"

Hezbollah’s victory in Syria in the Battle of Qusair was a wake up call for many pro-Islamist actors in the Arab world. In response, Qatar — through Yusef al-Qaradawi and Al Jazeera as well as key Egyptian Islamic leaders — has gone on the offensive. These players have publicized key Islamist factions, especially the Syrian Islamic Front (SIF) as well as called for jihad as a necessary duty for all. Through these actions, one of the key winners has been the SIF, a Salafi umbrella formation, which is arguably the best fighting force within the opposition.
The SIF, led by its principal constituent force, Harakat Ahrar al-Sham al-Islamiya (HASI), coordinates extensively with the al Qaeda affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra (and though skeptical of the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham, coordinates with it in Aleppo), but also with all other Syrian rebel groups. While it is more than willing to fight alongside groups loyal to the so-called Free Syrian Army (FSA) and the Syrian National Coalition, it expressly rejects their rights to represent the entire Syrian opposition. The SIF’s insistence in a future Syria becoming an Islamic state ruled by sharia contradicts the objectives expressed by the wider moderate opposition. Although it has not issued any direct threats outside Syria, the SIF is opposed to any external intervention in Syria by any Western state and its leader has threatened attacks on any foreign military force entering Syria, supportive or opposed to President Bashar al-Assad.
In the past two weeks, the SIF’s leader, Hassan Aboud Abu Abdullah al-Hamawi, has publicly appeared for the first time in an Al Jazeera interview, attended a conference of senior Muslim clerics in Cairo calling for jihad (the only Syrian rebel leader present), and spoke on the Egyptian Salafi TV station al-Nas. It appears that key players with vested interests in Qatar and Egypt’s clerical community are attempting to anoint the SIF as the leaders of the Syrian revolution.
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