Syria’s Jihadist Leader Calls for Peace While Forces Massacre Minorities

Syria’s interim president Ahmed al-Sharaa, a former jihadist leader with deep ties to Al-Qaeda and ISIS, called for “national unity” on Sunday even as his forces carried out mass killings of minorities across Syria’s coastal regions.

Speaking from a mosque in Damascus, al-Sharaa insisted that Syria could “live together” despite the ongoing slaughter of Alawite, Christian, and other minority communities by his own militant allies. The hypocrisy of his message was immediately apparent.

Reports from multiple watchdog groups, including the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), paint a horrifying picture of mass executions, looting, and destruction:

• 745 Alawite civilians have been killed in Latakia and Tartous.

• An additional 300 government security personnel and 148 pro-Assad militants were executed.

• Christians have been targeted, with churches desecrated and civilians murdered, including Greek Orthodox victims in Tartous.

• Food and water supplies have been cut off, leaving entire neighborhoods without basic necessities.

Sharaa’s response? A "fact-finding committee" and vague promises of accountability while his forces continued their attacks.

Al-Sharaa is not just a warlord he is a former terrorist leader. His group, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), was once designated a terrorist organization by the United States due to its Al-Qaeda links. Before his rebranding effort, al-Sharaa worked alongside ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and had a $10 million FBI bounty on his head. That designation was mysteriously lifted in 2024, raising serious questions about Western policy toward Syria.

While Joe Biden’s administration was busy legitimizing radical Islamists, the real victims the religious and ethnic minorities of Syria were left to fend for themselves.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio issued a strong condemnation of the killings, calling them acts of "radical Islamic terrorists, including foreign jihadis." He reaffirmed America’s commitment to Syria’s persecuted minorities and demanded accountability for the attacks.

But words are not enough. The Biden administration helped pave the way for this disaster by failing to support Syria’s vulnerable minority groups. Now, the world is witnessing the predictable consequences: mass killings, religious persecution, and the destruction of communities that have existed for centuries.

As the violence continues, one thing is clear: Al-Sharaa’s Syria is not a land of unity, but a jihadist state built on bloodshed.

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