Al Nusra Front

• Motivations goals and objectives

Motivation: Religion

Background

The Arab Spring in Syria began in March 2011 as a series of peaceful demonstrations which escalated in response to the savage reaction of Bashar Al-Assad’s Ba’athist regime. Syria’s geographical position makes its security an international priority, wedged as it is between Turkey, Jordan, Iraq, Lebanon and Israel, and with the last three of these countries having particularly tense security situations of their own. Indeed, violence from Syria has already spilled over into all three of these volatile countries, and the threat of further regional destabilisation is very real.

In the 22 months since the Syrian Arab Spring began in earnest, the conflict has turned into something of a war by proxy, with the foreign policy objectives of various countries being fought out on the ground. A number of separate rebel groups have emerged and preparations are being made for a post-Assad Syria as these groups vie for dominance and international support.

JN is one such rebel group, and one of the few which is fighting in the revolution on ideological, jihadist, grounds; the majority of rebel groups are concentrating primarily on the matter of a political change in government. Although all of the rebel groups have the same immediate objective of fighting the regime, it seems likely that following the anticipated fall of Assad, serious discrepancies in long-term aims will emerge.

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Many pro-democracy rebels are in favour of asking the international community for help to create a democratic state in Syria. However, the lack of international intervention has left many of the country’s citizens feeling that the rest of the world has abandoned them, or that the coalition plan is not producing the correct results. This is leading to an increase in public support for jihadist groups, such as JN, as they are seen as an effective force.

JN reject the concept of asking the...