Profiling Jabhat al-Nusra (Charles Lister, Brookings)

Since mid-2014, the world’s attention has been transfixed on the aesthetically shocking actions of ISIS and the threat it poses to regional and international security. However, it is arguably Jabhat al-Nusra in Syria—and perhaps the al-Qaida movement more broadly—that looks more likely to survive over the long term and to threaten local, regional and international security interests. Since its emergence in Syria in late 2011, Jabhat al-Nusra has transformed itself from an unpopular outsider accused of Islamic State in Iraq (ISI)-like brutality towards one of the most powerful armed actors in the Syrian crisis. Moreover, its break away from the ISI in April 2013 set it further down a path of deep integration into the broader Syrian armed opposition in its fight against Bashar Assad’s regime.

http://www.brookings.edu/research/papers/2016/07/27-nusra-front-profile-lister