Western powers, including the United States, are tentatively opening lines of communication to the new rulers of Syria — an alliance of Islamists led by an al-Qaeda splinter group whose boss is, inconveniently, a designated terrorist with a $10 million U.S. bounty on his head.
Ousted dictator Bashar Assad had few friends outside of his patrons in Iran and Russia, so a very thin atmosphere of optimism surrounds the new power in Damascus. The insurgent alliance was led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a group that began as al-Qaeda’s franchise in Syria.
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