By Tom Perry and Timour Azhari
(Reuters) – Syria’s Ahmed al-Sharaa has transformed himself from al Qaeda militant to Syrian president in a dramatic political rise capped on Wednesday by a meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump.
The encounter in Saudi Arabia is a milestone for a man who joined al Qaeda in Iraq around the time of the 2003 U.S.-led invasion and spent years in U.S. prison there before returning to Syria to join the insurgency against Bashar al-Assad.
The meeting – following Trump’s announcement of an end to U.S. sanctions on Syria – is a huge boost for Sharaa as he tries to bring the fractured country under his control and revive its economy, and Trump said he was looking to normalise ties with Damascus.
Sharaa took power after his Islamist fighters launched an offensive from their enclave in the northwest in 2024 and toppled Assad, whose allies Russia and Iran were distracted by other wars.
He was long better known as Abu Mohammad al-Golani, his nom de guerre as commander of the Nusra Front, an insurgent group fighting Assad and for years al Qaeda’s official wing in the conflict.
He cut ties with al Qaeda in 2016, gradually recasting his group as part of the Syrian revolution rather than global jihad.
Sharaa swapped combat fatigues for suits and ties after entering Damascus as Syria’s de facto ruler in December 2024, promising to replace Assad’s brutal police state with an inclusive and just order.
He cited priorities including reuniting Syria, reviving an economy choked by sanctions and bringing arms under state authority. His administration won significant backing from Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar.
But he has struggled to meet his aims as armed groups kept their weapons, sanctions remained and sectarian killings left minority groups afraid of his rule.
Israel, alleging Sharaa remains a jihadist, has declared south Syria off limits to his forces. It said a strike near the presidential palace in Damascus on May 2 was a warning that it would not let Syrian forces deploy south of the capital or allow any threat to Syria’s Druze minority.
The challenges were laid bare in March when Assad loyalists attacked government forces in the coastal region, prompting a wave of revenge killing in which Islamist gunmen killed hundreds of civilians from the Alawite minority, from which Assad hailed.
It amplified fears about the jihadist roots of Syria’s new ruling group despite Sharaa’s promises of tolerance and accountability for the killings. Fears of a slide back towards authoritarian rule were hardened by a temporary constitution focusing power in his hands.
SHARIA LAW
Sharaa characterised Assad’s defeat as a God-given victory.
He sidestepped interviewers’ questions on whether he thought Syria should apply Islamic sharia law, saying it was for experts to decide. The temporary constitution strengthened its role.
He cited revolutionary legitimacy for his designation as interim president. He has said elections will take place, but that Syria needs up to five years to organise them properly.
In a Reuters interview at the presidential palace, Sharaa underlined his intention to turn the page on Assad’s rule.
“My chest tightens in this palace. I’m astonished by how much evil against society emanated from every corner,” he said.
Sharaa was born in Saudi Arabia, where he spent the first years of his life before moving to Syria. His father was an Arab nationalist, an ideology at odds with Sharaa’s political Islam.
In a 2021 interview with the U.S. Public Broadcasting Service’s FRONTLINE programme, Sharaa said he was influenced by the second Palestinian Intifada, or uprising against Israeli occupation, which began in 2000.
He returned to Syria from Iraq once the uprising began, sent by the leader of the al Qaeda-affiliated Islamic State group in Iraq at the time, Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, to build up al Qaeda’s presence.
The U.S. designated Sharaa a terrorist in 2013, saying al Qaeda in Iraq had tasked him with overthrowing Assad’s rule and establishing Islamic sharia law in Syria. It said the Nusra Front had carried out suicide attacks that killed civilians and espoused a violent sectarian vision.
Sharaa gave his first media interview in 2013, his face wrapped in a scarf and showing his back to the camera. He told Al Jazeera Syria should be run according to sharia law.
In his 2021 FRONTLINE interview, he faced the camera in a shirt and jacket. He said the terrorist designation was unfair and that he opposed the killing of innocent people.
Asked about his views on the September 11 attacks at the time they happened, Sharaa said anybody in the Arab or Islamic world who said “he wasn’t happy would be lying to you, because people felt the injustice of the Americans in their support of the Zionists, their policies towards Muslims in general, and their clear and strong support of the tyrants in the region”.
“But people regret the killing of innocent people, for sure,” he said.
The Nusra Front had never presented a threat to the West, he said. Despite its al Qaeda ties, Nusra was regarded as relatively less heavy handed in dealings with civilians and other rebel groups than Islamic State.
(Writing by Tom Perry, Editing by William Maclean and Timothy Heritage)
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