Since the Turkish offensive into Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) held territories in October 2019, local Kurdish media reports of the Turkish intelligence agency’s operations to free ISIS affiliates have started to ring alarm bells. And increasingly, Turkey’s relationship with ISIS affiliates operating in Syria have come into question, like reported by alarabiya.net.

The following month in November, the predominantly Kurdish US-allied SDF’s counter-terrorism unit arrested members of an ISIS cell involved in smuggling the organization’s affiliates out of northeast Syria. Furthermore, counter-terrorism investigations uncovered that the Turkish National Intelligence Organization, known as MIT, had commissioned Abu Naji, a leader of the Turkish-backed Ahrar al-Sham paramilitary group, to smuggle ISIS family members out of al-Hol camp, according to a statement by SDF-affiliated Manbij Military Council. Naji had previously carried out several bombings in Manbij and Hasakah, the statement said, local Kurdish media reported.

On July 17, Turkish media, including state-run outlets, published a report hailing a successful operation in the northeast of Syria by MIT. The report claimed that MIT “rescued” a Moldavian woman and her four children from the al-Hol camp in northeast Syria, located in territory held by the SDF, where tens of thousands of ISIS members and their family members and affiliates are held at the camp.

The report of Turkey’s involvement in freeing ISIS family members may surprise many who still view Ankara as a NATO ally. However, some experts, have been arguing for some time now that Ankara’s sponsorship of terrorist organizations is much worse than imagined. Michael Rubin, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, wrote in a 2019 article that “Erdogan’s terror complicity is worse than many imagined.”

Furthermore, Turkey’s history has proven that the West cannot solely rely on Ankara to fight terrorists, as it has been unwilling to take on ISIS directly, a report by US think tank RAND from January 2019 found. Recent developments demonstrate that Turkey has undeniably been lying to America about fighting ISIS, and rather their interests lie in countering the Kurds and Erdogan’s opposition.

The news of Turkey freeing ISIS affiliates from US-backed forces comes after serious concerns were raised about Turkey’s possible knowledge of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, ISIS’s notorious leader who was killed in a US raid on October 26, 2019, camping out near the Turkish border, and his replacement who had sheltered in regions controlled by the Turks. After Baghdadi’s killing, former special presidential envoy for the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS Brett McGurk penned an op-ed in the Washington Post in which he explored Turkey’s relationship with Baghdadi as he was found in northwestern Syria, just a few miles from Turkey’s border and called into question Ankara’s complicity in the affair.

Indeed, the main reason behind Turkey’s continued support of extremist groups, such as ISIS, stems from the fact that Erdogan shares the same values as the Muslim Brotherhood, a group which Erdogan has offered protection to within Turkish borders. As a result of relations between Turkey and the ISIS, members of the terrorist organization and their families seek to go to Turkey as they believe they won’t face legal repercussions there for their decision to join ISIS, a report by the London-based Investigative Journal found.

The Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES), known as Rojava, has plans to set up an international tribunal to try ISIS members. However, some countries, including the UK, did not support Rojava’s plan, and has even rejected any support of Kurdish officials’ plan about rehabilitation and reintegrating ISIS families and members. A recognition of Rojava would upset Erdogan, and where Western nations still consider Turkey an ally, they can’t risk upsetting Erdogan.

Nevertheless, British officials are now facing a backlash over the handling of the issue and cases such as Shamima Begum’s, a former UK citizen who is currently held at al-Hol camp. Begum left the UK in 2015 to join ISIS, and the UK Home Office has revoked her citizenship; as she seeks to return to the UK, whether or not the UK should grant her citizenship has been the subject of fierce internal debate in Britain.

In essence, Turkey’s involvement in freeing ISIS affiliates has been described by Homeland Security Today as a move that demonstrates Erdogan and his followers support for Jihadi groups has gone from rhetorical to a genuine and cultish support. Further, the move marks a significant security risk. In May, a Nordic Monitor report found that Erdogan’s chief aide Sefer Turan was a staunch supporter of the Egytian Islamic Jihad, an al-Qaeda affiliated group.

In fact, Ankara does not even see the need to hide its undeniable supports for terrorist groups. In January 2019, MIT was accused of sending $600,000 to the al-Shabab terrorist organization in Somalia. Turkey’s anti-Western and pro-Putin position, its totalitarianism, and Western officials’ inability to acknowledge the reality is endangering the security of the West and the Middle East. It is a delusion to think that Turkey is not lost yet, and failing to understand this new Turkey will only compound the disaster.

Iranian forces used two ships and a helicopter to board a tanker called the Wila in international waters, U.S. Central Command said in a tweet on Wednesday.

The ship was most recently near the Strait of Hormuz, a critical trade choke-point that borders Iran and accounts for about one-third of the world’s seaborne oil flows. Iran last year seized a British oil tanker in the strait for about two months, flaring tensions with the U.S. and boosting oil price volatility.

The Wila was eventually released by Iranian forces, and the U.S. military was not involved in anything other than monitoring, Reuters reported, citing an unidentified official with knowledge of the matter. The White House and National Security Council did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Wila, a chemicals and oil products tanker sailing under the Liberian flag, has been floating off the eastern coast of the United Arab Emirates for about a month, according to ship-tracking data compiled by Bloomberg. Its previous stop was about July 8 near the Iraqi oil terminal of Al Basra, where its draft increased, indicating it picked up a shipment, according to the data.

With a capacity of about 50,000 barrels, the Wila is relatively small compared to the tankers that ship Middle East crude, which are usually up to 2 million barrels.

In 2018, the Trump administration imposed a “maximum pressure” campaign against Iran with the aim to cut off oil exports, a crucial source of revenue. Overseas sales dropped from 2.5 million barrels a day in April 2018 to just under 200,000 barrels last month, according to Bloomberg’s latest tracking data.

The U.S. has also recently stepped up efforts to limit trade between Iran and Venezuela, which are both under American sanctions. Five Iranian tankers carrying a total of 1.5 million barrels of gasoline arrived in Venezuela in May and June. U.S. prosecutors last month said they’re seeking to seize the gasoline on board four more Venezuela-bound Iranian vessels.

Abu Firas, a founding member of the al-Qaida linked militant group, was reportedly killed in the rebel held province of Idlib according to syriahr.com.

A prominent leader in Syrian al-Qaida offshoot al-Nusra Front was killed on Sunday in an air raid in the rebel held north-west province of Idlib alongside at least 20 other militants including foreign jihadists, rebels and a monitoring group have said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which tracks violence in the country, confirmed reports on websites by militant sympathisers that Abu Firas, known as “the Syrian”, was killed in a suspected Syrian or Russian air raid on a village north-west of the city of Idlib.

Abu Firas was a well known figure who had many followers within the hardline group and who gave commentaries released by al-Nusra Front on sensitive issues ranging from governance to religious jurisprudence.

An Islamist source said Abu Firas was a founding member of the militant group who fought in Afghanistan in the 1980s and was a senior member of its policy making Shura Council. He also worked with Osama bin Laden.

An army defector, Abu Firas originally came from Madaya, near Damascus, another source said.

The militant who supported the imposition of Islamic sharia across Syria was killed alongside his son and Uzbekistan fighters in a strike that also targeted the militant Jund al-Aqasa group in the village of Kafr Jales in mainly non-government-controlled Idlib province, the monitor said.

A fragile “cessation of hostilities” truce has held in Syria for over a month as the various parties try to negotiate an end to Syria’s five-year civil war.

But the truce excludes Islamic State and al-Nusra Front, and air and land attacks by Syrian and allied forces continue in parts of Syria where the government says the groups are present.

Islamic State has killed at least 40 U.S. backed Syrian fighters and regained areas it had earlier lost in a major flare-up of violence in the last pocket of land controlled by the group, according to a monitoring group.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the group has killed dozens of members of the Syrian Democratic Forces and captured at least 20 of them after launching a counteroffensive in the eastern province of Deir el-Zour.

The terrorist group also is said to have captured Sousa, a village which they lost control of earlier this week.

The ISIS-linked Aamaq news agency released video of six SDF gunmen it said had been captured alive, according to the Associated Press.

Fighting reportedly continued until early Saturday, with IS fighters attacking SDF positions in the area.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guard launched missiles targeting a mock aircraft carrier in the strategic Strait of Hormuz, a drill that was condemned by the US as “irresponsible and reckless behavior by Iran”, like reported by aawsat.com.

Footage broadcasted on Iranian state television showed the IRGC’s air and naval forces readying for an attack off the country’s southwest coast.

Speedboats skimmed across the water in formation before ground forces fired cannons and a missile was launched from a helicopter.

The mock-up of a Nimitz-class aircraft carrier came into view with rows of dummy fighter jets on either side of its landing strip, AFP reported.

Another missile fired from a helicopter left a trail of smoke before appearing to smash into the side of the fake warship.

“What was shown today in these exercises at the level of aerospace and naval forces was all offensive,” IRGC commander, Major General Hossein Salami told state television.

Tensions have escalated between Iran and the United States since US President Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew from a landmark nuclear deal in 2018.

Spokeswoman for the US Navy’s Bahrain-based 5th Fleet that patrols the Mideast, said officials were aware of an Iranian exercise she described as “attempting to intimidate and coerce,” The Associated Press reported.

“While we are always watchful of this type of irresponsible and reckless behavior by Iran in the vicinity of busy international waterways, this exercise has not disrupted coalition operations in the area nor had any impacts to the free flow of commerce in the Strait of Hormuz and surrounding waters,” Rebecca Rebarich said.

There has been a significant rise in ISIS attacks in Iraq and Syria, with the group exploiting security gaps in Iraq caused by the coronavirus pandemic to relaunch and invigorate its rural insurgency in the country, according to a report submitted to the UN Security Council that was made public on Thursday, like reported by cnn.com.

The wide-ranging report, put together by the UN monitoring team that tracks the global jihadi terror threat, states that the group is consolidating in Iraq and Syria and “showing confidence in its ability to increasingly operate in a brazen manner in its former core area.”

It states that the number of ISIS attacks in Iraq and Syria “increased significantly in early 2020 as compared with the same period in 2019.”
Referring to the situation in Iraq, the UN monitoring team stated that ISIS has “exploited security gaps caused by the pandemic and by political turbulence in Iraq to relaunch a sustained rural insurgency, as well as sporadic operations in Baghdad and other large cities.”

In recent weeks in particular, Iraq has seen a huge surge in Covid-19 cases, with the number of cumulative cases surpassing 100,000 on Thursday compared with fewer than 7,000 confirmed on June 1.

Syria has far fewer confirmed cases, but leaders of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces say ISIS has exploited the fact that the pandemic has limited the SDF’s mobility in the region.

Gen. Mazloum Abdi, the top commander of the SDF, told CTC Sentinel, the monthly publication of the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point, in June that a major Covid-19 outbreak would limit his forces’ ability to counter the Islamic State “because we will be busy managing the situation in detention facilities” where the group currently houses thousands of former ISIS members.

The newly released UN report, which is based on information from member states, estimates that there are currently more than 10,000 ISIS fighters in Iraq and Syria.

One reason for ISIS’s resilience in those countries is money. According to the new UN report, member states assess ISIS still has approximately $100 million in reserves. It states the group’s assets are “believed to take the form of cash, buried or stored in caches across the conflict zone or kept with financial facilitators in neighbouring countries. Some of the funds have been invested in legitimate businesses in Iraq, the Syrian Arab Republic and neighbouring countries.”
Report challenges Trump’s narrative

The new United Nations findings challenge the narrative of President Donald Trump, who earlier this year claimed to have destroyed “100% of ISIS and its territorial caliphate.”

The UN monitors also presented a more pessimistic assessment than that recently presented by the Trump administration. In June, Ambassador James Jeffrey, the special envoy to the global coalition to defeat ISIS, stated that although ISIS remained “a resilient and significant threat” in Iraq and Syria, there had been a small reduction in the overall number of ISIS attacks and a lessening in their complexity, “so we think the situation is not getting worse, it’s getting better.”

The UN report does not paint a uniformly negative picture of the evolving ISIS threat in Iraq and Syria. It noted that several significant ISIS leaders had been removed since Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was killed last October and that “as some financial facilitators are captured or killed in counter-terrorism operations, knowledge of the whereabouts of hidden funds may also be lost.”

The new UN report also notes that ISIS’s new leader Amir Muhammad Sa’id Abdal-Rahman al-Mawla “has not visibly asserted himself in communications, which may prove to be a limiting factor in his influence and appeal, and perhaps that of the group.”
In June the US government doubled the reward for information about al-Mawla to $10 million.

When it came to the big picture the new UN report noted that although ISIS “maintains the ambition to control territory and populations … for the moment, [it] represents an entrenched rural insurgency without the reach to threaten urban areas on a sustained basis.”

Covid-19 and the global terror threat
The UN report finds that outside of Syria, Iraq and other conflict zones, the short-term terror threat has fallen as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic, noting that “restrictions on international travel significantly constrain terrorist mobility, networking and finance-related activity” and that targets have become more elusive because of the discouragement of public gatherings

However, it warns that ISIS has “had a captive audience during the lockdown and, if it has successfully used this for planning and recruitment purposes, it is possible that the easing of restrictions in non-conflict zones will see a spike in attacks once targets become available again. Another motivation is fear of irrelevance: COVID-19 largely eclipsed terrorism from the news.”

The report warns that should the pandemic lead to a severe global recession that could create conditions where terrorist and extremist narratives gain increased currency.

The report also noted that there have been no indications that ISIS “is systematically attempting to weaponize the virus.”
Concern over al Qaeda

The report warns that the security situation in West Africa and the Sahel is a particular cause for concern, stating that ISIS and al Qaeda franchises there “continued to enjoy operational success in early 2020,” which led to heightened concerns about stability in the region.

It also states that al Qaeda remains active in Afghanistan nearly 19 years after 9/11 and notes that its leadership continues to maintain a close relationship with the Haqqani network, a powerful subgroup within the Afghan Taliban.

A Pentagon report published earlier this month reached a similar conclusion.
The persisting close relations between al Qaeda and the Taliban are widely seen as one of the main stumbling blocks to future progress in the peace process in Afghanistan in the wake of the agreement signed between the US and the Taliban earlier this year.

Though there has been speculation that al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri may, like Osama bin Laden, have hidden in Pakistan, the UN report states that according to member states, al-Zawahiri is currently based in Afghanistan. The report finds that should al-Zawahiri’s “poor health … force a leadership succession, it will be challenging for Al-Qaida in the context of a peace process” in Afghanistan.

The report also found that al Qaeda has “ingrained itself in local communities and conflicts” around the world, with its recent “favored” affiliate in Syria, Hurras al-Din, “committed to preparing for external attacks despite its current focus on targeting Syrian forces” and its Yemeni affiliate, al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, still “determined to mount external operations.”

According to the US government, AQAP had “significant ties” to Saudi air force officer Mohammed Alshamrani, who carried out a terrorist attack that killed three at Naval Air Station Pensacola in Florida in December 2019.

The report states that “during his time at Pensacola and up to the day of the attack, Alshamrani was in direct contact with Abdullah al-Maliki, an AQAP media and Internet recruitment operative who was killed in Yemen on May 13. The Pensacola attack is believed to have been planned prior to Alshamrani’s arrival in the United States.” In a May news conference, Attorney General William Barr and FBI Director Christopher Wray revealed that al-Maliki had been targeted in a counterterrorism operation but did not spell out whether he had been killed.

Special Forces snipers have launched a “secret war” on Islamic State jihadis hiding in mountain caves in Iraq, killing 100 fighters in an attempt to stop an IS resurgence in its tracks, according to standard.co.uk.

The SAS soldiers tracked the IS fighters – who include British people – to the mountains and then attacked with sniper rifles, artillery and precision airstrikes from RAF jets and unmanned drones, the Mail on Sunday reported.

There have been around ten battles in northern Iraq and other secret manoeuvres in Syria since April, the paper said.

Several British jihadis have reportedly been killed in the fighting, after escaping from prison camps and finding their way back to their military units. Islamic State maintains a network of caves and tunnels in Northern Iraq where the fighters took shelter to avoid capture.

The latest attack is said to have began on April 10 when British troops and British-trained Kurdish soldiers, forced the IS fighters into a building before RAF jets flew in from Cyprus, as well as a drone flown by controllers at RAF Waddington in Lincolnshire.

Since then there have reportedly been several battles in April, May and June with the RAF providing back-up firepower.

A defence source told the Mail on Sunday: “The regiment has been having a field day. It’s been hard soldiering in tough conditions, very hot and mountainous, and Islamic State fights to the death.

“Around 100 militants have been eliminated. There was a major battle every few days in May followed by some big clashes in June too.

“It is imperative that IS doesn’t get a foothold in the region again.”

“The RAF’s bombing has been very accurate with no civilian casualties and there have definitely been British jihadis among the deceased. They’ve been identified during the battle in communications intercepts and afterwards from ID cards and by DNA.

Defence minister Ben Wallace said: “The use of RAF jets and Reaper aircraft to deliver successful strikes against terrorists and their hideouts demonstrates that the UK’s defence never sleeps and we will always do what is necessary to protect our people.”

Islamic State lost control of Iraq in 2017 and Syria in 2018. But its fighters have reportedly been gathering together again, causing British and international coalition special forces to respond.

Despite recently suffering setbacks, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) remains a major player in war-torn Yemen and a major regional and global threat. As recently as 2015, with all eyes on the rise of Daesh, AQAP was able to orchestrate the Charlie Hebdo massacre in central Paris—the first jihadi terrorist attack in Europe since 2005, like reported by eeradicalization.com. A new leadership, ongoing fighting in Yemen, and AQAP’s core characteristics leave the terrorist organisation capable to strike on multiple fronts.

New Leadership and Challenges

In February 2020, Washington announced it had killed AQAP’s leader, Qassim al-Rimi in a drone strike. Al-Rimi represented a significant target for U.S. authorities. He was one of the few remaining Al-Qaeda leaders predating the 11 September 2001 attacks. Following initial efforts to re-group and re-organise, AQAP’s new commander, Khalid bin Umar Batarfi, inherits an organization on the back foot.

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) and U.S. counterterrorism campaigns have depleted both AQAP and Islamic State (ISIS) fighters in Yemen through targeted assassinations and the promotion of mass desertion. In 2016, the UAE also led international efforts to expel AQAP from Al-Mukalla, the largest city controlled by the group in Yemen, and brought tribal actors into Arab coalition-supported security structures against the jihadists. AQAP statements and sermons warning local tribesmen that they will be targeted if they cooperate with those militias reflect the pressure this move has put them under.

Gregory Johnsen, author of The Last Refuge: Yemen, al-Qaeda, and America’s War in Arabia, argues that Batarfi was entrusted to lead AQAP’s efforts to rebuild for two major reasons. “First, he is from the Arabian Peninsula”, writes Johnsen, which means he is better able to understand and exploit local conditions. “Second,” says Johnsen, “Batarfi has extensive international jihadi credentials. He trained and fought in Afghanistan prior to September 2001, assisted fighters traveling to Iraq following the U.S. invasion in 2003, and helped lead AQAP’s push to seize territory in southern Yemen in 2010 and 2011.”

Before assuming the leadership, Batarfi was key to Al-Rimi’s plans to take advantage of the chaos in Yemen caused by the fighting between pro-government forces and the Iran-backed Houthis, whose coup in the capital and expansion across Yemen had plunged the country into warfare. More worryingly for the U.S., Batarfi was already in charge of the group’s external operations when AQAP claimed responsibility for orchestrating last year’s deadly shooting at U.S. Naval Air Station Pensacola in Florida.

Structural Resilience

Batarfi has an in-built advantage to his position: eradicating AQAP from Yemen will take much more than some successful military operations by the group’s opponents. AQAP’s success was never much related to its military strength. Rather, AQAP was successful in securing hospitality and endorsement from key towns by winning the complicity of tribal leaders and passive toleration from local populations. To date, the branding of its cause, community development projects, and youth engagement have all played an equally important part in AQAP’s patient integration strategy, which targeted local communities throughout Eastern and Southern Yemen.

To underscore the importance of AQAP’s local strength in Yemen it is worth noting that ISIS, which relied overwhelmingly on bold military operations to inspire fear and support but produced little in the way of culturally specific narratives and did not engage in community engagement, failed to establish itself in a durable way and failed to displace AQAP. It appears sections of ISIS in Yemen—most of which originate as splinters from AQAP—are currently being re-absorbed by AQAP.

Historically, Yemen has functioned as the ideal sanctuary for AQAP and its militants due to its territory and geographical position. The sparsely populated, dry highlands characterising the interior in Central and Eastern Yemen facilitate hiding and guerrilla tactics. Yemen’s long a porous border with Saudi Arabia makes the country the perfect launching point to attack one of the organisation’s primary enemies: The House of Saud. For instance, AQAP’s first operation outside Yemen was an August 2009 suicide bombing in Saudi Arabia that attempted to assassinate the Kingdom’s security chief, Prince Mohammed bin Nayef.

Opportunities Ahead

Last year, the UAE announced its decision to draw down some forces from Yemen. The counter-terrorism mission has continued, notably with the arrest of ISIS’s Yemeni leader, Muhammad Qanan al-Sayari (Abu Osama al-Muhajir), in June 2019, but questions have been raised about the efficacy of the Coalition mission going forward. Batarfi and his organisation is likely to prove a longer-term and more dangerous enemy than ISIS. AQAP will also undoubtedly seek to exploit any faltering in coordination between Saudi Arabia’s military and UAE-trained local forces that have kept AQAP at bay. AQAP is further likely to use any increased prominence in Saudi Arabia’s role to stoke popular resentment about this powerful next-door neighbour’s long-term agenda for Yemen in an attempt to recruit more Yemenis to its cause while revamping the organisation’s mission against the Al-Saud family.

Another fortunate development for Batarfi is the reintensification of hostilities between Yemen’s government and the Saudi-led Arab coalition on one side, against the Iran-backed Houthi rebels on the other. Both of these forces have regularly targeted AQAP—and been targeted by AQAP terrorists. That their energies are now diverted against each other rather than AQAP provides Batarfi some space to regroup. In this context, Yemen’s Al-Jawf, Marib, and Bayda provinces—where AQAP retains the strongest networks and most influence among the tribes—are the areas to watch for AQAP’s revival.

Lastly, the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, which has affected state capacity all over the world by reducing the available resources for security operations, is likely to have a significant effect on Yemen, where the state was already plagued with troubles. It is possible that Batarfi could shift his ambitions, depending on how bad things get, and exploit the instability in Saudi Arabia—or even the West—caused by the coronavirus to launch external terrorist operations.

Conclusion

International jihadi terrorism is in constant state of evolution and AQAP has already demonstrated in the past that terrorist groups that might appear defeated have been able to develop new techniques and to maintain or even increase their appeal and emerge as powerful foes once again. With global and regional powers increasing their focus on other priorities, Yemen continues to offer significant opportunities for AQAP to reverse its military misfortunes on the ground and, possibly, in the months ahead, revive its terrorist sleeper cells around the world.

Twenty-four Houthi rebels were killed in Al-Hudaydah province in western Yemen in the last 24 hours, the Yemeni army told Anadolu Agency late Tuesday.

The rebels were killed after they tried to infiltrate Sana’a road and Kilo 16 region in the east of Al Hudaydah province, according to Memun al-Mehjemi, spokesperson for the army’s al-Amalika Brigade, who said tens of other Houthi militias were injured during clashes.

The Houthis have not yet released a statement.

Yemen has been beset by violence and chaos since 2014, when Houthi rebels overran much of the country, including the capital, Sana’a.

The crisis escalated in 2015 when a Saudi-led military coalition launched a devastating air campaign aimed at rolling back Houthi territorial gains.

Tens of thousands of Yemenis, including civilians, are believed to have been killed in the conflict, which has led to one of the world’s worst humanitarian crisis as millions remain at risk of starvation.

Iranian local media yesterday said a senior commander of the country’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) was killed in Syria.

“IRGC leader Ibrahim Asami has been killed in Syria,” IRGC’s Brigadier, Rustom Ali Rafea, was quoted by IRNA as saying.

Rafea pointed out that Asami was killed “a few days ago”, adding that he was buried in the Iranian western province of Alborz.

Iranian forces have been supporting Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad in his battle against opposition groups which have been working to oust him since the start of the country’s civil war in 2011.