| Once upon a time, back in 2011, the Free Syrian Army was the big tent opposition to the Bashar al Assad Baathist Syrian government, and Amar al-Wawi, a former government intelligence officer, moved freely across the border between Turkey and Syria as their public relations man. Then ISIS and Al Nusra broke away, the Muslim Brotherhooder types set themselves up as the Islamic Front, and the non-religious rump withered away, leaving an empty name to be used by Turkey for its mixture of Turkic paramilitaries and ISIS remnants stationed on the Syrian side of Turkey’s border to guard it and harass the Kurdish and Syrian natives. Amar al-Wawi seems to have kept his footing, though, clearly continuing to make himself as useful to the Turkish paymasters in the current setup as he was to them in the heady days of the Arab Spring. |
