Training camps run by the Al Nusrah Front, the Khorasan Group, and a Chechen-led group, Khalifat Jamaat, were identified in Syria. The Long War Journal has identified 42 jihadist training camps in Iraq and Syria.
Abu Muhammad al Julani seeks to undermine public support for airstrikes in Syria by arguing that citizens in the West, and not just their rulers, will pay the price for the war. Julani also discusses Al Nusrah’s fight against Hezbollah and urges jihadists not to join the West in the fight against the Islamic State.
Al Qaeda and its allies in Syria were struck by US warplanes on the first day, but have not been targeted since.
One of the first reported casualties of the US-led bombing campaign earlier this week was an Al Nusrah Front commander known as Abu Yusuf al Turki. He had been training al Qaeda snipers in Syria. He was previously suspected of plotting to attack the 2004 NATO summit in Turkey.
The threat posed by al Qaeda remains today. The “Khorasan group” is merely al Qaeda in Syria.
The most recent attacks did not hit the Khorasan group, al Qaeda’s leadership cadre inside Syria that is plotting to attack the West.
The Al Nusrah Front, al Qaeda’s official branch in Syria, has posted a series of photos purportedly showing sites struck by the US.
The strikes against the Islamic State and al Qaeda in Syria were “organized in three waves.”
