Islamic Front control staves off opposition infighting in Aleppo
Coordination among the disparate anti-regime forces is more effective in the Aleppo area thanks to control by the Islamic Front and the common threat of the Islamic State, though tension has risen because of rebel infighting in the bordering region.
ALEPPO, Syria — Close relations between the Islamic Front (IF) and other factions have thus far enabled a higher degree of coordination in and around Syria’s former industrial capital than in other regions controlled by anti-regime forces.
The Bab al-Salam border crossing is a fenced route with checkpoints, a media office to register foreign journalists staffed by a former Liwa al-Tawhid Brigades fighter and polite, uniformed IF security officers who work closely with Turkish border guards.
The crossing is the only one at which Western journalists can — generally — get legally stamped out of Turkish territory, and the area across is starkly different from the relative confusion reigning at the Bab al-Hawa crossing farther west.
The latter leads into the Idlib region, where on a trip earlier this year this reporter saw a multitude of rebel brigades’ names spray-painted on walls to mark territory, and where checkpoints of different groups can be tense experiences even for rebel fighters. A variety of groups warily coexisted in the region until fighting broke out between jihadist Jabhat al-Nusra and the moderate Syrian Revolutionaries Front (SRF) and others.
