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.