A recently formed armed group that emerged in Syria following the ouster of President Bashar al-Assad in December vowed  this week to counter alleged efforts by the United States, Israel and Turkey to divide the country.

In a statement released on Monday and shared by the Iranian Fars news agency, which is affiliated with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the general commander of the Islamic Resistance Front in Syria - Awli al Bas (Great Might) said the formation of his group was a “legitimate response” to the “attempts at division, starvation, displacement, arrest and systematic killing” that Syria is currently witnessing.

“The front emerged from the Syrian people to confront any attempts to undermine the country's security amid the absence of the Syrian Arab army and political and social forces that previously governed Syria,” added the commander, who was not named in the statement.

He further denounced “the coordinated Zionist-Turkish-American displacement plan, backed by Arab support, to divide Syria after the end of the era of the resistant and defiant Syrian [Assad] regime, which had been the backbone of all resistance and liberation movements worldwide from 1970 until the end of 2024.”