From fighters to police in post-Assad Damascus

Until recently, these people were still at war with the Syrian government. Now, they are setting up checkpoints across the capital. They are veterans of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS. The Islamist group, once an affiliate of Al Qaeda, overthrew Bashar al-Assad’s government in early December. After 13 years of civil war, restoring security is one of HTS’s top priorities. The group has appointed people like Basel al-Helal, a former rebel, to lead the police in Damascus. The police-turned-militants are now controlling traffic and are trying to return property looted during the recent government overthrow. They also said their mission was to conduct raids to capture drug traffickers, thieves and former government officials. Before overthrowing al-Assad, HTS ran a local government in a region of northern Syria it controlled. There, it is accused of human rights abuses, including the imprisonment of critics. This worries some people. They are concerned about how HTS will govern now that it controls a much larger and more diverse area of ​​the country. These HTS fighters say concerns about them are misguided.