How Will the New Syria Be Governed?
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Support for this podcast and the following message come from Allianz Travel Insurance. Planning on Jamaica for Christmas and Iceland in July? An all-trips plan can protect your trips all year. Learn more at AllianzTravelInsurance.com. Today on State of the World, how will the new Syria be governed? You're listening to State of the World from NPR. We are the day's most vital international stories up close where they're happening. I'm Greg Dixon. Syria is in a moment of transition.

Syrians are at once rejoicing that 14 years of devastating civil war have come to an end, and also anxiously watching for what will come next as a new government is invented after more than 50 years of dictatorship. The rebel group that led the toppling of the Assad regime in December is now heading the interim government. And to get an idea of how they might rule the new Syria, Emperor's Emily Fang traveled to a city the group controlled during much of the civil war.

As we drive into Idlib, a city in northwestern Syria, we see a succession of dirt barricades. They're the remains of checkpoints. They used to cordon off this part of Syria from territories held by the former regime. And inside these former cordons in Idlib is where Ahmed al-Sharah, leader of the fighting group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS, is now.

And now the interim president first held court. And as Zahra Jabir explains, Shara first had to compete with other factions vying for control.

Jabir is a Syrian journalist and activist who lived in Idlib during the Syrian civil war. Jabir says Shara's group was among several militias which imposed conservative Islamist rules, like burning down cigarette and alcohol stores. During the early phases of Shara's rule here in Idlib, his group was more conservative.

Here's cafe owner Abdul Kahar Zakour. He says women could no longer work next to men or enter stores alone if the employees were men. We're sitting in his airy cafe surrounded by people smoking shisha, the water pipe, and with Fayrouz, the Lebanese singer beloved in the Arab world, crooning in the background. 15, 16, 17.

All of this, soccer notes, waving at the smokers and the music, was technically forbidden early on under HTS rule. Jerome Drevin is a senior analyst with a non-profit international crisis group who is writing a book on HTS. He has been interviewing the group for years, including Shara, back when the leader was working with Al-Qaeda. But gradually it understood that it wasn't working. People were pushing back. So Shara then split with Al-Qaeda,

Once he consolidated power in Idlib, he relaxed Islamist rules, a process that began as early as 2017. This ideological pragmatism and a willingness to evolve is a hallmark of HDS. Drevin found Sharaa...

with a combination of co-optation, convincing, and also repression. That meant employment laws segregating genders were also removed. HTS also focused on setting up social services. Their ideological practicality is evident at this shisha store in downtown Idlib, whose owner Yamin Shahr says even during the most strict period of HTS Islamist rule, banning shisha is

He kept selling water pipes. Smoker's gonna smoke, he shrugs. HDS looked the other way. Shahr also says, like everyone we spoke to in Idlib, HDS has been the most incorruptible faction so far, with low taxes and no bribes.

HTS's practicality is front and center in clothing stores and idlib. Yamin Harboot, a salesperson at one of them, says there were small things HTS did not allow, like very short clothing. But they did not really enforce rules that banned bright colors, for example.

And now, with its leader Syria's interim president, HDS appears to be focusing on bigger issues, like co-opting any remaining opposition groups. One of those opposition voices was Zahir Jaber, the Idlib-based activist. He says last year he organized a demonstration against HDS in Idlib. He said he was afraid that too much power was concentrated in one leader's hands.

that of Ahmed al-Sharah. He expected to be arrested and shot at like he was by the former regime. Instead, Jabra says he was called in for a meeting with Ahmed al-Sharah himself and his suggestions noted and some even incorporated. Jabra walked away a fan of HTS and Syria's new leader, even if it means a more religiously conservative government for the entire country.

Emily Fang, NPR News, Idlib. That's the state of the world from NPR. Thank you for listening.

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