The sudden collapse in December of the long-standing Bashar Assad regime in Syria, unleashed a wave of trouble for most Syrians, with the exception of Islamists and their extremist supporters across ...

In 2013, he refused to swear allegiance to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who would go on to become the emir of the Islamic State group, and instead pledged his loyalty to Al-Qaeda's Ayman al-Zawahiri.