Jaysh al-Mujahedeen

Jaysh al-Mujahedeen was an Islamist opposition group of 5,000-12,000 fighters that targeted the Islamic State (IS) and the Assad Regime in the Aleppo and Idlib governorates. Jaysh al-Mujahedeen formed on January 3, 2014 exclusively to target IS. In May 2014, a subsidiary brigade, Harakat Nour al-Din al-Zenki, split off from Jaysh al-Mujahedeen to pursue funding from Saudi Arabia because Saudi Arabia allegedly did not want to fund Jaysh al-Mujahedeen due to ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. As Jaysh al-Mujahedeen continued its fight against IS in September 2014, the United States began providing Jaysh al-Mujahedeen with weapons, and sent 50 of the group’s fighters to Qatar for training as part of a CIA program to provide military support to vetted opposition groups. In April 2015, Jaysh al-Mujahedeen joined the Fatah Halab control group and cooperated with groups such as the Levantine Front and Harakat Nour al-Din al-Zenki to fight IS and the Assad Regime. In August 2016, members of the Fatah Halab control group coordinated with the Jaysh al-Fatah umbrella organization to break through the Assad Regime’s siege on the city of Aleppo. In January 2017, Jabhat Fatah al-Sham, formerly known as Jabhat al-Nusra, targeted Jaysh al-Mujahedeen in retaliation for sending representatives to peace talks with the Assad Regime in Kazakhstan. After losing its offices in the Idlib governorate, Jaysh al-Mujahedeen merged with Ahrar al-Sham.