| Army of Emigrants and Supporters Liwa al-Muhajireen wal-Ansar (Arabic:لواء المهاجرون والأنصار) Jaish al-Muhajireen wal-Ansar (جيش المهاجرين والأنصار) | |
|---|---|
 Flag of Jaish al-Muhajireen wal-Ansar | |
| Leaders |
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| Dates of operation | Summer 2012[6] – 2025 |
| Group | Green Battalion |
| Active regions | NorthwesternSyria |
| Ideology | Salafi jihadism Islamic fundamentalism |
| Size | ≈750 fighters (September 2015)[7] |
| Part of |  Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (from 2017)Former:
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| Allies |
Former:
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| Opponents |  Ba'athist Syria Iran Russia United States |
| Battles and wars | |
Preceded by Muhajireen Battalion (Katibat al-Muhajireen) | |
Liwa al-Muhajireen wal-Ansar (LMA,Arabic:لواء المهاجرون والأنصار),Brigade of Emigrants and Supporters or literallyBanner of the Emigrants and Supporters), also known asJaish al-Muhajireen wal-Ansar (JMA orJAMWA,Arabic:جيش المهاجرين والأنصار,Army of Emigrants and Supporters), formerly theMuhajireen Battalion (Arabic:كتيبة المهاجرين,Katibat al-Muhajireen), was aSalafi jihadist group consisting of bothArabic-speaking fighters and fighters from theNorth Caucasus that has been active in theSyrian Civil War against theSyrian government.[16] The group was briefly affiliated with theIslamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in 2013,[2] but after changes in leadership, it took an increasingly hostile stance against it.[17] In September 2015, JMA pledged allegiance to theal-Nusra Front.
The group has beendesignated as a terrorist organization byBahrain,[18]Canada,[19]Malaysia[20] and theUnited States.[21] However, analyst Joanna Paraszczuk has argued that the charges of kidnapping and attacking civilians indicated by theUS State Department were unproven; and that the sanctions will have no practical effect.[22]
At theSyrian Revolution Victory Conference, which was held on 29 January 2025, most factions of the armed opposition, including the Liwa al-Muhajireen wal-Ansar, announced their dissolution and were incorporated into the newly formedMinistry of Defense.[23]
The group was established under the nameMuhajireen Battalion in summer 2012, and was led by an ethnicKist,Abu Omar al-Shishani ("Father of Omar theChechen), an Islamist fighter fromGeorgia’sPankisi Gorge[6] who had fought against Russia in theSecond Chechen War and theRusso-Georgian War. While Syrian jihadist groups likeAhrar ash-Sham andal-Nusra Front included foreign jihadists who had traveled to Syria to fight with the rebels, Jaish al-Muhajireen wal-Ansar was composed largely of non-Syrian fighters when it was formed.[1] Its membership would come to consist of mostly Arabs from Syria,Saudi Arabia andLibya.[16]
The group became involved in theBattle of Aleppo against theSyrian Army and its allies. The group lost ten men in two days in late September 2012 in a confrontation with the Syrian Army; the unit subsequently redeployed after receiving insufficient support from other rebels.[1]
The Muhajireen Battalion went on to participate in major assaults against Syrian military bases in alliance with other jihadist units. In October 2012, they assisted theal-Nusra Front in a raid on the 606 Rocket Brigade, an air defense andScud missile base in Aleppo.[24] In December 2012, they fought alongside al-Nusra Front during the overrunning of the Sheikh Suleiman Army base west of Aleppo. In February 2013, together with theal-Tawhid Brigade and al-Nusra Front, they stormed the base of the Syrian military's 80th Regiment near themain airport in Aleppo.[25]
In March 2013, theKavkaz Center reported that the Muhajireen Battalion had merged with two Syrianjihadist groups, Jaish Muhammad and Kata'ib Khattab, to form the group Jaish Muhajireen wal-Ansar.[26]
The group played a key role in the August 2013 capture ofMenagh Air Base, which culminated in aSVBIED driven by two of their members killing and wounding many of the last remainingSyrian Army defenders.[27] A branch of the Muhajireen Battalion was involved in the2013 Latakia offensive.[28]
In August 2013, Abu Omar al-Shishani released a statement announcing the expulsion of one of his commanders,Sayfullakh Shishani, and 27 of his men from the group. He accused the men of embezzlement and stirring up the animosity of local Syrians against the foreign fighters by indulging intakfir—excommunication—against other Muslims.[29] However, Shishani rejected these charges, instead claiming that he had been expelled because he had opposed Abu Omar's plan to merge JMA with theIslamic State of Iraq and the Levant.[30]
Following the announcement of the death ofCaucasus Emirate leaderDokka Umarov in March 2014, a statement from the North Caucasian members of JMA was posted on the rebelKavkaz Center website pledging allegiance to his successor,Aliaskhab Kebekov.[31]
In February 2014, JMA clashed with the Badr Martyrs' Brigade of the16th Division over theHaritan and Mallah areas of Aleppo. An agreement was then signed on 16 February JMA representativeAbdul Karim Krymsky and Badr Martyrs' Brigade leader Abdul Khaliq Lahyani under the auspices of Ahrar al-Sham representative Abu Amir al-Shami, in which the two groups agreed to release their prisoners from the other party and to work together against the Syrian government, and the Badr Martyrs' Brigade agreed to not set up military headquarters in and around Mallah and to hand over houses to JMA, while JMA agreed for its fighters to remain in these houses and its headquarters, not to stand masked at checkpoints which were to be manned by Ahrar al-Sham and the al-Nusra Front.[32] However, on the next day the commander of JMA,Salahuddin Shishani, stated that Krymsky signed the agreement without consulting him and the rest of JMA's leadership. Al-Shishani denounced the Badr Martyrs' Brigadeas apostates "supported by theinfidelWest" through theSupreme Military Council, and rejected the agreement as invalid.[33][34]
Later in February 2014, JMA joined theAhl al-Sham Operations room, a joint command consisting of the main Aleppo-based rebel groups includingal-Nusra Front, theIslamic Front and theArmy of Mujahideen. In the months that followed, JMA reportedly spearheaded many of the assaults on Syrian government-controlled areas of western Aleppo.[11] On 25 July 2014, the group joined with several other Aleppo-based jihadist factions into an alliance calledJabhat Ansar al-Din.[35]
In late 2014, theSaudi-dominated factionGreen Battalion swore allegiance to JMA leader Salahuddin Shishani and became part of the group.[36] In mid-2015, Shishani was deposed from the leadership following an internal dispute with the Saudi head of JMA's sharia committee, Mu'tasim Billah al-Madani.[16][37] In the interim, a Tajik named Abu Ibrahim al-Khurasani assumed the leadership of the organization, though he stepped down in September 2015. Al-Madani subsequently became the new leader of JMA,[4] while Shishani and his North Caucasian loyalists formed a new independent group calledJaish al-Usrah, and swore allegiance to the Caucasus Emirate's then leader,Magomed Suleymanov.[38][39]
In late November 2013, in an online statement, Abu Omar al-Shishani swore abay'at—oath of allegiance—toAbu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of theIslamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). The statement claimed that those members of the group who had sworn a prior bay'at toDokka Umarov, leader of theCaucasus Emirate, were awaiting approval from Umarov before also joining ISIL.[40] The group suffered a split, with hundreds of members siding with Abu Omar and joining ISIL.[16] Those fighters who remained in JMA appointed another Chechen,Salahuddin Shishani, as their new commander in December 2013.[2] The group has since fought alongside groups that ISIL has clashed with,[11] and some of its leaders have publicly opposed ISIL.[17] Following the 2015 leadership dispute, many JMA militants reportedly defected to ISIL.[39]
In 2016 the group's Islamic Repentance Brigade based in Aleppo defected to ISIL.[41]
Reuters reported in early March 2015 that the al-Nusra Front had plans to unify with Jaish al-Muhajireen wal-Ansar into a new organisation, separate fromal-Qaeda.[42] Al-Nusra rejected these reports on 9 March 2015.[43] On 23 September 2015, Jaish al-Muhajireen wal-Ansar left Jabhat Ansar al-Din and joined al-Nusra.[8]
The al-Nusra Front formedHayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) on 28 January 2017, with Liwa Muhajireen wal-Ansar as a member group.[44] As part of HTS, the group fought in annorthwestern Syria campaign of late 2017–early 2018[45] and theoffensive in mid-2019. On 19 May 2019, during the latter offensive, LMA emir Mansur Dagestani was killed in combat in the northernHama Governorate.[5]
The group's leadership structure consists of a military leadership, asharia committee, ashura council and a media arm, Liwa al-Mujahideen al-Ilami. The latter was the same name as an unrelated media group established by foreignmujahideen fighting in theBosnian War.[6] The name simply translates as "media group of the mujahideen".
The group was composed of diverse nationalities. The Chechen rebel news agencyKavkaz Center described the then Muhajireen Battalion as being made up ofmujahideen from theCaucasus Emirate,Russia,Ukraine,Crimea and otherCIS countries.[46] Many of them were veterans from other conflicts.[1] Members killed fighting for the group have included ethnicAzeris,[47]Tajiks,Kazakhs andDagestanis.[48] Some Syrian rebels referred to them as "Turkish brothers".[49] One JMA battalion was composed of jihadists from western countries (the US, the UK, Germany and others) who fought together for language reasons.[50] As the group expanded, it integrated native Syrians into its membership.[26] Following a leadership dispute in mid-2015, the JMA split and became effectively an Arab dominated organisation.[16]
Madani now serves as a religious leader for LMA and the larger al Qaeda entity, now known as Hay'at Tahrir al Sham (or the Assembly for the Liberation of Syria, HTS).
