SyriaSharia law imposed in some rebel-controlled areas in Syria

The Syrian anti-regime uprising began two years ago as part of the broader Arab Spring rebellion against authoritarian Arab regimes. In Tunisia, Egypt, and Yemen, the autocratic leaders decided to leave power without putting much of a fight.

In Libya, Col. Qaddafi fought back, but a NATO-led international coalition provided military support to the insurgents, and he was removed.

Syria is different from these cases in at least four respects:

• President Bashar Assad retains the support of about 20-25 percent of the population – Alawites, Druze, Kurds, Christians, and some middle class Sunnis. So far, most of the military and the security services have remained loyal to him.
• Assad also enjoys the support of outside forces – Iran, Iraq, Russia, and Hezbollah. These allies keep sending substantial military and economic support to shore up the regime, and Hezbollah has sent thousands of its fighters to help the Syrian military fight the rebels.
• There is no international coalition offering meaningful military support to the rebels.
• The Syrian war is more clearly a war of Sunni Arabs against a non-Sunni regime.

Most of the support for the rebels comes from two countries – Saudi Arabia and Qatar. As was the case in Libya, the Qataris direct their support almost exclusively to the most fundamentalist elements in the anti-regime coalition.

As a result, the Jihadist Jabhat al-Nusra, an group on the U.S. terrorist organization list, has emerged as the strongest militia among the different armies and militias fighting the regime.

The Washington Post reports that the Syrian revolution has mutated from a largely spontaneous uprising against four decades of Assad family into a full-scale war, and is now changing yet again – into what appears to be a systematic, coordinated effort to impose strict Sharia Islamic law in those parts of Syria which have come under the control of the Jihadi elements in the anti-Assad coalition.

The Jabhat al-Nusra soldiers, having gained a reputation as the most daring and competent fighters in the anti-Assad campaign, have now turned their ferocity and zeal to the task of asserting their authority over civilian life in the areas they control, imposing Islamic codes and punishments, and running day-to-day matters such as divorce, marriage, and vehicle licensing.

As was the case with Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas among the Palestinians, many Syrian citizens who do not subscribe to the Islamist fundamentalist creed of the al Qaeda-affiliated Jabhat al-Nusra, still appreciate the fact that the group was quick to try and provide much needed services to poor and needy people, replacing the services no longer provided by the Syrian government.

The Post reports that across the northeastern provinces of Deir al-Zour and Raqqah, where the rebels have made substantial advances recently, Jabhat al-Nusra has taken the lead both in the fighting and in setting out to replace the toppled administration. The groups has assumed control of bakeries and the distribution of flour and fuel – but it has also tried to stop people from smoking in the streets or listening to music, and is now forcing women to cover themselves.

The group has also been quick to mete out Islamic justice. Most offenders are now sentenced to between five and forty lashes with a metal pipe. The group leaders say that the more extreme punishments – amputating a hand or a leg, or being stoned to death — are suspended during times of war, in accordance with Islamic law.

Mohammed Najib Banna, an Islamist jurist who belongs to a rival effort to set up a judiciary in Aleppo, told the Post that with Assad showing no sign that he is prepared to give way, the Islamists gaining ground in the areas he no longer controls, and Western countries still refusing to arm more-moderate battalions, “Jabhat al-Nusra will grow stronger and stronger.”