SUMMARY

The dispute between the Islamic State of Iraq, at the time al-Qaida's Iraqi affiliate, unilaterally decided to merge with Jabhat al-Nusra, al-Qaida's Syrian affiliate, to form the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS). Jabhat al-Nusra and the al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahiri disputed the merger and Zawahiri dictated that ISIS should limit its operations to Iraq, which ISIS rejected. The dispute caused many Jabhat al-Nusra fighters to defect to ISIS, whilst ISIS got kicked out of the al-Qaida network.

ISIS quickly grew into a powerful force in Syria, which, combined with its extremism and tendency to enforce its control of territory on other groups, caused many groups to turn against it. This included Jabhat al-Nusra, despite ideological affiliation and having cooperated with ISIS in some areas before. As such, Jabhat al-Nusra joined with several other groups, primarily in Raqqah and Deir ez Zor, to oust ISIS from Syria in January 2014 (see IS - Islamic Front, Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, Liwa al-Jihad fi Sabeel Allah, Liwa Thuwar ar-Raqqa and Euphrates Islamic Liberation Front, Islamic Front, Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, Liwa Thuwar ar-Raqqa - IS for Raqqah, and Authenticity and Development Front, Islamic Front, Jabhat Fateh al-Sham - IS and IS - Mujahideen Shura Council for Deir ez Zor, and IS - Islamic Front, Jabhat Fateh al-Sham for several other areas). The attack on ISIS backfired, however, as ISIS managed to gain near total control of both Raqqah and Deir ez Zor, expelling Jabhat al-Nusra from these areas.

The dispute between them continued until Jabhat Fateh al-Sham became part of the alliance Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) in January 2017, after which the conflict continued under the guise IS - HTS.