Sayf Balud

Sayf Balud, also known by the alias Sayf Abu Bakr (Arabic: سيف أبو بكر‎),[lower-alpha 1] is a Syrian rebel leader who has fought for several armed opposition factions in the Syrian Civil War. Having served with the Free Syrian Army during the conflict's early stages, he reportedly joined the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in 2013, possibly as a spy for the Turkish intelligence. He defected from ISIL in 2014, and consequently became the commander of the CIA-supported Hazzm Movement and later the Hamza Division. As part of these groups, he has become an important ally of Turkey within the armed Syrian oppsition. He also acts as the de facto military governor of al-Bab since 2017.

Sayf Balud
Sayf Balud in 2013
Other name(s)Sayf Abu Bakr (nom du guerre)
Nickname(s)"The Turkmen commander"[1]
Bornc. 1988[2]
Bizaah, Aleppo Governorate, Syria
Allegiance Syria (before 2011/12)
Syrian opposition (from c. 2011/12)
Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (2013–2014; disputed)
Service/branchSyrian Army
Free Syrian Army
Syrian National Army
Years of service? – present
Rank
  • First Lieutenant (Syrian Army)
  • Brigadier General (Hamza Division)[3]
UnitAbu Bakr Sadiq Brigades
Al-Tawhid Brigade
Hazzm Movement
Hamza Division
Battles/warsSyrian Civil War 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh conflict

Biography

Early role in the civil war

Sayf Balud is an ethnic Syrian Turkmen from Bizaah, Aleppo Governorate.[2][7] According to the news site El-Dorar, he was originally a First Lieutenant in the Syrian Army and rebelled when the Syrian Civil War erupted.[8] According to Muhammad al-Binshi, he initially joined the Abu Bakr Sadiq Brigades, a "moderate" rebel group, in the early insurgency phase of the Syrian Civil War.[7][9] In 2012, he had become a "gunman" serving in the al-Tawhid Brigade, taking part in the Battle of Aleppo.[2] By spring 2013, he fought as part of the Free Syrian Army in operations around Kuweires Military Aviation Institute.[9]

In summer 2013, Sayf Balud fought in a rebel group alongside ISIL against Kurdish-majority factions such as the People's Protection Units (YPG) in the northern Aleppo countryside. In one instance, he appeared in an ISIL propaganda video in which prisoners of war, labelled as "PKK members", were presented at a mosque in Qabasin. The video showed how an ISIL member, with Sayf Balud at his side, was talking to the prisoners and giving them "a lesson in 'repentance'".[9] According to analyst Nicholas Heras, by mid-2013 ISIL had become so powerful in the region around al-Bab that many local insurgents joined the organization, including Sayf Balud and other members of his family. His exact motivations for doing so remain unknown. An intelligence insider told Heras, however, that Sayf Balud was actually an agent of the Turkish intelligence service MİT who acted as spy within ISIL. In any case, Sayf Balud reportedly became an "important aide" to the local ISIL commander, acting as liaison between the organization and other rebels. He reportedly played a major role in consolidating ISIL's grip on the area of al-Bab and its surroundings. His service with ISIL lasted until the first half of 2014, when he and members of his family defected and fled to Turkey.[2] Based on information gathered by Heras, researcher Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi argued that Sayf Balud's escape to Turkey might have resulted from ISIL discovering that he was working for the Turkish intelligence. In contrast, his later unit – the Hamza Division – would claim that Sayf Balud had never served ISIL and had been actually imprisoned by the organization in Aleppo's al-Uyun hospital in the time from 2013 to 2014, before being rescued by other rebel factions.[9][lower-alpha 2]

By late 2014, Sayf Balud was back in Syria and had risen to sub-commander in the Hazzm Movement, a rebel group vetted and supported by the CIA. At the time, he fought at al-Ma'amal.[9][2] Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi speculated that Sayf Balud's rapid rise within the Hazzm Movement despite previous interactions with ISIL could have been due to connections with the Turkish intelligence.[9] As part of the Hazzm Movement, he fought in Aleppo's Industrial City and Handarat in late 2014.[11]

Leader of the Hamza Division

He officially joined the Hamza Brigade around 2015,[9] although he had already been connected to the group beforehand, acting as one of its recruiters in Aleppo. Around 2015, he was possibly part of the United States Armed Forces' Syrian Train and Equip Program at the invitation of Turkey.[11] Although initially one among several sub-commanders of the Hamza Brigade, he was promoted to its overall leader after the death of its previous commander, Yasser Abu al-Sheikh in early 2016.[11] He consequently became the leader[9] of the Hamza Division which was a merger of the Hamza Brigade with several other groups, organized in April 2016.[8][12] As overall commander, Sayf Balud organized a "special forces" elite unit within the Hamza Division.[11]

He was also promoted to brigadier general,[3] and led his forces during the Turkish-led Operation Euphrates Shield against ISIL.[9][3] Around this time, he increasingly became "a prominent public face" of the anti-ISIL campaign waged by Turkey and its Syrian allies.[11] After al-Bab was captured from ISIL in March 2017, Sayf Balud was appointed de facto military governor of the city and its surroundings by Turkey.[1] Meanwhile, the Hamza Division became part of the Syrian National Army (SNA) as the "Second Division", with Sayf Balud overseeing the unit's further expansion and improvement in training.[1] In May 2018, his brother Hamed Balud (alias "Yaba") was involved in a scandal as he and other Hamza Division fighters attacked three hospitals in and around al-Bab, possibly to terrorize local supporters of ISIL and the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). Hamed was filmed and subsequently arrested, but managed to escape.[13] The affair surrounding his brother caused considerable local opposition against the Hamza Division and Sayf Balud, as he had personally appointed Hamad to run al-Bab's administration. In spite of the scandal, Sayf was able to maintain his position thanks to Turkish support.[1]

Sayf Balud later fought against the SDF in Operation Olive Branch, assisting in the conquest of the PYD-governed Afrin Canton.[9] According to Heras, Sayf and the Hamza Division caused considerable ethnic tensions during and after the capture of Afrin, as they favored Turkmen. However, Sayf was reportedly awarded a personal audience with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan for his role in Afrin.[14] According to Heras, "there [was] a definite sense within the opposition movement" by 2018 that Sayf was factually far more powerful within the SNA as his formal rank would suggest, thanks to the "patronage of Turkey".[15] Sayf led his unit during the Northwestern Syria offensive (April–August 2019), publicly declaring that rebel rocket attacks on Nubl and al-Zahraa were meant as retribution for government bombardments of Idlib and Hama.[16]

In 2020, he helped to recruit 500 Hamza Division fighters who allegedly served in a conflict for Nagorno-Karabakh, fighting for Azerbaijan against Armenia.[7] At the time, The Daily Beast published an article which portrayed Sayf Balud as an "ISIS Warlord" who had fought for the Jihadist movement for several years before defecting to Turkey. Large parts of this story were consequently debunked by Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi, prompting the Daily Beast to correct the article.[9]

See also

Notes
  1. He is also known as "Sayf Boulad Abu Bakr".[4] His nom du guerre has also been written as "Saif Abu Bakr",[5] "Seif Abu Bakr",[3] and "Seyf Ebu Bekir".[6]
  2. The Hamza Division is the only source completely denying Sayf Balud's involvement in ISIL. Despite the "murky" details of the events around 2013/14, Nicholas Heras argued that his source was trustworthy and that Sayf served as ISIL member, although factually as Turkish undercover agent. After initially finding no evidence for Sayf's ISIL membership, Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi later stated that Heras' information about Sayf Balud being a spy within ISIL made sense.[9] Journalists Colin P. Clarke, Ahmet S. Yayla,[6] Wladimir van Wilgenburg,[5] and Mehdi Hasan also described Sayf as former ISIL member.[10]

References
  1. Heras 2018, p. 14.
  2. Heras 2018, p. 12.
  3. "Hamza Brigade's Leader: Few Hours Later We Will Raise The Victory Signs In Bab City (Video)". Qasioun News. 14 November 2016. Retrieved 3 October 2020.
  4. Heras 2018, p. 11.
  5. Wladimir van Wilgenburg (29 May 2020). "Clashes in Syria's Turkish-occupied Afrin leave 3 civilians dead". Kurdistan24. Retrieved 4 October 2020.
  6. Colin P. Clarke; Ahmet S. Yayla (31 December 2018). "The United States Can't Rely on Turkey to Defeat ISIS". Foreign Policy. Retrieved 4 October 2020.
  7. Muhammad al-Binshi (2 October 2020). "Turkey Sends Syrian Rebels to Azerbaijan to Face Off Against Putin's Armenian Allies". The Daily Beast. Retrieved 3 October 2020.
  8. "Hamza Division: a new military formation to fight ISIL". El-Dorar. 23 April 2016. Retrieved 3 October 2020.
  9. Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi (1 October 2020). "Factcheck: Was 'Sayf Abu Bakr' an Islamic State Commander?". Retrieved 3 October 2020.
  10. Mehdi Hasan (26 October 2019). "Everyone Is Denouncing the Syrian Rebels Now Slaughtering Kurds. But Didn't the U.S. Once Support Some of Them?". The Intercept. Retrieved 5 October 2020.
  11. Heras 2018, p. 13.
  12. "Afrin: How Eight Women were Forcibly Disappeared by the Hamza Division?". stj-sy.org. 3 August 2020. Retrieved 4 October 2020.
  13. "Proliferation of Weapons Afflicting Residents of Al-Bab". Sada al-Sham; Syrian Observer. 21 June 2018. Retrieved 3 October 2020.
  14. Heras 2018, p. 15.
  15. Heras 2018, pp. 14–15.
  16. "We will spare no effort to defend our people in Idlib and support revolutionary factions there, a "National Army" Commander says". Nedaa Syria. 8 May 2019. Retrieved 4 October 2020.

Works cited
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