Since the fall of the Assad regime, there has been much debate surrounding the persona and career of Syria's new president Ahmad al-Sharaa (better known previously by the name of Abu Muhammad al-Jowlani). Of course, some basic facts are known, such as the fact that he went to Iraq after 2003 to participate in jihad there and was then dispatched by then Islamic State of Iraq leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi to Syria in order to establish Jabhat al-Nusra, which rejected a formal merger with Baghdadi's group in 2013 and declared allegiance to al-Qaeda, only to fully break ties with al-Qaeda by January 2017 in the formation of Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham, which led the final offensive that brought down the regime. But other issues are more murky: what exactly was he doing in Iraq during his time there? What exactly was his relationship with Baghdadi such that the latter entrusted him with forming Jabhat al-Nusra?

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