Washington’s Embrace of Julani: The Final Collapse of the “War on Terror” Narrative

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The photograph of Abu Mohammad al-Julani walking through the White House — smuggled through a back door like contraband — should have been a geopolitical earthquake. Instead, the neoconservative commentariat, the self-appointed guardians against “Islamist infiltration,” fell silent. The same voices that spent two decades terrorizing the American public about al-Qaeda said nothing when Washington received one of its senior alumni as Syria’s new “president.” Their sudden muteness tells us more than their theatrics ever did.

For us, none of this is surprising. It simply formalizes what we already knew: the so-called “War on Terror” was never about fighting terrorism. It was a geopolitical instrument that could be paused, reversed, or inverted whenever U.S. or Israeli strategic interests required it.

And Julani’s rise proves that point better than anything else.

America’s Betrayal: Not Only of Syrians, but of Its Own Veterans

I have American friends who served in Iraq and Afghanistan. They were told they were fighting al-Qaeda, fighting extremism, defending their country. Today, they live with PTSD, chronic wounds, and emotional scars, all while the very people they were told to fight are being escorted into the Oval Office for photo-ops. If I were in their shoes, I would feel deeply betrayed.

Meanwhile, Washington is rewriting history and hoping no one notices. The U.S. government had full knowledge of the jihadist engine that was being built in Syria. In 2012, Jake Sullivan emailed Hillary Clinton acknowledging that “al-Qaeda is on our side in Syria”. The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) warned the Obama administration in 2012 that the insurgency’s core force was jihadists, Salafis, and the Muslim Brotherhood. Yet Obama approved “Timber Sycamore,” the CIA program that armed and trained these very groups.

Now, over a decade later, we arrive at the inevitable destination: the United States hosting the former emir of Jabhat al-Nusra — the Syrian branch of al-Qaeda — as the U.S.-approved steward of a “new Syria.”

It is macabre theater.

Julani as Washington’s Franchise Operator

Those who believe the U.S. selected Julani by accident misunderstand how imperial management works in the 21st century. Washington does not need a statesman; it needs a compliant subcontractor, and Julani’s primary qualification is obedience.

Julani was chosen because he will do what Washington requires:

• Sign a security deal with Israel and formally surrender Syrian territory: the Golan, Mount Hermon, and whatever else is demanded.

• Open Syria’s economy to Western multinationals.

• Accept IMF oversight, indebting Syria for generations and converting it into a privatized playground for global corporations.

This is the “economic hitman” model in its purest form. Before the war, Syria had virtually no foreign debt — less than $7 billion, most of it Soviet-era and never called in. That made Syria difficult to coerce. It had a growing, nationally-oriented economy. It was sovereign.

That could not be tolerated.

The destruction of the Syrian state — its infrastructure, its currency, its industry — was not an unintended consequence. It was the precondition for the new IMF-groomed Syria being rolled out today.

Israel’s Role: The Puppetmaster Behind the Curtain

Some in Washington want Julani to rule all of Syria as a centralized dictator. Israel disagrees. Tel Aviv wants Julani to rule select Sunni-majority regions while Israel maintains leverage — or direct influence — over minority regions: the Druze in Sweida, the Kurds in the east, and the Alawites along the coast.

This is why figures like Laura Loomer perform their outrage theater online but never mention Netanyahu’s role in ushering Julani into Damascus. This is why Julani’s fighters freely used Israeli field hospitals during the war — a fact admitted by a former Mossad chief on Al Jazeera. This is why Israel’s air force, which hunts Hezbollah commanders across borders, somehow never found Julani, a man supposedly at the top of the global jihadist hierarchy.

Because he was never considered a threat. He was an investment.

Tel Aviv and Washington may differ in style, but they agree on the outcome: Syria must be fragmented, tamed, and folded into the Abraham Accords architecture. Julani, once promising his fighters they would march to Jerusalem, is now marching to Washington instead in a suit and tie.

No jihadist has ever pivoted so quickly from “holy war” to neoliberal restructuring.

The Manufactured Erasure of Eastern Christianity

Another silence deserves attention: the silence of Western churches, the Vatican, and European capitals as Syria’s Christian communities were decimated. How can institutions that claim moral and religious authority ignore the destruction of communities that have existed since the time of the Apostles?

The answer is ideological. The West has embraced Christian Zionism, a political theology that replaces the ancient churches of the East with a manufactured Americanized sect that aligns perfectly with Israeli geopolitical priorities. Traditional Middle Eastern Christians — Orthodox, Syriac, Armenian — do not fit that mold. They are obstacles, not allies.

Thus, their suffering is simply erased.

The Final Death of the “War on Terror” Narrative

Washington’s normalization of Julani marks the end of the myth that the U.S. fought terrorism. The truth is now impossible to hide: the U.S. and its allies weaponized Islamist extremism whenever it served geopolitical goals and crushed secular governments when they threatened Western hegemony.

The “War on Terror” was never a war on terror. It was a war through terror, reshaping the Middle East, redrawing borders, destroying independent states, and expanding American and Israeli influence under the cover of moral rhetoric.

And now the mask has been removed.

A Final Word

When I watched Julani standing next to U.S. lawmakers — including Brian Mast, who parades around Congress in an IDF uniform — I did not feel anger as much as sorrow. Sorrow for Syria, for the minorities whose future is now hostage to a man who once commanded car bomb brigades, and sorrow for the Americans who still believe their leaders wage wars for freedom.

The tragedy is not only what has happened to Syria. The tragedy is that the world is expected to pretend this is normal.

—Kevork Almassian is a Syrian geopolitical analyst and the founder of Syriana Analysis.