At the event on 29 January 2025 declaring the victory of the Syrian revolution, most factions of the armed opposition including Ahrar Al-Sham Islamic Movement announced their dissolution and were incorporated into the newly formed Ministry of Defense.

It aims to completely overthrow the Assad regime in Syria and build an Islamic state whose only sovereign, reference, ruler, direction, and individual, societal and nationwide unifier is Allah Almighty's Sharia (law).

[18] This view was shared by Wilson Center researcher Ali El Yassir who stated that the group had "unambiguously espoused a Salafi and Jihadi discourse when it was created".

[54] According to the International Crisis Group in 2012, Ahrar al-Sham, along with the more extreme al-Nusra Front, had "embraced the language of jihad and called for an Islamic state based on Salafi principles.

"[55] Around the same time, Institute for the Study of War researcher Elizabeth O'Bagy stated that Ahrar al-Sham consisted of "conservative Islamist, and often Salafist, member units" and also included "many Salafi-jihadists".

[56] According to US intelligence officials, a few al-Qaeda members released from prisons by the Syrian government have been able to influence actions of the group, and install operatives within the senior ranks of Ahrar al-Sham.

[57][58][59] Such ties were not disclosed publicly until January 2014, when a former senior leader of Ahrar al-Sham, the now deceased Abu Khalid al-Suri, acknowledged his long-time membership in al-Qaeda and role as Ayman al-Zawahiri's representative in the Levant.

Jaysh al-Ahrar later left HTS due to disagreements with the leadership and the resignation of the Saudi cleric Abdullah al-Muhaysini, and went on to join the National Front for Liberation alongside Ahrar al-Sham in 2018.

[78][79] In an Amnesty International report in July 2016, Ahrar al-Sham, along with al-Nusra Front, was described as having "applied a strict interpretation of Shari'a and imposed punishments amounting to torture or other ill-treatment for perceived infractions."

[82] Ahrar al-Sham has claimed that it only targets government forces and militia and that it has cancelled several operations due to fear of civilian casualties.

[84] While there may be differences in how Jihadist Salafist groups define the act of jihad, they generally reject the institutional politics of liberal democracy and westernization because "of its inability to deliver the material and ethical goods they demand.

"[84] Jihadist Salafist do not just rally behind a shared religious view, but around fighting the ideals they think exist in institutional politics such as hierarchy, exclusion, and corruption.

[47][90][91] Ahrar al-Sham was credited for rescuing NBC News team including reporter Richard Engel, producer Ghazi Balkiz, cameraman John Kooistra and others after they were kidnapped in December 2012.

[98] In August 2013, members of the brigade uploaded a video of their downing of a Syrian Air Force MiG-21 over the Latakia province with a Chinese-made FN-6 MANPADS, apparently becoming the first recorded kill with such a weapon.

[99] In mid-November 2013, after the Battle for Brigade 80 near the Aleppo International Airport, fighters from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant beheaded a commander[100] of Ahrar al-Sham forces, mistaking him for an Iraqi Shiite pro-government militiaman.

[131][132] On 13 May 2016, Amnesty International named Ahrar al-Sham as one of the groups responsible for "repeated indiscriminate attacks that may amount to war crimes" and reported allegations of their use of chemical weapons.

[139][140] Syrian Civil War battles and offensives In September 2015: In collaboration with Jabhat al-Nusra, Ahrar al-Sham overtook an Assad regime stronghold, the Abu al-Zuhur military air base in Idlib governorate.

[141] May and June 2016: Allied with Jabhat al-Nusra, they conducted attacks in Northern Aleppo against ISIS that initially made rapid advances but were eventually pushed back.

[141] Spring 2016: Ahrar al-Sham was involved in heavy fighting with other Anti-ISIS rebel forces in Eastern and Western Ghouta and in the Dar'a region in southern Syria.

[141] On 21 January 2017, five factions from Ahrar reportedly left inorder to from a coalition known as Tahrir al-Sham: Jaysh al-Ahrar, al-Bara, Dhu Nurayn, al-Sawa'iq and Usud al-Har Battalion.

It progressed from the use of improvised explosive devices and small-arms ambushes in early 2012 to assuming a lead role in large-scale sustained assaults on multiple fronts by 2013.

The capture of materiel from the Syrian Armed Forces enabled Ahrar to regularly deploy tanks and mobile artillery and anti-tank guided missiles.

[141] Aside from large scale offensives, Ahrar al-Sham was known for its use of Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) and a tactic in which they would target military bases and capture weapons.

[172] While foreign fighters may come from other countries, Ahrar al-Sham extends welcoming arms because they believe in a common linkage among Muslims fighting for an Islamic regime in Syria.

Syria,[176] Iraq,[177] Russia,[177] Lebanon,[177] Egypt,[177] and the United Arab Emirates[178] support classifying Ahrar al-Sham as a terrorist group, but they have not been able to achieve a unanimous consensus.

[16][179] Ahrar al-Sham's relationships with U.N. designated terrorist organizations has been, and continues to be, a key point of contention in U.S. and Russian foreign relations and in their Syrian ceasefire negotiations.

[182]It was reported that administration officials disapproved this mention and thought that it would potentially harm the U.S. government efforts to convince the Russians and the Syrian government not to attack Ahrar al-Sham with one senior administration official reportedly saying that despite the fact that "for months, we've been arguing to make sure the Russians and the Syrian regime don't equate these groups with the terrorists, Kerry's line yields that point.

"[183] Explaining these comments, US State Department spokesman John Kirby said that "secretary Kerry was simply trying to describe the complexity of the situation in Syria, noting that we aren't blind to the notion that some fighters shift their loyalties.

[16] During Ahrar al-Sham's presence in Deir ez-Zor, after capturing oil fields from the Syrian government alongside other opposition groups, the group alongside the al-Nusra Front and Jaysh al-Islam co-signed a request asking the Islamic State's leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi to mediate a dispute over an oil field that was recently captured.

In January 2020, a former IS-linked media outlet that has since turned critical of IS, wrote in a publication that IS had allowed former Ahrar al-Sham members to "repent" in eastern Syria, and specifically mentioned one former Ahrar al-Sham commander that joined IS despite openly opposing the group, and though defecting to IS he did not hold a military position in the group but he did work in oil fields held by IS, and held a prominent position in IS's oil industry.