Abu Ibrahim is a big bear of a man in his early forties. He wears flip-flops and a T-shirt and tracksuit pants, and shuffles because of a sniper bullet in his left leg, fired by Syrian government forces; another bullet went through his right foot not long ago, and his face is scarred from an explosion caused when an assailant tried to kill him with a grenade. He keeps a pistol tucked into the waistband of his tracksuit pants. His men are loyal and watchful and one of them never leaves his side. He told me that he used to be a “fruit merchant.” Now, Abu Ibrahim is one of the chieftains of the war in Syria’s strategic northern Aleppo province, where a decisive military confrontation seems to be beginning.
Recently, I was introduced to Abu Ibrahim by a Syrian friend who lives near Azaz, a town located amidst olive and pistachio orchards about two miles from the Turkish border and a dozen miles north of the city of Aleppo, which Abu Ibrahim rules, in loose coördination with two other rebel leaders, each with their own contingent of fighters and political inclinations. Last week, the rebels wrested Azaz from Army control in a fierce and prolonged battle. A swathe of shot-up and destroyed buildings, with a few incinerated tanks, runs through the town—a sad spectacle, mostly deserted of civilians. A tenuous calm reigns.