‘Former’ terrorist-turned-Syrian president Ahmed al-Sharaa‘s new government pick has been accused of posing next to severed heads before his appointment. Sharaa, who used to be known as Mohammad al-Julani and ran the al-Qaeda-ISIS hybrid in Syria, appointed Mohammed Sobhi al-Nashef to run his regime’s ‘Digital Media’ department.
But Armenian-Syrian refugee journalist Kevork Almassian has published an image he says shows al-Nashef next to at least six severed heads:
Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you Mohammed Sobhi al-Nashef, the new director of the Digital Media Department in Raqqa under Jolani’s Ministry of Information.
Yes, that is apparently the same man in the photo on the right, standing beside what appear to be severed heads.… pic.twitter.com/vtHRmZnaOF
— Kevork Almassian (@KevorkAlmassian) September 24, 2026
Almassian is not an unproblematic character. From an Armenian Christian family, he fled Syria in 2015-16, ended up working for a far-right politician three years later and was accused of acting as a ‘pro-Assad propagandist’. But the images do appear to show the same person.
A credible scenario with Julani
Certainly, the idea of a Sharaa minister having previously posed with the heads of victims is a credible scenario. Julani was recently described by the US diplomat who whitewashed his record as being entirely unrepentant for the atrocities he and his followers committed.
And Julani’s followers – some still wearing their ISIS patches – have taken ‘selfie’ videos since Julani took power, threatening to drink the blood of any group not aligned with their faction. They have proudly filmed themselves beating Alawite Syrians, with the bodies of dead victims scatted in the background. Around the same time, the Syrian coastline was littered with the washed-up bodies of the victims of his regime’s slaughter of minoritised people.
Despite Julani’s lack of regret for his and his group’s crimes, the UK government removed Sharaa’s terrorist group HTS from the list of banned organisations in October 2025. Before that, while HTS was still a ‘proscribed’ terror group, then-UK PM Keir Starmer invited Sharaa to the UK.
Non-violent anti-genocide group Palestine Action was already — and remains — on the list of proscribed organisations. The Crown Prosecution Service and many UK judges continue to use subterfuge to sentence its activists as terrorists even for actions carried out before the group was banned. But the UK government is happy to embrace a Syrian regime whose continued crimes are either very real or entirely credible.
Featured image via the Canary
By Skwawkbox
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