Abu Firas al-Suri

Radwan Nammous
Born	1950 Madaya, Syria
Died	3 April 2016 (aged 65) Idlib Governorate, Syria
Nationality	Syrian
Military career
Allegiance	Syria (Until 1979) al-Qaeda (Late 1980's)
Service/branch	Syrian Army (Until 1979) al-Nusra Front (2012–2016)
Rank	Chief Spokesperson for the al-Nusra Front
Battles/wars	Syria Syrian Civil War Lebanon Syrian Civil War spillover in Lebanon Military intervention against ISIL American-led intervention in Syria

Radwan Nammous, also known by his nom de guerre, Abu Firas al-Suri, was a senior official in the al-Qaeda affiliated al-Nusra Front, serving as the group's spokesman.

Early life

Suri was born in 1950 in the Syrian town of Madaya, near Damascus. He joined the Syrian military and attained the rank of lieutenant but was discharged due to his Islamist leanings in 1979.

He then joined the Muslim Brotherhood of Syria and was reportedly a military trainer in the Muslim Brotherhood's Fighting Vanguard group during the Islamist uprising in Syria against the Hafez al-Assad regime between 1979 and 1980.

Al Suri later traveled to Afghanistan, where he met Abdullah Azzam, a founding father of modern jihadism, and Osama bin Laden. He then helped bin Laden and Pakistani jihadists establish Lashkar-e-Taiba, a terrorist organization that remains closely linked to al-Qaeda to this day.

After the 9/11 attacks, al Suri helped the families of al-Qaeda members escape Afghanistan. From 2003 to 2013 he was in Yemen, until the dispute between the al-Nusra Front and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant erupted.

Syrian Civil War

Due to the the infighting between jihadist groups in Syria, Al Qaeda’s senior leaders dispatched al-Suri to Syria, where he participated in failed mediation efforts between al-Nusra Front and ISIL.

Role within the al-Nusra Front

Al-Suri's role as a senior figure in the al-Nusra Front was not publicly known until March 2014 when he appeared in a Nusra video speaking against ISIL. In the following months. al-Suri took on an increasingly prominent role within al-Nusra. Al-Suri became a spokesman for events such as the group's hostage taking of UN peacekeepers in 2014. In July 2014, an audio recording of a major rally of fighters in Syria was leaked. In it, al-Suri could be heard introducing Abu Mohammad al-Julani, al-Nusra’s emir, who spoke of establishing an Islamic emirate in Syria. In a video released by al-Nusra on 8 August 2014, al-Suri said al-Nusra would declare an emirate in Syria only after consulting with other factions.

On 3 April 2016, Abu Firas al-Suri (at the age of 65), his son and 20 other al-Nusra Front fighters were killed in a US airstrike in Syria's Idlib province.