Al Qaeda in Syria: The Split That Wasn't

Regardless of its name change and highly publicized “split” from al Qaeda this past summer, Jabhat Fateh-al Sham (JFS), formerly known as Jabhat al-Nusra, remains firmly on the United States’ terrorist radar.

“We judge a group by what they do, not by what they call themselves,” said U.S. State Department spokesman John Kirby about al-Nusra in August. “Thus far, there’s no change to our views about this particular group. We certainly see no reasons to believe that their actions or their objectives are any different. And they are still considered a foreign terrorist organization.”