Al-Qaida's Syrian branch was left reeling Friday after its military chief was killed in an apparent army airstrike, adding to confusion over the future path of the most powerful group opposing both President Bashar Assad and the Islamic State group.
Abu Humam al-Shami, who trained in Afghanistan alongside plotters of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States and whose Nusra Front controls wide parts of northwestern Syria, was killed by an explosion at a meeting of commanders on Thursday in Idlib province.
The Sunni Muslim militant group, loyal to the successors of Osama bin Laden, is one of the two most powerful anti-Assad forces in Syria. It split off from the Islamic State group, which rejects al-Qaida as insufficiently radical.