Canada has dropped its terror designation for Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, pointing to similar moves by the US and UK and arguing that the shift aligns with efforts to stabilize Syria after the fall of Bashar al-Assad. Ottawa says the decision wasn’t made casually, even as it keeps sanctions on dozens of former Syrian officials. HTS and its leader Ahmad Sharaa were designated terrorists for more than a decade, yet the same Western governments that listed them later backed their fight against Assad and eventually removed the labels once he was ousted.

The story gets more tangled when you look at how these groups evolved. HTS grew out of the Nusra Front, itself a branch of the Islamic State of Iraq, which later became ISIS. Throughout the Syrian war, the US, UK, and Israel quietly funneled support to the Nusra Front despite its terror status. Canada was pulled into its own scandal when a spy working for Canadian intelligence helped move British women into Syria to marry ISIS fighters. Ottawa only acknowledged this when Turkiye arrested the agent in 2015, a cover-up later detailed in a book on the Five Eyes alliance.

Now Canada is not only lifting designations but also bringing home citizens who joined ISIS, Nusra, or other extremist groups. Instead of prosecuting them, officials say reintegration is the priority. According to Canadian research institutes, only a small number of returning fighters have ever faced charges, raising questions about accountability, policy consistency, and what this shift means for future counter-terrorism decisions.