The transitional government inherited the ISIS file from the SDF and the United States in 2026: desert cells, the Deir ez-Zor networks and the detention population. Attack tempo fell after the January 2026 settlement of the east; the relationship is a low-tempo insurgency against a state ISIS calls apostate.
A symmetric arrangement: it reads the same from either side. Authored once, on one record.
The arrangement
- Status
- ActiveIn force and operating. Says nothing about how well it is working, or about which way it is heading.Last material change: 2026-04-16.
- What it covers
- Counter-terrorismDefenceCategories the arrangement is documented to include. Not a measure: a relationship covering more of them is described in more detail, not held more firmly.
Summary
HTS and the Islamic State fought each other from 2014, and the transitional state's core forces carry that history. The territorial caliphate ended at Baghouz in March 2019 under the SDF and the coalition; what survived — Badia cells, Deir ez-Zor attack networks, extortion economies — waited on the prisons and camps the SDF held. The December 2024 collapse of the Assad state and the January 2026 fighting in the northeast opened seams the remnant used; the 30 January 2026 integration agreement, the completion of the United States withdrawal on 16 April and the SDF's August dissolution transferred the file to Damascus. Al-Hol's population fell to the low thousands after the January 2026 takeover of the camps. Analysts describe the remnant's posture since as recalibration rather than resurgence; it attacked United States forces lethally as late as January 2026 and continues low-tempo operations. No negotiation of any kind exists or could: ISIS treats the transitional state as apostate and the state treats the remnant as a terrorist organisation.
Why it matters
The state's international standing — sanctions relief, the rescinded state-sponsor designation, the residual coalition relationship — rests in part on its performance against ISIS, and the file it inherited includes a detention population no state has resolved. The relationship is where the module's isis-suppression question lives.
Related events
- ISIS seizes territory and declares a caliphate 2013 – June 2014
Military · Territorial change · Political
- The territorial caliphate ends at Baghouz March 2019
Military · Territorial change
- The January 2026 northeast fighting 4 – 14 January 2026
Military · Territorial change
- The US-brokered integration agreement 29 – 30 January 2026
Political · Diplomatic · Military
- The United States completes its withdrawal February – April 2026
Military · Diplomatic
Organisations
Structures through which this relationship operates. Not parties to it — the parties are the two actors above.
Places
Markers this module already publishes. This record adds no geographic precision of its own.
What remains unknown
- Attack attribution in the Badia and Deir ez-Zor rests on event-data compilations and local reporting; no consolidated official series exists.
- The disposition of the detention population transferred in 2026 — prosecutions, repatriations, releases — is reported piecemeal.
Readings the evidence also supports
- The fall in attack tempo may reflect the closure of the seams the remnant used, a deliberate lull while the new state is tested, or a loss of capacity; the evidence supports the first and does not exclude the others.
Listed because the record's own assessment is not the only one its sources permit — not as a hedge on the assessment above.
Watch questions this relationship bears on
Standing analytical questions whose evidence runs through this relationship, each with its latest review. Derived from the Watch object, never restated here.
All Syria relationships Open in Explore
Assessed as of — 2026-08 Last reviewed — 2026-09-14