It is far too early to tell whether it will have any impact on the ground, but a new Syrian rebel leadership is finally taking form after the splits of this spring.

On February 16, 2014, the Supreme Military Council of the Free Syrian Army (FSA)—an umbrella term for rebels backed by Gulf countries, Turkey, the United States, and some European states—held a surprise meeting to remove its chief of staff, Lieutenant General Salim Idris, and replace him with Brigadier General Abdel-Ilah Bashir al-Nuaymi. Idris contested the election, describing it as “worse than a coup,” and got much of the FSA General Staff to line up behind him. In turn, Bashir was backed by the FSA Supreme Military Council and the Ministry of Defense of the Syrian opposition’s exile government. Reconciliation talks in early March failed to resolve the dispute. The public split has instead deepened, perhaps related to the growing cold war between Saudi Arabia and Qatar.

While Idris made a fuss in the press, still supported by a media team supplied to the FSA by foreign backers, little was heard from Bashir for over a month. But by late March, he began to turn up in the media in his new role as FSA chief of staff. He visited the frontlines in Aleppo and was photographed under a Tawhid Brigade banner (although this large Islamist faction in Aleppo has formally cut ties to the FSA). The exile government also recently released pictures of Bashir visiting the northern coastal region, where there is now heavy fighting, as part of a delegation alongside Minister of Defense Assad Mustafa.