THE SYRIAN FIRING SQUAD

Osama knew the execution position well — captive kneeling, head bowed slightly forward, hands behind his back. He had led his share of hostages and prisoners to the crest of the sandy hill five miles east of the rebel-held city of Idlib in northern Syria. But this time, he was the one struggling for breath under the black hood cinched tight over his head in the blistering desert sun.

From behind the three members of his firing squad, Commander Mahmoud Ramadan shouted the list of crimes Osama al-Jihadi had committed against Islam. He punctuated each judgment with vicious laughter. Ridicule was standard procedure in the execution of an apostate, and Osama imagined that his cousins on the other side of Idlib could hear the man bellowing. A year earlier, Osama could never have imagined he would be kneeling before an executioner.

The commander's monologue ended abruptly in a single gunshot, and Osama crumpled to the ground. A half dozen rapid-fire shots followed, and blood once again soaked into the sandy hill.

But it was not Osama's.

At precisely 3:00 a.m. one night the previous year, in the basement of a spacious suburban home not far from the bloody mound, a cold-eyed, twenty-ish man raised his hand toward a group of comparably aged males gathered in the underground room. The assembly honored his silent request for their attention.

"When Bashar Al-Assad dies, we will crush the Alawites and slaughter all Christians!" The young man spoke resolutely, confident of his cause.

Jabhat al-Nusra, the Syrian version of al-Qaeda, was now a grim threat to the Bashar Al-Assad regime that had looked so invincible just months before. Still maintaining discretion about its movements, though, the group planned its business a safe forty miles from al-Nusra's primary target, one of the oldest cities in the world. Continually inhabited for more than four thousand years, Aleppo boasts more residents than its slightly older but more well-known sister city and capital, Damascus.

"America will help us overthrow this evil regime. They hate Assad. But we are the ones who owe him and his father for what they did to our families in Hama. I will never give up the fight to liberate Syria from this illegitimate infidel. I will die in this fight, because I have no doubt this is what Allah created me for."

The young man returned the nods of his listeners. They, too, hated Assad. The bully of the Levant1 had too long oppressed them with his massive military and by way of his despicable alliances with Russia and Iran. Shameless flaunting of power only enflamed the hostility against him.

Life was good in Syria — at least for the family of Bashar Al-Assad. The president's wife looked as if she walked into the royal palace straight off of a fashion runway in Paris. The Assads loved the good life in Damascus. President Assad slept well at night — that is, until the Syrian civil war started.

"The one who has the plan for overthrowing the government will speak to you now." The upstart leader smiled and gestured with his right hand toward the basement's side entrance. "You didn't know you would have the pleasure of hearing from our spiritual mentor tonight, did you?"

Fifty men leapt to their feet as Osama al-Jihadi marched through the door and replaced the younger man as the focal point of the room. The straight-backed leader turned powerful shoulders from side to side and surveyed the room for half a minute before speaking.

"So these are my warriors?" The hint of a smile crossed Osama's face. "I like what I see — not only in this room but also in Syria's future. We will take what is rightfully ours as Sunni Muslims. We outnumber Assad and the filthy Alawites nearly five to one.

"So tell me, how have we let this trifling Alawite tumor control us for so long? How can he cause us to live as exiles in our own country?" Osama glared at his audience.

"I'll tell you how: it's because cowards have led us! But those days are over. Many of us here will die in this holy fight. But by Allah's strength, so will Bashar Al-Assad. We will see that he gets what is coming to him."

Osama al-Jihadi stood motionless. His eyes shifted from cohort to cohort until he had personally acknowledged nearly every man in the room. Finally, he nodded toward the one who had introduced him, and the meeting was over.

Jamal al-Jihadi filed slowly out of the basement with the other men but briefly caught his older cousin's steady eye. He smiled and bowed his head toward his leader and uncle's son. The strong man of al-Nusra had no idea that every time his favorite cousin grinned, he was praying for Osama.

"Jamal, you have to get out! My sister in Lebanon is ready for us." Jamal's fiery wife, Safa, slammed both hands flat on the kitchen table, her words and eyes pleading with the man seated across from her. "I don't care if Osama is your cousin. You're playing with fire. Surely he suspects something. Osama recruited you, so the two of you could be 'freedom fighters.' But these people of his are nothing but cold-blooded terrorists. How can you even go to the meetings anymore in good conscience? You're a believer!"

Jamal closed his eyes, sincerely considering the fears of the wife he so adored — and the mother of his three young children. Barely five feet tall, his lovable stick of dynamite was also by far the best cook in either of their extended families. Her Lebanese heritage added literal and figurative spice to every family gathering.

Their passionate dialogue had begun the instant he entered the kitchen, groggy from too little sleep after the late-night meeting. Jamal mainly listened, and after just ten minutes, he felt as if the talk with his wife had been in progress for hours.

He picked up a serving dish from the center of the table and scraped the last fava beans onto a piece of pita. Studying the pale green objects, he smiled softly, and raised his hand like a schoolboy waiting to be called on at the madrassa.

"I would like to say something."

Safa accepted the interruption and with flair slapped her right hand across her mouth.

"My dear Safa, when Jesus came into my life, I knew He called me first to our precious family, yet my heart is in agony for my larger al-Jihadi family as well. Some people are called to take Jesus to foreign lands, but I'm to stay here. This is my calling. It begins for me in my house, but I am willing to tell everyone else about Him too."

"Yes, I know that, Jamal, and I love you for being such a brave man. But you were raised a Muslim — we both were — and your family is involved in terrorism. Many of them are! Do you think they will not notice the change in you? It's all over your face. The Holy...