section_path: Documentary
section_name: Documentary
paragraph_text: Documentary
  
  On 1 June 2021 PBS Frontline released a documentary, The Jihadist, investigating al-Sharaa's past in the context of the ongoing Syrian civil war. In the interview, reflecting on his past affiliation with al-Qaeda, on U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East and the Palestinian cause, al-Sharaa commented in the interview:
  
  The history of the region and what it went through over the past 20 or 30 years needs to be taken into consideration... We are talking about a region ruled by tyrants, by people who rule with iron fists and their security apparatuses. At the same time, this region is surrounded by numerous conflicts and wars... We can't take a segment of this history and say so-and-so joined Al Qaeda. There are thousands of people who joined Al Qaeda, but let us ask what was the reason behind these people joining Al Qaeda? That's the question. Are the U.S. policies after World War II toward the region partially responsibility for driving people towards Al Qaeda organization? And are the European policies in the region responsible for the reactions of people who sympathize with the Palestinian cause or with the way the Zionist regime deals with the Palestinians?.. are the broken and oppressed peoples who had to endure what happened in Iraq, for example, or in Afghanistan, are they responsible..?.. our involvement with Al Qaeda in the past was an era, and it ended, and even at that time when we were with Al Qaeda, we were against external attacks, and it's completely against our policies to carry out external operations from Syria to target European or American people. This was not part of our calculations at all, and we did not do it at all.