The State Department is poised to officially drop its designation of Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) — the Islamist group that toppled the Bashar al-Assad regime and whose former leader is now the president of Syria — as a foreign terrorist organization.

The US is set to take the Syrian Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) off its list of foreign terrorist organisations on Tuesday, according to a state department memo. The group led a rebel offensive in December that toppled the Assad regime,

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the move, which will take effect on Tuesday, 'recognizes the positive actions taken by the new Syrian government' under President Ahmad al-Sharaa.