The Assad family, which ruled Syria for over 50 years, began its collapse on Sunday as rebel forces declared control over Damascus, leaving the fate of President Bashar al-Assad unknown.
These events have sparked celebrations among the long-oppressed population but also concern over the potential impact of the regime’s disintegration on the entire region.
Rebel forces entered the capital overnight, just over a week after launching an offensive that swiftly overran Syria’s major cities. Assad, according to two Syrian security officials, fled early Sunday morning, with his destination remaining unknown.
The government, which had survived over a decade of civil war and economic crises, crumbled under the pressure of rapid advances by various rebel groups converging from the north, south, and east.
A dramatic turn of events
The fighting represents the latest dramatic twist in a series of interconnected conflicts that have rocked the Middle East for over a year, beginning with Hamas’s attack on southern Israel on October 7th, 2023, that triggered a war in Gaza, which then spread to Lebanon and Iran.
Assad became a casualty of the wars in Lebanon and Ukraine, which drained the resources of Russia and Iran-backed Hezbollah, two key allies whose military support had sustained Assad’s rule for years.
Iran, Russia, Turkey, Israel, Arab states, and the United States (U.S.) – which has at least 900 troops in Syria – are closely monitoring the situation, worried that the rapid collapse of the regime without a succession plan could create a dangerous vacuum, potentially spreading the conflict to neighboring countries.
The offensive that led to the regime’s downfall was launched by Hay‘at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), designated a terrorist organization by the U.S. and led by Abu Mohammad al-Julani, a former associate of ISIS and al-Qaeda. Al-Julani has since severed those ties and pledged to protect Syria’s religious and ethnic diversity, though doubts remain about the sincerity of his transformation.
The Assad family, though widely despised, maintained a fragile balance of power in a country divided by warring rebel factions and external pressures from Turkey, Russia, and Iran. In recent days, neighboring countries have rushed to fortify their borders to prevent the conflict from spilling over. Israel announced it was bolstering forces on the Golan Heights, a territory bordering Syria that it has occupied since 1967.
Though small and impoverished, Syria has played a pivotal role in interconnected regional conflicts. It has been a conduit for arming Hezbollah, enabled Iranian influence near Israel’s borders, and stored chemical weapons, now feared to fall into the wrong hands.
Assad was scheduled to address the nation on Saturday at 8 p.m. local time, but the speech never occurred. His whereabouts remain unknown. Officials close to the Syrian government have been hiding from the fighting in Damascus as rebels took control of the capital.
“We declare Damascus free from the tyrant Bashar al-Assad,” stated Lieutenant Colonel Hassan Abdul Ghani from the rebel military command in a social media post early Sunday morning.
Just hours earlier, on Saturday, rebels announced they had seized Homs, a city of 800.000 residents that served as a critical gateway to Assad’s stronghold on Syria’s coast, where Russia maintains military bases.
Refugees celebrate
Exiled Syrians who fled the civil war celebrated the regime’s fall. Footage from Homs shows residents tying a noose around a statue of Assad’s father, Hafez al-Assad, who ruled Syria for three decades, and toppling it.
Regime forces had claimed they established an impenetrable security cordon around Damascus, but it quickly collapsed under pressure from the north, where HTS advanced, and the south, where other rebel groups positioned themselves in the capital’s suburbs.
“We did it, we won. We’re finally a free country,” said Abdulkafi Alhamdo, an English professor from Aleppo who recently returned to the city after fleeing in 2016.
As rebels advanced toward Homs, Syrian security agents burned documents on the rooftop of the main intelligence building before abandoning it, said Rim Turkmani, whose friends in the city witnessed the events from their balconies.
Rebels freed hundreds of prisoners from a facility nicknamed the “human slaughterhouse” after seizing the site en route to the capital. According to Amnesty International, as many as 13.000 people were executed in the infamous Saydnaya prison in the first six years after the 2011 uprising. Many others died from repeated torture and systematic denial of food, water, and medical care.
A long history
Protests against Assad began with the Arab Spring in 2011 and escalated into an open civil war, with multiple factions vying for control over parts of the country. Iran and Russia intervened in 2015 to help Assad crush the uprising with airstrikes and proxy forces.
Both Iran and Russia have signaled to Assad that they cannot or will not intervene this time, sources familiar with the communications said. Meanwhile, rebels from HTS, with 25.000 fighters, appear ill-equipped to manage and govern the vast territories they have seized in recent days.
“We may see a major, swift victory followed by the start of problems,” said a Western diplomat focused on Syria, pointing to factional conflicts in Libya after Muammar Gaddafi’s ouster in 2011.
Foreign ministers from Russia, Iran, and Turkey met on the sidelines of a conference in Qatar to discuss a diplomatic resolution to the fighting as diverse rebel forces advanced.
With regime forces withdrawing, Russia may focus on securing an agreement to retain its two bases on the Mediterranean coast, whichwill enable it to project power across the region, said Michael Kofman, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
Turkey, a NATO member that supports rebels and has previously sent troops across the border, could significantly strengthen its influence in Syria.
The meeting in Qatar sought to broker an agreement among Russia, Iran, and Turkey to divide territory following Assad’s fall. Asked about the U.S. position, a State Department spokesperson said U.S.troops should remain in northeastern Syria to help fight ISIS and assist Syrians in achieving the conditions necessary for self-sufficiency.
Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani emphasized the urgent need for a political framework to guide developments in Syria.
“Our concern is that this could return us to old cycles of internal violence, civil war, which is what truly threatened Syria’s territorial integrity and unity,” he said at an annual policy forum in Qatar. The U.S. ally, closely aligned with Turkey and a supporter of some Syrian rebel groups, also maintains ties with Iran and Russia, Klix.ba writes.
