Celebrations across Syria mark end of Assad rule

Celebrations erupted around Syria and crowds ransacked president Bashar al-Assad’s luxurious home on Sunday, after Islamist-led rebels swept into Damascus and declared he had fled the country.

In the wake of a spectacular end to five decades of Baath party rule, Assad’s whereabouts were not immediately clear, but his key backer Russia said he had resigned from the presidency and left Syria.

Residents in the capital were seen cheering in the streets as rebel factions heralded the departure of “tyrant” Assad, saying: “We declare the city of Damascus free.”

AFPTV footage showed a column of smoke rising from central Damascus, and AFP correspondents in the city saw dozens of men, women and children wandering through Assad’s luxurious home after it had been looted.

The rooms of the residence had been left completely empty, except for some furniture and a portrait of Assad discarded on the floor, while an entrance hall at the presidential palace not far away had been torched.

“I can’t believe I’m living this moment,” tearful Damascus resident Amer Batha told AFP by phone.

“We’ve been waiting a long time for this day,” he said, adding: “We are starting a new history for Syria.”

Assad’s reported departure comes less than two weeks after the Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group challenged more than five decades of Assad family rule with a lightning offensive.

“After 50 years of oppression under Baath rule, and 13 years of crimes and tyranny and [forced] displacement […] we announce today the end of this dark period and the start of a new era for Syria,” the rebel factions said on Telegram.

While there has been no communication from Assad or his entourage on his whereabouts, prime minister Mohammed al-Jalali said he was ready to cooperate with “any leadership chosen by the Syrian people”.

The head of war monitor the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, Rami Abdel Rahman, told AFP: “Assad left Syria via Damascus International Airport before the army security forces left” the facility.

AFP has been unable to independently verify some of the information provided by the different parties, including the reported departure.

TOPPLED

Around the country, people toppled statues of Hafez al-Assad, Bashar al-Assad’s father and the founder of the system of government that he inherited.

For the past 50 years in Syria, even the slightest suspicion of dissent could land one in prison or get one killed.

As rebels entered the capital, HTS said its fighters broke into a jail on the outskirts of Damascus, announcing an “end of the era of tyranny in the prison of Sednaya”, which has become a by-word for the darkest abuses of Assad’s era.

The rapid developments came just hours after HTS said it had captured the strategic city of Homs, where prisoners were also released.

Homs was the third major city seized by the rebels, who began their advance on 27 November, reigniting a years-long war that had become largely dormant.

United States president Joe Biden was keeping a close eye on the “extraordinary events” unfolding in Syria, the White House said.

Assad’s rule, backed by Russia and Iran, had for years also been supported by the Lebanese group Hezbollah, whose forces “vacated their positions around Damascus”, a source close to it said on Sunday.

According to the rebels, the Islamist leader of HTS, Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, arrived in Damascus on Sunday.

HTS is rooted in the Syrian branch of Al Qaeda.

Proscribed as a terrorist organisation by Western governments, it has sought to soften its image in recent years, and has told minority groups living in areas it now controls not to worry.

Before Sunday’s announcements, Damascus residents had described to AFP a state of panic as traffic jams clogged the city centre, with people seeking supplies and queueing to withdraw money.

But morning saw chants and cheering, with celebratory gunfire and shouts of “Syria is ours and not the Assad family’s”.

Before Damascus, a string of towns and cities, including the northern city of Aleppo, had fallen from Assad’s hands.

The commander of Syria’s US-backed, Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which controls much of north-east Syria, hailed “historic” moments with the fall of Assad’s “authoritarian regime”.

The rebel offensive began the very day a ceasefire took effect in Lebanon after nearly a year of war between Israel and Hezbollah.

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