Assad is granted asylum in Russia as rebels seize control of the Syrian capital

A rapid advance by Syrian rebel groups on the country's capital has led to the collapse of Bashar al-Assad's control of a nation his family had ruled for half a century.

Crowds celebrated the seismic political shift in the streets of Damascus overnight and into Sunday, as Syrian state television broadcast a statement from a group of rebels, one dressed in a black hoodie, who announced that Assad had been deposed.

The Russian state news agency, Tass, posted on social media that Assad had landed in Moscow with his family, and would be granted asylum by the Kremlin.

With Assad gone, the rebels said they had taken the step of freeing all Syrian prisoners from jail. The man reading that statement on television, just hours after the city's fall, had echoed calls from the leading group in this lightning rebel offensive, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, demanding that citizens and fighters alike ensure the country's national institutions were protected. He ended his statement with a declaration after more than 13 years of bloody civil conflict: "Long Live a Free Syria."

A separate video showed the country's prime minister, Ghazi al-Jalali, being escorted from his home by armed rebels to hand formal power to a committee formed from various rebel groups, known as the Syrian Military Operations Command.

Assad's downfall came less than two weeks after an initial incursion west of the country's second largest city, Aleppo, triggered a cascading series of routs and retreats by the demoralized Syrian military.

President Biden called Assad's toppling a "fundamental act of justice and a moment of historic opportunity," during remarks from the White House in which he described how the Assad's "abhorrent" government had "brutalized, tortured and killed" hundreds of thousands of ordinary Syrians.

Biden also hailed the weakening of Hamas, Iran, Russia and Hezbollah, which he said had made it "impossible" for those powers to continue to prop up Assad, after military actions of "self-defense" from Israel and Ukraine that had continued with "unflagging" support from the U.S.

The U.S. military on Sunday afternoon said it had carried out dozens of airstrikes throughout the day, targeting what it called "known ISIS camps and operatives in central Syria." The group has maintained a small and disparate presence in parts of northeastern and central Syria since an international coalition in 2019 retook control of the last vestiges of its territory. 

The U.S. military's Central Command, based in Tampa, Fla., said in a statement that a variety of American military aircraft participated in the strikes, which were designed to ensure the group "does not seek to take advantage of the current situation to reconstitute in central Syria."

Questions about what comes next

The United Nations, United States and other governments have acknowledged this weekend's events as a highly significant, watershed moment, with the U.N. calling for the rebels to host talks that can lead to a more inclusive government for the country.

The U.N.'s lead envoy to Syria, Geir Pedersen, said the more than decade-long brutal civil war had left deep scars in Syria, but now was the time for all parties to prioritize dialogue, and he would be looking forward with "cautious hope" for the nation's new developments.

Efforts by the U.N. and others to build a successful transitional government will be complicated by the fact that Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, the Islamist group that led the offensive to topple Assad, is still designated as a terrorist organization by the U.N., U.S. and others. The group's leader, Abu Mohammed al-Golani, has however sought to present a far more moderate face in recent months, as analysts have told NPR.

Germany's leading diplomat described Assad's toppling as a "great relief" for Syria's people, but she also cautioned against radicalization, particularly given what's expected to be HTS' leading role in any future form of government.

"The country must not now fall into the hands of other radicals," said Annalena Baerbock, the German foreign minister, "whatever form they take."

Iran, which together with Russia played a leading role in supporting Assad's rule for many years, made unverifiable claims that rebels had attacked its embassy in Damascus on Sunday, airing footage from a television network that seemed to show a diplomatic compound. However, diplomats had reportedly left the embassy before any attack, according to an online post in the Iranian newspaper The Tehran Times, which cited the country's foreign ministry.

Russia, which has long used its military to prop up the Assad regime against wide-ranging opposition forces, has long maintained an airbase and naval repair hub in Syria, but the Russian embassy in Damascus has said its staff are fine and those bases appear unharmed. Nonetheless, a leading foreign affairs lawmaker in the upper house of the Russian parliament has said Assad's departure will mean difficult times ahead for Syria, a country known for its patchwork mosaic of ethnicities, religions and political affiliations.

"Syria is a very difficult story, for everyone without exception," said Konstantin Kosachyov, who is deputy chair of the Russian Senate. "One way or another, the civil war will not end today, there are too many opposing interests and too many opposing forces."

"The situation has evolved very quickly," according to Phillippe Lazzarini, the head of the U.N. agency dedicated to Palestinian refugees, UNRWA. "It's like the fall down of a house of cards."

He told NPR at a policy forum in Qatar that his organization's camps in Syria house around 400,000 people, but have largely remained calm with some services continuing to operate. He said he hoped the transition process would allow schools to reopen in the camps.

Israel heightens security, as Lebanon opens border crossings

Meanwhile in neighboring Israel, authorities are strengthening their security measures in the Golan Heights, the border region that Israel largely seized from Syria in the war of 1967.

The Israeli military said it had helped U.N. peacekeepers based in the region to stave off several armed men over the weekend, but would not interfere in Syria's internal events, and would simply keep certain areas of the Golan Heights closed to act as a buffer zone for security reasons.

On another Syrian border — with Lebanon — over which at least a million Syrians have fled as refugees since the start of their country's civil war, Lebanese authorities have instead opened the border crossing in anticipation of a reverse flow of refugees seeking to return home after years away.

Israeli airstrikes in recent weeks have damaged several of the border crossings between Lebanon and Syria, through which the Israeli military says the armed group Hezbollah has often sought to smuggle weapons that ultimately originate in Iran.

The Lebanese army — still working to redeploy troops to its southern border with Israel as part of a recent ceasefire agreement — has said it's also sending more units to its northern and eastern borders with Syria, in light of recent events.

Hadeel al-Shalchi, Emily Feng, Michele Kelemen and Aya Batrawy contributed to this report

Copyright 2024, NPR

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