The swift fall of Syria’s Assad brings moments inconceivable under his iron rule
It took barely 10 days for Syria’s insurgents to march from their stronghold in the northwest into Damascus and bring an end to the Assad family rule that had gripped the country for half a century. Every step of the way brought moments that would have been unbelievable only days earlier.
Raising their hands and automatic rifles into the air, insurgents rode out of their enclave in Idlib province on Nov. 28. Some wore Islamic extremist emblems on their uniforms, a sign of the jihadi roots of the leading insurgent faction, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham.
First to fall was Syria’s largest city, Aleppo, with a swiftness that may have amazed even the fighters. They celebrated by taking photos of each other stomping on a poster of President Bashar Assad in his sunglasses and military uniform. At the airport, they tore down a poster glorifying the ruling family — Bashar; his father and predecessor Hafez Assad; and Bashar’s elder brother Basel, who was supposed to succeed their father but died in a 1994 car crash.
More towns and cities fell like dominoes in the following days, including Hama and Homs. Along the way, Assad’s army melted away. Surrendered soldiers lined up for rebel-issued certificates of amnesty. Advancing rebel fighters passed army trucks and tanks abandoned on the side of the highway.
There was little fighting. The main response from the government was sporadic airstrikes from Syrian and Russian warplanes. Among the dead was a Syrian photographer, Anas Alkharboutli, who worked for Germany’s DPA news agency. Friends mourned over his body, his press helmet and flak jacket laid on his chest.
Overnight Saturday into early Sunday, the fighters marched unopposed into their greatest prize, the capital, Damascus. Assad and his family fled, ultimately taken in by his ally Russia.
Assad’s regime was deplored by many for its brutality and corruption. Insurgents and civilians celebrated his downfall by waltzing freely into his private residence and ransacking it. One man yanked a chandelier from the ceiling. A fighter posed for a photo behind a gigantic desk surrounded by luxurious furniture of wood inlaid with mother-of-pearl. A family posed in the palace’s grandiose atrium lined with colored marble beneath a giant chandelier.
Others streamed into the biggest symbol of Assad’s police state, Saydnaya Prison, hoping to find relatives who had disappeared years or even decades earlier. One man held up nooses he found — a reminder of the mass executions that rights groups say killed thousands of inmates. Insurgents set fire to a military court building, where rights group say death sentences were churned out after perfunctory trials that often lasted just minutes.
Some insurgents danced in the streets while others posed — cheering — on an army tank. Many waved the flag of the Syrian opposition, green, white and black with three red stars, instead of the Assad-era flag of red, white and black with two green stars.
The insurgent takeover has pushed the country into the unknown. There is potential for more chaos with jihadi militants hoping to seize power and the possibility of conflicts between the many armed factions. But with the end of Assad’s rule, it is a time for celebration.
By The Associated Press
