LAST UPDATE | 8 Dec 2024

THE SYRIAN GOVERNMENT has collapsed, falling to a lightning rebel offensive that seized control of the capital Damascus and sent crowds into the streets to celebrate the end of the Assad family’s 50 years of iron rule.

It has been reported by Russian media that Assad and his family are now in Moscow, and have been granted asylum on humanitarian grounds.

Syrian state television aired a video statement this morning by insurgents, saying that president Bashar Assad has been overthrown and all detainees in jails have been set free.

The man who read the statement said the Operations Room to Conquer Damascus, an opposition group, is calling on all opposition fighters and citizens to preserve state institutions of “the free Syrian state”.

“Long live the free Syrian state that is to all Syrians in all” their sects and ethnic groups, a group of men in the video statement said.

The Syrian government fell earlier today in a stunning end to the rule of the Assad family, after a sudden rebel offensive sprinted across government-held territory and entered the capital in 10 days.

The head of a Syrian opposition war monitor said president Bashar Assad had left the country for an undisclosed location, fleeing ahead of insurgents who said they had entered Damascus after a stunning advance across the country.

Syrian Prime Minister Mohammed Ghazi Jalali said the government was ready to “extend its hand” to the opposition and hand over its functions to a transitional government.

“I am in my house and I have not left, and this is because of my belonging to this country,” Jalili said in a video statement. He said he would go to his office to continue work in the morning and called on Syrian citizens not to deface public property.

He did not address reports that Assad had left the country.

Rami Abdurrahman of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights told The Associated Press that Mr Assad took a flight on Sunday from Damascus.

State television in Iran, Assad’s main backer in the years of war in Syria, reported that Assad had left the capital. It cited Qatar’s Al Jazeera news network for the information and did not elaborate.

There was no immediate statement from the Syrian government.

An Associated Press (AP) journalist in Damascus reported seeing groups of armed residents along the road in the outskirts of the capital and hearing sounds of gunshots.

Syrians celebrate the arrival of opposition fighters as they step on a picture of Syrian President Bashar Assad in Damascus, Syria, Sunday, 8 December. Alamy Alamy

The city’s main police headquarters appeared to be abandoned, its door left ajar with no officers outside. Another AP journalist shot footage of an abandoned army checkpoint where uniforms were discarded on the ground under a poster of Assad’s face.

Residents of the capital reported hearing gunfire and explosions. Footage broadcast on opposition-linked media showed a tank in one of the capital’s central squares while a small group of people gathered in celebration. Calls of “God is great” rang out from mosques.

People also chanted anti-Assad slogans and honked car horns. In some areas, celebratory gunshots rang out.

Soldiers and police officers left their posts and fled, and looters broke into the headquarters of the Ministry of Defence.

“My feelings are indescribable,” said Omar Daher, a 29-year-old lawyer.

“After the fear that he (Assad) and his father made us live in for many years, and the panic and state of terror that I was living in, I can’t believe it.”

Daher said his father was killed by security forces and his brother was in detention, his fate unknown. Assad “is a criminal, a tyrant and a dog,” he said.

“Damn his soul and the soul of the entire Assad family,” said Ghazal al-Sharif, another reveller in central Damascus.

“It is the prayer of every oppressed person and God answered it today. We thought we would never see it, but thank God, we saw it.”

It was the first time opposition forces had reached Damascus since 2018, when Syrian troops recaptured areas on the outskirts of the capital following a years-long siege.

The pro-government Sham FM radio reported that the Damascus airport had been evacuated and all flights halted.

The insurgents also announced they had entered the notorious Saydnaya military prison north of the capital and “liberated” their prisoners there.

The night before, opposition forces took the central city of Homs, Syria’s third largest, as government forces abandoned it.

The city stands at an important intersection between Damascus, the capital, and Syria’s coastal provinces of Latakia and Tartus — the Syrian leader’s base of support and home to a Russian strategic naval base.

The government denied rumours that Assad had fled the country.

Sham FM reported that government forces took positions outside Homs without elaborating. Abdurrahman said Syrian troops and members of different security agencies withdrew from the city, adding that rebels entered parts of it.

The insurgency announced later on Saturday that it had taken over Homs. The rebels had already seized the cities of Aleppo and Hama, as well as large parts of the south, in a lightning offensive that began on November 27. Analysts said rebel control of Homs would be a game-changer.

The rebels’ moves into Damascus came after the Syrian army withdrew from much of the southern part of the country, leaving more areas, including several provincial capitals, under the control of opposition fighters.

The fall of Damascus would leave government forces in control of only two of 14 provincial capitals: Latakia and Tartus.

The advances in the past week were by far the largest in recent years by opposition factions, led by a group that has its origins in al-Qaeda and is considered a terrorist organisation by the US and the United Nations.

In their push to overthrow Assad’s government, the insurgents, led by the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group, or HTS, have met little resistance from the Syrian army.

The rapid rebel gains, coupled with the lack of support from Assad’s erstwhile allies, posed the most serious threat to his rule since the start of the war.

The UN’s special envoy for Syria, Geir Pedersen, called on Saturday for urgent talks in Geneva to ensure an “orderly political transition”.

Speaking to reporters at the annual Doha Forum in Qatar, he said the situation in Syria was changing by the minute. Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov, whose country is Assad’s chief international backer, said he feels “sorry for the Syrian people”.

In Damascus, people rushed to stock up on supplies. Thousands went to Syria’s border with Lebanon, trying to leave the country. Lebanese border officials closed the main Masnaa border crossing late Saturday, leaving many stuck waiting.

Many shops in the capital were shuttered, a resident told The Associated Press, and those still open ran out of staples such as sugar. Some were selling items at three times the normal price.

The UN said it was moving non-critical staff outside the country as a precaution.