BEIRUT (AP) — The Syrian government appeared to have fallen early Sunday in a stunning end to the 50-year rule of the Assad family after a lightning rebel offensive.
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 remarkably swift 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.
Unconfirmed reports that Assad’s plane has been shot down:
This is develping, so take it with a grain of salt.
Holy shit, this just gets crazier and crazier
Could be faking his own death so he isn’t tracked down and killed.
Not that Assad isn’t a massive cunt, but I do wonder what might happen next.
For reference here is a news article about a certain group taking Afghanistan in 1996, and the tone about today’s news seems oddly familiar.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/september/27/newsid_2539000/2539973.stm
The PM may call for free elections all he wants, but a group that has spent the last decade shedding blood for this moment my not see things quite the same way.
Still, the Syrian government and Hezbollah were in cahoots, so I can think of at least one Syrian neighbour that will be celebrating this. It’s one less route for weapons to end up in the West Bank.
Practical result - Israel is already hard at work annexing more Syrian territory: https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-moves-capture-syrian-held-golan-heights-following-assad-overthrow ofc Netaniahu swears that it’s “temporary”, I guarantee you - this is a permanent.
I mean Golan Heights is mentioned in the news all the time, and I’ve never seen any of them talk about it as anything other than Israeli territory, despite it being Syria.
Not that Assad isn’t a massive cunt, but I do wonder what might happen next.
Given the track record of violent revolutions throughout history, nothing good. Still, seeing how low the “better than Assad” bar is it might be a slight improvement.
Some real “Welcome to the Imperium of Mankind, atleast we arent the Dark Eldar.” Energy.
Another route would be an independent source of water and power and a trade route and free association and free movement about their own country. But sure, choose violence to end violence, because that works.
Seeing some peace in the region would be nice, but I can see Kurdish forces and Turkish backed rebels in the mix, and those guys don’t tend to get along.
It’s one less route for weapons to end up in the West Bank.
Only true if the revolution was Israeli sponsored.
To think the US haven’t had some hand in toppling a regional Russian ally would be naive.
Gotta say, its good Assad’s gone, but HTS does not sound much better.
The statements their leader have made seems promising. Cooperation with the UN, peaceful overhanding of power etc. But they stem from Al-Qaeda so let’s hope this doesn’t age like milk…
The statements their leader have made seems promising.
He is making the right noises, but then again so did the Taliban when they took control of Afghanistan.
The taliban had no allies, resources or much established that was at stake, thus no real incentive to follow through. They were just testing the waters to see if the world actually cared that much about those things or it was just a lot of noise. Turns out they were right, no country reciprocated on their statements, and so they just went back to their old ways.
HTS does actually have incentive to follow through here I think
My point exactly
Probably not, but at least for tonight we can celebrate
The enemy of my enemy is not as bad an enemy as the other enemy.
Time will tell. What they’ve been saying is mostly good, but words are one thing, actions are another. All we can do is hope.
RIP BOZO
Pieces, for sure
To shreds you say?
My best wishes to a free Rojava and may all Syrians get to experience a life of peace and freedom
I do hope so but HTS has some concerning links to IS.
Not sure if I would have preferred al-Assad having to live out the rest of his life in exile and constantly look over his own shoulder… Or seeing him imprisoned in Syria and/or publicly hanged for his crimes against humanity. But I guess with him having fled via plane, we’ll all have to accept the former.
…15ft/s drop at the mysterious end of his flight path in the mountains: https://www.flightradar24.com/data/aircraft/yk-ata#3844aec1
That’s a rumor that’s going around. The flight path makes no sense for a VIP (for example, flying over the city center of occupied Homs), and while it was pretty clearly a crash of a military plane, that doesn’t at all imply it was al-Assad’s. We don’t know the destination, just that he boarded a plane, but I’m guessing we’ll see him turn up soon enough.
Yeah, we’ll have to see. Sucks for whoever was actually on this plane though.
That’s what you get for hanging out with a scum bag
Word. “You are the friends you keep”, and so forth.
Well, if it was a Boeing plane he might nit make it to his destination.
Can someone ELI5 what happened? I knew about the civil war but it had been effectively at a stalemate for a couple of years. How did the rebels suddenly surge like they did?
From what I know, this is the combination of three things
- Opposition rebel groups decided not to fight each other
- Assad had it’s russian support cut out
- Blitz offensive lead by the opposition rebel groups, some of which had Turkish support lead to mayhem in Assad ranks
He relied primarily on Russian, Iranian, and Hezbollah support.
Iran and Russia used to be helping them, but Iran is in a shadow war with Israel and Russia is in a war with Ukraine + western allies. Their funding and personnel dried up.
Plus, the Syrian rebels banded together. Without Russian air support and airstrikes around the capital, and without iranian arms, their regime collapsed and ran to Russia like a removed.
Will Syria be better now? It’s anyone’s guess. I could see Russia and China potentially making moves on them during the rebuild process, but who knows for sure. The US will probably pull out soon once the next government is formed in January. It could be up to the Syrian rebels and Syrian people, but their country infrastructure is pretty blown apart, so they will need outside capital and expertise to rebuild.
$$$ Assad must have run out of treasure
2024 be like: I’m not done yet!!!
best wishes to the Syrian people + a MODERN INNOVATIVE (SOLAR POWERED?) RESTART of the country (but without the oil, that is in the north and under US (!) and Kurdish control) so they will rely on their willpower to rebuild this broken country and NOT descend into another Sharia radical Islamic state, thanks make it something that tourists want to visit :D MANY Syrians are still abroad, will they return now? we don’t know X-D (they definitely want to return from Lebanon)
Good luck. It was jihadists that deposed Assad, I’m sure they’ll just give up their newly acquired country. And I’m sure the CIA will stand idly by while that happens. Unfortunately Syria is fucked. Caliphate incoming.
That was damn fast, I didn’t think they’d hit Damascus this week.
Professor: Good news, everyone!
“Hayʼat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS; Arabic: هيئة تحرير الشام, romanized: Hayʼat Taḥrīr aš-Šām[54], lit. ‘Organization for the Liberation of the Levant’ or ‘Levant Liberation Committee’),[51] commonly referred to as Tahrir al-Sham, is a Sunni Islamist[55]” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tahrir_al-Sham not so sure but Sunni are the more radical islamic religious group?
Sunni is just a branch, there are two main branches Sunni and shia, neither are particularly more radical than the other. Kind of like Catholic and protestant christians
did u know there are WAY more branches of Islam: Alawite being the most moderate (?) one https://sh.itjust.works/post/29207324
Confusion and fear have swept through Bashar al-Assad’s Alawite sect and other loyalist communities since his fall, with many questioning how the collapse was so rapid after so many of their members had died to keep him in power. https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/assad-loyalists-shaken-by-his-fall-some-relieved-by-lack-violence-2024-12-08/
fucked
FYI I am Muslim
-
Sunni and shia together make up ~99% of all Muslims
-
No branch of Islam is inherently more extreme than the other, it varies from person to person or group to group.
-
Alawites are (arguably) not muslim
-
The vast majority of Muslims are members of the Sunni branch, like 90%. Its differentiating factor is not being more radical, but mostly about the succession of Muhammad, especially compared to the Shia branch.
Too soon to know much for sure, but this could be fucking wild if it’s really at face value.
The West will soon realise they backed the wrong horse.
They seem to be backed by Turkey, which isn’t a western country afak?
Turkey is ruled by a two-face jackass who tries to play both sides. He’s mainly interested in slaughtering the Kurds and carving out a piece of Syria for himself. So yeah, wrong horse for the people of Syria who will have to endure an ultraconservative theocracy, but the west will celebrate this because this benefits israel. Syria had been a thorn in israel’s side.
And your point is?
Oh sorry, I just assumed you meant that the west backed these rebels, which they don’t. You should have been clearer if that wasn’t the case.
You assumed correctly. And they have. The West, particularly the United States, the United Kingdom, France, and other European countries, has supported various rebel groups in Syria during the Syrian Civil War, which began in 2011. Initially, the support was aimed at opposing the regime of President Bashar al-Assad. The U.S. and its allies provided military training, weapons, and funding to moderate rebel groups, such as the Free Syrian Army (FSA). The Kurds in the north of Syria have been openly backed by the US for years. Admittedly it’s not necessarily the FSA that have become victorious but the point still stands…the West has backed the wrong horse. And in the months to come this they will privately lament the regime’s demise.
I don’t understand, do you mean that the west should have backed this terrorist group to come out on top or what?
I fear you grossly misinterpreted my comment but for clarity: the West should have backed Assad as the alternative will be worse, a lot worse.
Thanks for the clarification, I assumed you meant that the West had backed HTS, but I understand what you meant now. :)
