- Syrian rebels declared that president Bashar al-Assad has been ousted after they seized control of Damascus on Sunday.
- Opposition groups have ended Assad family’s iron-fisted rule after more than 13 years of civil war in a seismic moment for the Middle East
- Mr Assad flew out of Damascus for an unknown destination earlier on Sunday
- The fall of the government follows a sudden rebel offensive that sprinted across government-held territory and entered the capital in the space of 10 days
Key Reads
- Who are the Syrian rebels who have just taken Damascus?
- Syria’s civil war: What is going on and who is involved in this rapidly changing situation?
- Advance of Syrian rebels threatens wider instability in Middle East
- Rebels topple president Bashar al-Assad; Russian media reports that Syrian president has arrived in Moscow
That’s it for our live story today. You can read the latest from Sally Hayden in Beirut here.
The US Central Command (CENTCOM) said its forces conducted dozens of airstrikes on Islamic State targets in central Syria on Sunday.
In a statement, the CENTCOM said its strikes were aimed to ensure that the Islamic State does not take advantage of the current situation in Syria. - Reuters
The United States will work with partners and stakeholders in Syria to help seize an opportunity and manage the risk, US President Joe Biden said on Sunday after rebel fighters overthrew Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
In remarks at the White House, Biden said the United States will support Syria’s neighbors through the period of transition and will assess the words and actions of rebel groups.
Biden said the United States does not officially know of Assad’s whereabouts but noted reports that he fled to Moscow. He said Assad “should be held accountable.”
Biden said Syria is in a period of risk and uncertainty and that it is the first time in years that neither Russia nor Iran nor the Hezbollah militant organization held an influential role in Syria.
“For years, the main backers of Assad have been Iran, Hezbollah and Russia. But over the last week, their support collapsed - all three of them - because all three of them are far weaker today than they were when I took office,” said Biden, who became president in 2021.
Biden said U.S. forces on Sunday conducted a dozen precision strikes within Syria targeting camps and operatives of the militant group Islamic State.
“It’s a moment of historic opportunity for the long suffering people of Syria to build a better future for their proud country. It’s also a moment of risk and uncertainty,” Biden said.
“As we all turn to the question of what comes next, the United States will work with our partners and the stakeholders in Syria to help them seize an opportunity to manage the risk,” Biden added. - Reuters
The Syrian flag was removed on Sunday from a pole outside the country’s embassy in Moscow, Russian news agencies reported.
The flag had been hoisted outside the embassy earlier in the day, the agency said.
TASS also quoted embassy staff as saying the embassy would operate as normal on Monday. It said the embassy provided no explanation for the absence of the flag. - Reuters
Syria’s Bashar al-Assad and his family have arrived in Russia and have been granted asylum by the Russian authorities, Russian news agencies reported on Sunday, citing a Kremlin source.
The Interfax news agency quoted the unnamed source as saying: “President Assad of Syria has arrived in Moscow. Russia has granted them (him and his family) asylum on humanitarian grounds.” - Reuters
United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres said on Sunday that the future of Syria is a matter for the Syrians to determine and that his special envoy Geir Pedersen “will be working with them towards that end.”
“There is much work to be done to ensure an orderly political transition to renewed institutions. I reiterate my call for calm and avoiding violence at this sensitive time, while protecting the rights of all Syrians,” Guterres said in a statement.
Statement from the Tánaiste & Minister for Foreign Affairs Micheál Martin on the situation in Syria:
“The regime of Bashar al-Assad was a brutal tyranny that maintained its grip on power through fear and repression. The end of the regime is an opportunity for the Syrian people to determine their future.
“This is a volatile moment. My hope is that calm can be restored, and that a peaceful transition of power is possible.
“I call on all sides to engage in an inclusive dialogue as provided for under UN Security Council Resolution 2254 and to work with the UN Special Envoy, Geir Pedersen.
“I urge those who have taken power to respect international humanitarian law, and ensure the protection of civilians and the human rights of minorities.
“Those who have influence in the region should use it constructively. All parties have a responsibility to ensure there is no return to violence or conflict.
“The people of Syria have suffered enormously over many decades and deserve a better future. The Government will continue to follow the evolving situation in Syria closely.”
Colin Lee, GOAL’s Director of Programme and Operations for the Middle East, has said: “As the ceasefire in Lebanon barely holds, a new and unexpected offensive has been shaking Syria for the past two weeks, after almost five years of relative truce, or so-called ‘frozen conflict’. And now the precarious balance of the fragmented country could revive an even more widespread conflict or a pathway to resolution. No one knows.”
Mr Lee added: “More than 12 million Syrian people have been displaced in this war since 2011 and with this unanticipated collapse of the regime, thousands and thousands of those people will be trying to get back to what they once called home.
" So, for GOAL, our focus is on the safety of our 800+ staff, who are all Syrian, and their families. Therefore, in partnership with our Syria programme management team, led by long-term humanitarian, Tamer Kirolos, we are tracking all our staff and assessing their potential relocation needs.”
Abu Mohammed al-Golani, a former al-Qaeda commander who cut ties with the group years ago and says he embraces pluralism and religious tolerance, leads the biggest rebel faction and is poised to chart the country’s future direction.
In his first public appearance since fighters entered the Damascus suburbs on Saturday, Mr al-Golani visited the capital’s sprawling Umayyad Mosque and said Mr Assad’s fall was “a victory to the Islamic nation”.
Calling himself by his given name, Ahmad al-Sharaa, and not his nom de guerre, he told hundreds of people that Mr Assad had made Syria “a farm for Iran’s greed”.
Syrian state television aired a video statement early on Sunday by a group of rebels saying that Mr Assad had been overthrown and all prisoners had been set free. They called on people to preserve the institutions of “the free Syrian state”.
Mr al-Golani said in the statement the group is determined to continue the path they started in 2011 during the Arab Spring. “The future is ours,” al-Golani’s statement said.
The rebels said they had freed people held at the notorious Saydnaya prison, where rights groups say thousands were tortured and killed.
A video circulating online purported to show rebels breaking open cell doors and freeing dozens of female prisoners, many of whom appeared shocked and confused. At least one small child could be seen among them.
Rebel commander Anas Salkhadi, who appeared on State TV later in the day, sought to reassure Syria’s religious and ethnic minorities, saying: “Syria is for everyone, no exceptions. Syria is for Druze, Sunnis, Alawites, and all sects.”
“We will not deal with people the way the Assad family did.” - Associated Press/Reuters
US President Joe Biden will meet with his national security team on Sunday morning to receive an update on the situation in Syria, a White House spokesperson said in a post on X.
The meeting comes after rebels declared they had ousted Syrian President Bashar al-Assad after seizing control of Damascus on Sunday. - Reuters
Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu has said the fall of the Assad regime is historic for the Middle East and “the direct result” of his country’s forceful actions against Iran and Hizbullah, two of the former president’s main supporters.
Starmer welcomes fall of ‘barbaric’ Assad regime
UK prime minister Keir Starmer said he welcomed the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s “barbaric regime” in Syria.
He called for all sides involved to protect civilians and ensure aid can reach the vulnerable. The UK government haf been helping citizens to flee Syria over the weekend before the situation reached a crisis point.
“The developments in Syria in recent hours and days are unprecedented, and we are speaking to our partners in the region and monitoring the situation closely,” Mr Starmer said. “The Syrian people have suffered under Assad’s barbaric regime for too long and we welcome his departure.
“Our focus is now on ensuring a political solution prevails, and peace and stability is restored.”
Israeli forces seize Golan Heights buffer zone
Israeli forces have seized a buffer zone in the Golan Heights established by a 1974 ceasefire agreement with Syria, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said.
Mr Netanyahu said the decades-old agreement had collapsed and Syrian troops had abandoned their positions, necessitating the Israeli takeover.
Israel captured the Golan Heights in the 1967 Middle East war and annexed it. The international community, except for the United States, views it as occupied Syrian territory.
Earlier on Sunday, a spokeswoman for the Irish Defence Forces confirmed that three members were currently deployed in the Golan Heights region on the border between Syria and Israel.
She said all three were “well and accounted for and continue with mandated operations”. Two members are working with UNDOF (United Nations Disengagement Observer Force) and the third is with UNTSO (United Nations Truce Supervision Organisation), she said.
Additional reporting from Reuters
World leaders react to ousting of Assad
French president Emmanuel Macron said France remained “committed to the security of all in the Middle East” and that “the barbaric state has fallen”.
“I pay tribute to the Syrian people, to their courage, to their patience. In this moment of uncertainty, I wish them peace, freedom and unity,” Mr Macron said in a post on X social media.
German chancellor Olaf Scholz said the end of Assad’s rule over Syrian was “good news” but what matters now “is that law and order are quickly restored in Syria. All religious communities, all minorities must enjoy protection now and in the future.”
“Bashir al Assad has brutally oppressed his own people, has countless lives on his conscience and has driven numerous people to flee Syria, many of whom have also come to Germany,” said Mr Scholz. “The Syrian people have experienced appalling suffering. The end of Assad’s rule over Syria is therefore good news.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has hailed the ousting of Syria’s Bashar al-Assad on Sunday as an “historic day”. He said it followed the blows delivered by Israel against Assad’s supporters Iran and Hizbullah in Lebanon.
On a visit to the area near the border with Syria, he said he had ordered Israeli forces to seize areas in the buffer zone to ensure Israel’s security and said: “We will not allow any hostile force to establish itself on our border”.
In Jordan, King Abdullah said his country respected the choices of the Syrian people. He urged the avoidance of any conflict in Syria that might lead to chaos and stressed the need to protect the security of his country’s northern neighbour, according to a statement published by the Royal Hashemite Court.
Reuters
Taoiseach welcomes fall of Assad dictatorship but says world must act ‘to prevent chaos and tyranny’
“The scenes we are seeing across Syria, including in Damascus, are truly historic,” said Taoiseach Simon Harris on Sunday. “The people of Syria have long wanted a future free of isolation and full of normalised relations with their neighbours and world powers. That now must be the goal of the UN, the Arab League and us in the European Union”.
He added that the fall of the Assad dictatorship “is to be welcomed, but the world must now act to prevent chaos and tyranny from filling the vacuum”.
“The future of Syria must be determined by Syrians through a peaceful transition as well as free and fair elections,” concluded the Taoiseach.
Irish Defence Force members in Golan Heights ‘well and accounted for’
Three members of the Irish Defence Forces are currently deployed in the Golan Heights region on the border between Syria and Israel, a spokeswoman for the Defence Forces confirmed on Sunday.
All three are “well and accounted for and continue with mandated operations,” she told The Irish Times.
Two members are working with UNDOF (United Nations Disengagement Observer Force) and the third is with UNTSO (United Nations Truce Supervision Organisation), she said.
The Defence Forces ended its final peacekeeping mission on the Golan Heights with the 68th Infantry Group in April 2024. The Defence Forces withdrew from the mission because of personnel shortages.
Who is fighting in Syria and why?
Many readers may be wondering how did front lines in Syria, which had been lying dormant for years, suddenly jolt back into action, resulting in the ousting of the country’s president.
Syrian rebels launched their surprise offensive on November 26th, attacking from areas to the north and northwest of Aleppo. They swept into the city on November 29th-30th, forcing out government forces. They have since seized control of Hama, Homs and Damascus, forcing president Bashar al-Assad to flee and ending his family’s decades of rule after more than 13 years of civil war.
It marks the most serious escalation of the conflict in years, adding to a toll that stands at hundreds of thousands dead since 2011, when the war mushroomed out of an Arab Spring uprising against Assad’s rule. Since then, more than half the pre-war population of 23 million people have been forced from their homes, with millions fleeing abroad as refugees.
More than 2,100 Syrian refugees have come to Ireland through the State resettlement programme.
Opposition forces must ‘break free from violence of the past’ and focus on ‘justice, not retribution’, says Amnesty International
Syria has a “historic opportunity” which must be seized to redress “decades of grave human rights violations”, the secretary general of Amnesty International has said. Speaking following the news that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad had been ousted, Amnesty’s Agnès Callamard called on opposition forces to “break free from the violence of the past. The most important step is justice, and not retribution.
“We urge all parties to the present conflict to fully respect the laws of armed conflict,” she said. “This includes the obligation not to attack anyone who clearly expresses an intention to surrender, including government forces, and to treat anyone taken into custody humanely.”
“After over five decades of brutality and repression, the people of Syria may finally have an opportunity to live free of fear with their rights respected. Under the rule of Bashar al-Assad, and before him his father Hafez al-Assad, Syrians have been subjected to a horrifying catalogue of human rights violations that caused untold human suffering on a vast scale.
“This included attacks with chemical weapons, barrel bombs, and other war crimes, as well as murder, torture, enforced disappearance and extermination that amount to crimes against humanity. This historic opportunity must be now seized and decades of grave human rights violations redressed.”
Bashar al-Assad has ‘left the country’ and given instructions for ‘peaceful transfer of power’, says Russia
The Russian Foreign Ministry said on Sunday that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad had left office and departed the country after giving orders there be a peaceful handover of power.
In a statement, the ministry did not say where Assad was now and said Russia has not taken part in the talks around his departure.
“As a result of negotiations between B. Assad and a number of participants in the armed conflict on the territory of the Syrian Arab Republic, he decided to resign from the presidency and left the country, giving instructions for a peaceful transfer of power.
“Russia did not participate in these negotiations,” the ministry said.
Moscow was extremely worried by events in Syria and urged all sides to refrain from violence, it said.
“We urge all parties involved to refrain from the use of violence and to resolve all issues of governance through political means,” the statement said.
“In that regard, the Russian Federation is in contact with all groups of the Syrian opposition.”
It said Russia’s military bases in Syria had been put on a state of high alert, but that there was no serious threat to them at the current time.
Reuters
France calls for peaceful transition
France on Sunday welcomed news of the fall of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and called for fighting to end with a peaceful political transition in the country.
“Now is the time for unity in Syria,” the foreign ministry said in a statement.
Reuters
Trump responds
US president-elect Donald Trump posted on his Truth Social platform on Sunday the following:
“Assad is gone. He has fled his country. His protector, Russia, Russia, Russia, led by Vladimir Putin, was not interested in protecting him any longer... Russia and Iran are in a weakened state right now, one because of Ukraine and a bad economy, the other because of Israel and its fighting success.
“Likewise, Zelenskyy and Ukraine would like to make a deal and stop the madness.
“There should be an immediate ceasefire and negotiations should begin. Too many lives are being so needlessly wasted, too many families destroyed, and if it keeps going, it can turn into something much bigger, and far worse. I know Vladimir well. This is his time to act. China can help. The World is waiting!”
Foreign involvement in the Syrian conflict
Since the beginning of Syria’s civil war, Turkey’s military has launched several military interventions across the border into Syria, mostly against Syrian Kurdish-led forces. Turkey now effectively controls a zone along Syria’s northern border.
Turkey also supports factions such as the Syrian National Army, a coalition of armed Syrian opposition groups. Analysts say it probably gave tacit approval to the offensive led by HTS (Hayat Tahrir al-Sham).
Throughout Syria’s civil war, Russia has been one of Assad’s most loyal foreign backers, sending Russian troops to support his forces and jets to bomb his enemies. It has maintained a strategic military presence in Syria with air and naval bases, which it uses to support military operations in the region.
Because of the grinding war of attrition in Ukraine, analysts say Russia has been unable to support Syria’s government as forcefully as it has in the past. Russian air strikes that attempted to slow the rebel advance have been relatively sparse.
Syria is a core part of Iran’s “Axis of Resistance,” a network of countries and groups that includes Hizbullah, Palestinian militant group Hamas and the Houthis in Yemen that hopes to destroy Israel and reduce American influence in the Middle East.
Iran smuggles weapons to Hizbullah across Iraq and Syria. Iran and Hizbullah have repaid the favour by sending thousands of militants to fight on Assad’s side during the civil war. On Friday, Iran began to evacuate its military commanders and personnel from Syria, according to regional officials and three Iranian officials, in a sign of its inability to help Assad hold power.
The role of the United States in the Syrian civil war has shifted several times. The Obama administration initially supported opposition groups in their uprising against the government, providing weapons and training, with limited effect.
After the rise of the Islamic State group in 2014, US forces fought the terrorist group with air strikes and assistance to Kurdish forces, and then stayed in northeastern Syria to prevent a resurgence. In 2019, then-president Donald Trump withdrew many of those forces, but the US still maintains about 900 troops, based in Kurdish-controlled oil-drilling areas in the northeast and a garrison in the southeast near Syria’s borders with Iraq and Jordan.
Israel’s military activities in Syria have been mostly focused on air strikes against Hizbullah and Iranian targets, especially senior military personnel, weapons production facilities and the transport corridor that Iran uses to send weapons to Hizbullah.
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How did Syria reach this point?
On November 27th Syrian rebels launched a shock offensive with gunmen capturing Aleppo, Syria’s largest city, and the central city of Hama, the fourth largest.
The rebel group are led by Islamist alliance Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS, along with an umbrella group of Turkish-backed Syrian militias called the Syrian National Army.
Their lightning offensive, taking over several key cities in the space of days, was the most direct challenge to president Bashar al-Assad’s power in years and may signal the end of his 24-year rule.
HTS is now the most powerful rebel faction in Syria.
It is designated as a terrorist group by the US and there are serious human rights concerns in the area it controls, including executions for those accused of affiliation with rival groups and over allegations of blasphemy and adultery.
The Syrian civil war started 13 years ago, during the Arab Spring, and escalated into a bloody, multifaceted conflict involving domestic opposition groups, extremist factions and international powers, including the United States, Iran and Russia. More than 500,000 Syrians have died, and millions more have fled their homes.
Welcome to The Irish Times live coverage of events unfolding in Syria – rebels declared on Sunday that president Bashar al-Assad’ regime has ended, ending his family’s iron-fisted rule after more than 13 years of civil war in a seismic moment for the Middle East.
We will be bringing you the latest from reporters across the globe as the Syrian situation progresses through the day.
