President Bashar al-Assad fled Syria as Islamist-led rebels swept into Damascus, triggering celebrations across the country and beyond at the end of his oppressive rule on Sunday, December 8, 2024.

Crowds cheered in the streets of Damascus, where celebratory gunfire erupted as five decades of brutal Baath party rule came crashing to a dramatic end with Assad’s flight from the capital on Sunday.

Russian news agencies said Assad and his family were in Moscow, while rescuers on Monday searched the Syrian capital’s notorious Sednaya prison for hidden underground cells holding detainees in secret.

Assad’s government fell 11 days after the rebels began a surprise advance, more than 13 years after Assad’s crackdown on anti-government protests ignited Syria’s civil war – which had become largely dormant until the rebel push.

“This victory, my brothers, is historic for the region,” Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, leader of the Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group (HTS) that spearheaded the advance, said in an address at the landmark Umayyad Mosque in Damascus.

United States President Joe Biden said Assad should be “held accountable” but called the nation’s political upheaval a “historic opportunity” for Syrians to rebuild their country.

Residents cheered in the streets as the rebel factions heralded the departure of “tyrant” Assad, saying: “We declare the city of Damascus free.”

President Assad flees as Syrian rebels capture Damascus

Celebratory gunfire sounded along with shouts of, “Syria is ours and not the Assad family’s”.

Dozens of men, women, and children were seen wandering through Assad’s modern, spacious home whose rooms had been stripped bare.

“I can’t believe I’m living this moment. We’ve been waiting a long time for this day,” tearful Damascus resident Amer Batha told AFP.

The rebel factions on Telegram proclaimed the end to “50 years of oppression under Baath rule, and 13 years of crimes and tyranny and displacement”.

It is, they said, “the start of a new era for Syria”.

The foreign ministry of Assad’s key backer Russia had announced earlier Sunday that Assad had resigned from the presidency and left Syria.

The head of war monitor the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, Rami Abdel Rahman, said: “Assad left Syria via Damascus International Airport before the army security forces left the facility.”

Later on Sunday, a Kremlin source told Russian news agencies that Assad and his family had arrived in Moscow where they had been granted asylum “on humanitarian grounds”.

The Star