DAMASCUS, Syria – Damascus stirred again to life on Monday, December 9, firstly of a hopeful however unsure period after rebels seized the capital and President Bashar al-Assad fled to Russia, following 13 years of civil warfare and greater than 50 years of his household’s brutal rule.
Busy site visitors returned to the streets and folks ventured out after a nighttime curfew, however most retailers remained shut. Rebels milled about within the heart.
The principle insurgent commander Ahmed al-Sharaa, higher generally known as Abu Mohammed al-Golani, met in a single day with Assad’s Prime Minister Mohammed Jalali and Vice President Faisal Mekdad to debate preparations for a transitional authorities, a supply acquainted with the discussions instructed Reuters.
Al Jazeera tv reported that the transitional authority can be headed by Mohamed Al-Bashir, who ran the administration in a small pocket of rebel-held territory earlier than the 12-day lightning offensive that swept into Damascus.
Syria’s banks would reopen on Tuesday, December 10, and employees had been requested to return to places of work, in keeping with a Syrian central financial institution supply and two industrial bankers. Syria’s forex would proceed for use, they mentioned.
On the Inside Ministry that ran Assad’s police drive, furnishings had been looted and employees stayed away. Armed rebels had been there to take care of order.
The oil ministry referred to as on all workers within the sector to move to their workplaces beginning on Tuesday, including that safety can be offered to make sure their security.
Fighters from the distant countryside milled about within the capital, clustering within the central Umayyad Sq. earlier than Damascus’s nice 1,300-year-old mosque.
“We had a function and a aim and now we’re achieved with it. We wish the state and safety forces to be in cost,” mentioned Firdous Omar, who mentioned he had been battling the Assad authorities since 2011 and was now wanting ahead to laying down his weapon and returning to his job as a farmer in provincial Idlib.
The advance of a militia alliance spearheaded by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a former al Qaeda affiliate, was a generational turning level for the Center East.
It ends a warfare that killed a whole lot of 1000’s, triggered one of many greatest refugee crises of contemporary occasions and left cities bombed to rubble, countryside depopulated, and the economic system hollowed out by international sanctions. Hundreds of thousands of refugees may lastly go dwelling from camps throughout Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan.
Assad’s fall wipes out one of many primary bastions from which Iran and Russia wielded regional energy. Turkey, lengthy aligned with Assad’s foes, emerges strengthened.
The Arab world faces the duty of reintegrating one of many Center East’s pivotal states, whereas containing the militant Sunni Islam that has previously metastasized into the sectarian violence of Islamic State.
HTS remains to be designated as a terrorist group by the United Nations, however has spent years attempting to melt its picture to reassure international states and minority teams inside Syria.
‘A brand new historical past’
The group’s chief Golani, who spent years in US custody as an rebel in Iraq however later broke with al Qaeda and Islamic State, has vowed to rebuild Syria.
“A brand new historical past, my brothers, is being written in the whole area after this nice victory,” he instructed an enormous crowd on the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus on Sunday.
Assad’s Prime Minister Jalali instructed Sky New Arabia he was prepared to offer paperwork and assist for the switch of energy.
The destiny of Syria’s military can be “left to the brothers who will take over the administration of the nation’s affairs,” Jalali mentioned. “What considerations us at present is the continuation of companies for Syrians.”
Assad’s police state was recognized for generations as one of many harshest within the Center East, holding a whole lot of 1000’s of political prisoners. On Sunday, December 8, elated inmates poured out of jails. Reunited households wept in pleasure. Newly freed prisoners had been filmed operating by the Damascus streets holding up their palms to indicate what number of years that they had been in jail.
One of many closing areas to fall was the Mediterranean coast, heartland of Assad’s Alawite sect and website of Russia’s naval base.
Two Alawite residents mentioned to this point the scenario had been higher than anticipated, seemingly with out retribution in opposition to Alawites. One mentioned a pal was visited at dwelling by rebels who instructed him handy over any weapons he had, which he did.
Close to Latakia, rebels had but to enter the Assad household’s ancestral village of Qardaha, website of a mausoleum for Assad’s father who seized energy in a coup in 1970 and dominated till his demise in 2000. A resident mentioned all senior figures tied to Assad had left.
The Kremlin mentioned it was too early to know the way forward for Russia’s army bases in Syria, however it will focus on the problem with the brand new authorities.
Israel, US launch strikes
Israel mentioned Assad’s fall was a direct consequence of Israel’s punishing assault on Iran’s Lebanese allies Hezbollah, who had propped up Assad for years however had been decimated since September by an Israeli air and floor marketing campaign.
Since rebels entered Damascus, Israel has struck websites in Syria. Israeli officers mentioned these air strikes would keep it up for days, to maintain Assad’s former arsenal out of hostile palms.
The US, which has 900 troopers in Syria alongside Kurdish-led forces within the east, mentioned its forces hit round 75 targets in air strikes on Islamic State on Sunday.
The US-backed Kurdish forces have clashed with Turkey-backed rebels within the north. A video, verified by Reuters, confirmed rebels coming into the city of Manbij, captured from the Kurdish forces on Monday. – Rappler.com
