Much remains uncertain about whether a stable government can emerge and this has major implications for the country and the Middle East
Much remains uncertain about whether a stable government can emerge and this has major implications for the country and the Middle East DAMASCUS, SYRIA - DECEMBER 8: People react to the fall of Syrian regime in Umayyad Square on December 8, 2024 in Damascus, Syria.
Rebel forces in Syria claimed that they had retaken the capital from longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad, who was reported to have fled the country. Syria has been mired in a multi-party civil war since 2011, amid the Arab Spring uprisings. Damascus has fallen. President Bashir al-Assad has reportedly fled to Russia, his once-vaunted army, unpaid and demoralised, disintegrating in the face of. First Aleppo fell to the rebels, then only days later Hama and the strategic city of Homs, and on to the capital Damascus. Assad’s prime minister Mohammad Ghazi al-Jalali promises to co-operate with the rebels. On the streets there were astonished, relieved residents, the rebels opened the doors of the country’s infamous prisons and in neighbouring Lebanon and Turkey exiled Syrians celebrated. The rebels have promised order, many posted outside banks and other public institutions to guard them. In just a few days the balance of power in the turbulent region has been turned on its head. Blowback from the Israeli onslaught on Gaza and Lebanon, and an uphill battle in Ukraine for Russia, have seen Assad’s powerful allies turn their back on him, exposing the brutal, impoverished regime, as Mao Zedong would have put it, as a paper tiger. It represents a watershed for the Middle East, in upheaval since the Hamas attack on Israel in October 2023. Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu hailed a “historic day” as he argued that his country’s attacks on Iran and Lebanon’s Hizbullah had set off a “chain reaction” throughout the region. Bressie on his Army dad: ‘I remember him being picked up to go overseas and you wouldn’t see him for a year. I remember the fear of it’Paul Mescal on Saturday Night Live review: Gladiator II star skewers America’s bizarre views about IrelandHayat Tahrir al-Sham , which seized the opportunity and leads the alliance which swept the country, had largely been confined to Syria’s north-west province of Idlib before beginning its offensive 12 days ago. Once an affiliate of al-Qaeda, it has rebranded itself as a patriotic nationalist movement and its leader has sought to play down fears of reprisals . International observers, delighted to see the back of Assad, will wonder nervously whether the leopard has really changed its spots. Not least are concerns thatAssad, a London-trained eye doctor, took power in 2000, the latest of a ruthless family at the head of the secularist Baathist Party that has run Syria since a 1970 coup. They are Alawites, a minority sect that is an offshoot of Shia Islam. In 2011 a bloody civil war started during the Arab Spring and escalated into a multifaceted conflict involving domestic opposition groups, Kurdish rebels, extremist factions and international powers, including the US, Iran and Russia. More than 500,000 Syrians have died, and millions more have fled their homes, six million of them abroad to Lebanon and Turkey. But much now remains uncertain about whether a stable government can emerge, or more fighting and suffering lies ahead. And in turn this has major implications for the wider Middle East region.Political upheaval in France and Germany is a problem for the EUPaul Mescal on Saturday Night Live review: Gladiator II star skewers America’s bizarre views about IrelandMotorist dies and teenager critically injured in separate road incidents in Co KerryOl’ Man River – John Mulqueen on singer and activist Paul Robeson
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