A group of unknown armed men stormed the Iranian embassy in Damascus on Sunday after Islamist rebels took over the city and overthrew Bashar Assad’s regime. According to the Russian Foreign Ministry, he had fled the country and left “instructions” for a transfer of power.
Iranian state television reported on the embassy incident and said they did not believe the gunmen were linked to the broader rebel group who took the city. Iran had withdrawn most of its officials and their families on Saturday, leaving only a handful of diplomats.
“It is said that the Iranian embassy next to nearby shops was stormed by an armed group different from the one that now controls (most of) Syria,” Iranian state television said, citing Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), who led the recent rebel advance. .
Arab and Iranian media shared images from inside the embassy building, where attackers ransacked furniture and documents in the building and damaged some windows.
ISLAMIC REBELS IN SYRIA CATCH ASSAD, PUTIN, IRAN GUARD REGIMES AND GIVE US NEW MIDDLE EAST HEADACHES
Rebel fighters stand at the Iranian embassy with a torn poster of Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah and Qassem Soleimani, the top commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, after Syrian rebels announced they would attack President Bashar al-Assad in Damascus on December 8, 2024 , Syria, have deposed. (REUTERS/Firas Makdesi)
According to Syrian television reports, Assad and his British-born wife Asma al-Assad fled Damascus this weekend with their three children. It was unknown where they were going.
A video statement by a group of men on Syrian state television said Assad had been overthrown and all prisoners had been released.
Syrian Prime Minister Mohammad Ghazi al-Jalali said early on Sunday that he did not know where Assad was. He told the Saudi television network Al-Arabiyya that communications were lost on Saturday evening.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry said in a Telegram post on Sunday that Assad left Syria after negotiations with rebel groups, and that the longtime Syrian leader had left behind “instructions” to “transfer power peacefully.” The Russian ministry said the Kremlin was not directly involved in these talks.
TOPSHOT – A photo taken at the entrance to the Kweyris military airport in the eastern part of Aleppo province on December 3, 2024 shows a portrait of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and a national flag in the dumpster after the area’s takeover by rebel groups. (Photo by RAMI AL SAYED/AFP via Getty Images)
Crowds of Syrians gathered in the central squares of Damascus to celebrate the news of Assad’s departure. Some chanted anti-Assad slogans and honked their horns. Celebratory gunshots rang out in other areas.
Syria has been embroiled in a bloody, nearly 14-year civil war as Islamist rebels sought to overthrow the Assad dynasty. The apparent collapse of more than 50 years of Assad family rule on the Syrian Arab Republic is a monumental turning point in Middle Eastern politics.
The overthrow of Assad in Syria creates a new crisis in the Middle East facing the new Trump administration. (Getty Images)
Abu Mohammed al-Golani, the Islamist leader of HTS, who has a $10 million bounty on his head from the US, is trying to present a watered-down version of the radical Islamism that fuels his years of struggle in Syria and Iraq against the Islam has determined. American troops. Al-Golani was arrested by the US military in the first decade of this century.
Syrian experts have told Fox News Digital that HTS wants to impose a totalitarian Islamist regime on the population. Phillip Smyth, an expert on Iranian regime and Syria proxy groups who sits at the Atlantic Council, told Fox News Digital: “HTS is a group that is an outgrowth of al-Qaeda and has ties to Turkey. Their end game is to create a Taliban-like society with a few adjustments.”
Syrian opposition fighters remove a Syrian government flag from an official building in Salamiyah, east of Hama, Syria Syria, Saturday, December 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)
Al-Golani banned his fighters from opening fire in the air in Damascus.
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“Public institutions will remain under the Prime Minister’s supervision until they are officially handed over,” he said in a statement published on his group’s social media.
Benjamin Weinthal of Fox News, Bradford Betz, Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report
