On December 8th, 2024, the regime of Bashar al-Asad evaporated. In the early morning hours the Syrian dictator of the last twenty-four years fled to Moscow via Russian aircraft, leaving the capital and entire country to jubilant crowds and several rebel coalitions. The significance of this date within modern Syrian history cannot be overstated; it is arguably only rivaled by April 17th, 1946, the day the last French soldiers left what had been the Mandate of Syria, and November 13th, 1970, when Bashar’s father Hafiz al-Asad launched his ‘Corrective Movement’ coup and seized power from fellow Ba‘th party rivals.
While the fall of the regime ends the central conflict within the Syrian civil war, the country remains divided between four primary actors – three of which are nominally allied under a broad opposition umbrella.
The first and most significant of these is Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the former al-Qa‘idah affiliate led by Abu Muhammad al-Julani or Ahmad al-Shar‘, which initiated and oversaw the offensive that broke the regime. Prior to November 27 HTS and its allies were confined to the Idlib pocket of northwestern Syria, administered by the HTS-controlled Syrian Salvation Government (SSG). Idlib was protected by Turkey via military outposts established as part of a deconfliction agreement with Russia, however HTS’s relationship with Turkey is somewhat ambiguous.
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