Zachary Laub
Thirteen years after protesters in Syria first demonstrated against the four-decade rule of the Assad family, a rapid assault by rebel fighters in late 2024 succeeded in toppling one of the world’s most despotic regimes. Bashar al-Assad’s abrupt ouster and replacement by an Islamist-led transitional government has been greeted with both joy and caution.
The country’s protracted civil war saw hundreds of thousands of Syrians killed and nearly fourteen million people—more than half the prewar population—displaced. Today, Syria remains a deeply impoverished and fractured state, large parts of its territory controlled by different armed groups with varying affiliations with foreign powers. Iran, Israel, Turkey, Russia, and the United States were all drawn into the conflict either directly or indirectly over the years.
This narrative chronology explains how Syria’s civil war morphed from small acts of anti-Assad defiance to one of the deadliest and most complex wars of the twenty-first century.
Assads’ Rule Breeds Discontent
Hafez al-Assad seized control from a Baathist military junta in 1970, centralizing power in the presidency. He came from the Alawi minority, a heterodox Shia sect that had long been persecuted in Syria and was elevated to privileged positions under the post–World War I French mandate. Syria has long been and remains a Sunni majority country.
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