Countries close borders after rebels’ stunning advance against Assad

The collection of rebel groups fighting to depose Syrian President Bashar al-Assad were pushing further south on Saturday towards a major city en route to the capital, as the government’s chief patron, Iran, moved to evacuate military commanders and other personnel from the country.

Reuters reported rebels seized control of the southern city of Daraa, the birthplace of a 2011 uprising against Assad and the fourth city his forces have lost in a week.

The rebels’ stunningly rapid gains spread alarm to neighbouring countries, prompting border closures to guard against the prospect of further chaos as Assad’s authoritarian government lost more of its grip over swaths of the country.

Syrian opposition fighters ride along the streets in the aftermath of the opposition’s takeover of Hama, Syria, on Friday.Credit: AP

And in another sign of the government’s loosening control, a Kurdish-led force backed by the United States, which is separate from the rebels advancing on Homs, said it had deployed in the eastern city of Deir el-Zour, which the government had previously held.

Taken together, the battlefield gains present the most serious challenge in years to Assad’s power.

But perhaps most significant was the withdrawal of Iranian personnel after more than a decade of staunch support for Assad. Those evacuated included top commanders of Iran’s powerful Quds Forces, the external branch of the Revolutionary Guard, said Iranian and regional officials.

Evacuations were ordered at the Iranian embassy in Damascus, and at bases of the Revolutionary Guard, the officials said. Iranians began to leave Syria early on Friday, they said, heading towards Lebanon and Iraq.

US officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said Damascus could soon be under threat. A senior US State Department official said Assad needed ground forces and Iran would be hesitant to provide any.

The US embassy in Damascus on Friday urged Americans “to depart Syria now while commercial options remain available in Damascus”.

“The bottom line,” said Mehdi Rahmati, an Iranian analyst, “is that Iran has realised that it cannot manage the situation in Syria right now with any military operation and this option is off the table.”

Despite being largely overshadowed by the wars in the Gaza Strip and Lebanon, the Syrian civil war never ended and instead fell into a protracted stalemate. Diplomatic efforts to find a solution have been stagnant for years.

Defectors line up to register with Syrian insurgents in Aleppo on Thursday. Rebels have called on government soldiers and security agencies to defect and receive “protection cards”.Credit: AP

The coalition of advancing rebels is led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, a group previously affiliated with al-Qaeda. Although it split with the terror group in 2016 and has attempted to gain international legitimacy, it is still designated as a terrorist organisation by the US and the United Nations.

The group’s leader, Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, said in an interview with The New York Times this week that his goal was to “liberate Syria from this oppressive regime”.

The reactions of Syria’s neighbours appeared to reflect the deep concerns about the spiralling and unpredictable war.

Lebanon announced it was closing all land borders with Syria except for one that links Beirut with Damascus. Israel said it would reinforce “aerial and ground forces” in the Golan Heights, which Israel seized from Syria after the Arab-Israeli War of 1967.

Jordan closed a border crossing with Syria after insurgents captured the area on the Syrian side, Jordan’s Interior Ministry said in a statement.

A Syrian opposition fighter holds up a mobile phone atop a seized Syrian airforce fighter plane at the Hama military airport on Friday.Credit: AP

And beyond the main rebel advances, the Assad government appears to be losing other pockets of territory. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a British-based war monitoring group, said the city of Sweida, south of Damascus, was no longer under government control.

The Russian embassy in Damascus issued a statement warning Russians of “the difficult military and political situation in Syria”. The embassy reminded Russians “of the opportunity of leaving the country on commercial flights through operating airports”. Russia is one of Syria’s most important allies.

The sudden rebel advance, launched last week, has abruptly changed the landscape of the 13-year civil war.

Residents leave the city carrying their belongings in the aftermath of the opposition’s takeover of Hama, Syria, on Friday.Credit: AP

The rebels have swept through major cities such as Aleppo and Hama and captured a significant amount of territory across four provinces, while government forces seemed to put up little resistance.

US officials have been surprised by the rebels’ progress so far and had not assessed that the Assad government’s control on Aleppo was so weak. They said the rebels appeared to have quickly taken advantage of the chaos created by their offensive, whose success likely exceeded their own expectations.

If the rebels gain control of Homs, it would be a significant turn in fortunes for Assad. The city sits at the crossroads of major highways, including one that leads to Damascus. Without Homs, the government would lose a key buffer between rebel-held areas in the north-west and Damascus further south.

Syrian rebel leader Abu Mohammed al-Golani first emerged as the leader of al-Qaeda’s Syria branch in 2011, in the first months of Syria’s war.Credit: Al Jazeera

Early in the civil war, parts of Homs fell to the rebels. Over the years, government forces besieged and bombarded rebel-held areas to wrest them back, devastating parts of the city.

The opposition fighters heading towards Homs on Saturday came out of Hama, the city they breached a day earlier.

While the rebels say their goal is to oust Assad, it is not clear what would happen if he were to fall. Many in the international community had come to grudgingly accept him as Syria’s leader, even after he violently crushed his country’s opposition and used internationally banned chemical weapons.

For them, Assad offered a semblance of control, while a rebel takeover threatened more uncertainties in a region already in upheaval. Some Arab states last year normalised diplomatic relations with the Assad regime after shunning his government for years.

An image of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, riddled with bullets, is seen on the facade of the provincial government office in the aftermath of the opposition’s takeover of Hama.Credit: AP

Publicly, American officials have been cautious about Hayat Tahrir al-Sham. But inside the US government, some officials said they believe the group’s turn to a more pragmatic approach was genuine, adding that its leaders know they cannot realise aspirations to join or lead the Syrian government if the group is seen as a jihadi organisation.

The group has retained its identity as a conservative Islamist organisation, but it has shown itself to be pragmatic while governing Idlib, in north-western Syria, US officials said. In areas that it has taken over, officials said, it has quickly focused on providing services to civilians.

In a briefing for reporters this week, Mouaz Moustafa, executive director of the Syrian Emergency Task Force, an opposition group that works with the US military, praised the group for turning on Aleppo’s electricity soon after it occupied the city.

Moustafa said it was wrong to tie the group to its jihadi roots, insisting it was not affiliated with terror groups. He urged the US to give full-throated support to the push against Assad, saying the offensive was in US national interests.

“Everyone should see this as Iran losing in Syria,” he said.

The rebel advance struck at a moment of weakness for Assad’s allies: Iran’s power has been curtailed by its conflict with Israel, and Russia’s military sapped by its invasion of Ukraine.

The Syrian government has relied on those countries and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah – now battered by its own war with Israel – to fight the rebels.

Russian airstrikes to try to slow the recent rebel advance have been relatively sparse, in what analysts see as a sign of Russia’s limited ability to aid Assad.

The Syrian Observatory said a Russian convoy had fled Deir el-Zour, the eastern city where Kurdish forces were advancing, and was headed to Damascus.

On Friday, the Syrian military struck rebels and their vehicles both north and south of Hama with artillery, missiles and airstrikes, assisted by Russia. Dozens of opposition fighters were killed and wounded, according to Syrian state media.

The Syrian military, after withdrawing from Hama following several days of fighting, issued an unusual statement explaining its pullback, saying it was seeking to avoid battles that would endanger civilians.

But sacrificing Hama also enables the Assad government to shift its limited military forces to areas it regards as more important, such as Homs.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey, who has backed some of the Syrian opposition, including rebel factions in the current offensive, said he had been frustrated with Assad over his unwillingness to negotiate over Syria’s future. He issued a qualified approval of the rebel advance.

”Idlib, Hama, Homs, and the target, of course, is Damascus,” Erdogan told reporters after Friday prayers in Istanbul, Turkish state media reported. “The opposition’s march continues. Our wish is that this march in Syria continues without incident.”

But Erdogan also seemed to express concern about the rebel advances, calling them problematic, Reuters reported.

“These problematic advances continuing as a whole in the region are not in a manner we desire; our heart does not want these,” he said. “Unfortunately, the region is in a bind.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.