Thousands of people took to the streets this Sunday in the vast majority of the provinces of Syria, and also in Damascus, after the Islamist rebels have taken over the capital of the Arab country and declared it “free” from President Bashar al-Assad, who clung to power for 24 years.
Arab media such as the private Qatari television network Al Jazeera have spread images of large concentrations of people in the Umayyad Square, in the center of Damascus, and of citizens immortalizing with their cell phones the atmosphere of joy in the Syrian capital after the fall of Al Assad.
These celebrations have taken place in parallel with so many others in the vast majority of the country’s provinces, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which has pointed out that thousands of people have taken to the streets from Tartus, Latakia, Baniyas, Homs, Aleppo, Idlib, Deir al Zur and Al Hasakah.
The celebrations have also spread to “towns inhabited mostly by citizens of the Alawite community“, the religious minority to which Al Assad belongs, after “the fall of the regime” of the president’s family, in power in Syria for almost 54 years.
In Tartus and Latakia, “thousands of people have taken to the streets to express their joy and have Destroyed statues of Hafez al-Assad“, the president’s father, who died in 2000.
The Observatory has pointed out that after the overthrow of Al Assad the rebels opened the doors of “prisons and detention centers”, such as the infamous Saydnaya prison about 30 kilometers north of Damascus and others in Adra and Homs, from where “thousands of prisoners were released.”
This occurs despite the fact that the Islamist rebel coalition led by the Levant Liberation Agency, which has taken control of Damascus today, announced a thirteen-hour curfew in the Syrian capital.
“The Military Operations Command announces the curfew in the city of Damascus from four in the afternoon until five in the morning,” according to a brief statement from the rebels.
It is one of the first measures taken by the rebels in the capital, after they asked for respect for public and private property, as well as not to shoot.
The insurgents today declared Damascus “free” from President Bashar al-Assad after 12 days of offensive initiated by a coalition led by the Levant Liberation Organization along with other Turkish-backed factions to overthrow the Syrian Government.
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