Rebel leader urges Syrians to celebrate in the streets on Friday
The leader of the Islamist rebels that seized power in Syria last week has called on people to take to the streets to celebrate what he described as âthe victory of the blessed revolutionâ on Friday.
In a video message shared on Telegram, Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, the leader of the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group, who is now using his real name Ahmed al-Sharaa, called on people to âgo to the streets to express their joyâ.
His call comes ahead of the first Friday prayers since Syriaâs new leadership took control. During the early days of Syriaâs uprising in 2011, protesters would usually gather after Friday prayers.
He is set to attend Friday prayers at Damascusâs landmark Umayyad mosque.
Key events
Thousands of Syrians gather at famed Damascus mosque
Syrians converged on a landmark Damascus mosque for Friday prayers, waving opposition flags and chanting â all scenes that would have been unimaginable during the Assad regime.
At the capitalâs famed Umayyad Mosque, men, women and children gathered to celebrate on the first Friday prayers since Assadâs ouster, later streaming into the city streets and squares, AFP reported.
The scenes were reminiscent of the early days of the 2011 uprising, when pro-democracy protesters in Syrian cities would take to the streets after Friday prayers – but never in Damascus, long a stronghold of the Assad clan.
On Friday, exhilarated crowds chanted âOne, one, one, the Syrian people are one!â
Some held the Syrian independence flag, used by the opposition since the uprising began, while dozens of street vendors milled around the mosque, seeking to sell the three-star flags.
UN says Syria’s new authorities are sending “constructive” signals
Syriaâs new interim authorities have asked the United Nations refugee agency to remain in the country and indicated a willingness to protect them, UNHCR said Friday.
âThe needs are absolutely huge,â Gonzalo Vargas Llosa, UNHCRâs representative in Syria, told reporters. The agency had had âsome contact with the interim authoritiesâ, he said, adding: âthe initial signals that they are sending us are constructiveâ.
The authorities told us âthey want us to stay in Syria, that they appreciate the work that we have been doing now for many years, that they need us to continue doing that work,â said Vargas Llosa.
He said the interim authorities had also indicated âthey will provide us the necessary security to carry out those activitiesâ.
Around 700 political prisoners held in the prison inside the Mezzeh airbase were released earlier this week following the ousting of the Assad regime.
The now-empty cells â cramped, peeling and covered in etchings â stand as a stark testament to the conditions suffered by former inmates. My colleagues have put together this photo essay:
Itâs almost 4pm in Damascus. Hereâs a quick summary of todayâs developments:
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The US secretary of state, Anthony Blinken, is wrapping up a visit to Turkey as part of a broader effort to rally support across the Middle East for a peaceful political transition in Syria. The US administration is worried that a power vacuum in Syria could worsen tensions in the region, already heightened by multiple conflicts, and create conditions for the Islamic State group to regain territory and influence.
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Blinken said Friday that thereâs broad agreement on what both Turkey and the US would like to see in Syria following concerns about the two NATO alliesâ competing interests in Syria, as Turkey targets a US-backed Kurdish group seen as key to containing the extremists.
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Blinken also said he saw âencouraging signsâ of progress toward a ceasefire in Gaza and urged Turkey to use its influence to encourage Hamas to accept. âWhat weâve seen in the last couple of weeks are more encouraging signs that (a ceasefire) is possible,â Blinken told reporters. More than 44,875 Palestinians have been killed and 106,454 injured in Israelâs military offensive on Gaza since 7 October 2023, the Gaza health ministry said Friday.
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G7 leaders are set to gather virtually on Friday afternoon to discuss Syria. The leaders have said they are prepared to support a transition to an âinclusive and non-sectarianâ government, and emphasised âthe importance of holding the Assad regime accountable for its crimes.â
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The European Commission said it would launch an âair bridgeâ operation aimed at delivering an initial 50 tonnes of health supplies to Syria via neighbouring Turkey in the coming days. A further 46 tonnes of relief supplies will be trucked from a stockpile in Denmark for distribution in Syria by Unicef and the World Health Organization.
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Russia has also reportedly established direct contact with the political committee of Syriaâs Islamist rebel group, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, according to the Interfax news agency, which quoted Russiaâs deputy foreign minister, Mikhail Bogdanov. In comments to reporters, Bogdanov reportedly said Moscow aims to maintain its military bases in Syria.
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Israelâs defence minister, Israel Katz, has ordered the military to âprepare to remainâ throughout the winter in the UN-patrolled buffer zone between Israeli and Syrian forces on the strategic Golan Heights. Israel seized the demilitarised zone on Sunday, hours after Syrian rebels ousted Bashar al-Assad.
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In the US, a former Syrian military official who oversaw a prison where alleged human rights abuses took place has been charged by a federal grand jury with several counts of torture and conspiracy to commit a crime. Samir Ousman al-Sheikh, who oversaw Syriaâs infamous Adra Prison from 2005 to 2008 under recently ousted President Bashar Assad, was arrested in July on visa fraud charges.
Bashar al-Assad was whisked away without a last message to his people, the aircraftâs transponder deliberately switched off to avoid detection as it departed from an airbase in Syria.
The operation was carried out with such secrecy that even the dictatorâs brother reportedly was not informed.
A decade earlier, it was Russian military power that saved Bashar al-Assadâs rule by intervening on his side during what appeared to be a losing civil war he violently attempted to suppress. Now, as rebel troops closed in on Damascus, Moscow provided Assad with a personal escape route. More on Assadâs escape here:
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Syria is urgently calling on officials across the country to prevent the destruction of crucial records such as arrest logs, lists of detainees and court and hospital records, citing the tens of thousands of people reported missing during the war.
In a statement Stephan Sakalian, the head of the ICRC in Syria said:
In the past 13 years, the ICRC has registered 35,000 cases of people who have gone missing in Syria.
Behind every such case, there is a family and excruciating pain that only gets worse as years go by ⦠This week, as prisons opened and detainees were released, these families lived through an emotionally trying momentâa moment filled with hope but also with anguish, anger, and frustration.
On Tuesday, my team and I went to Sednaya prison for the first time. We saw hundreds of people waiting outside. I spoke to an elderly woman who stood there since 7 am, desperate for any scrap of information about her son missing for over ten years.
Inside the prison, we saw piles of damaged documents scattered throughout different rooms. These records may contain crucial information that could help families find long-awaited answers.â
Mohammad al-Bashir, head of the interim government in Syria, has spoken to worshippers during the first Friday prayers since the ousting of the Assad regime.
More than 44,875 Palestinians have been killed and 106,454 injured in Israelâs military offensive on Gaza since 7 October 2023, the Gaza health ministry said in a statement on Friday.
EU to deliver aid to Syria via Turkey
The European Commission on Friday announced the launch of an âair bridgeâ operation aimed at delivering an initial 50 tonnes of health supplies to Syria via neighbouring Turkey, AFP reported.
The items from EU stockpiles in Dubai will be flown to Adana, Turkey for distribution in Syria âin the coming days,â according to a commission statement.
A further 46 tonnes of relief supplies will be trucked from a stockpile in Denmark to Adana for distribution in Syria by Unicef and the World Health Organization.
The king of Bahrain, King Hamad, has told Syrian rebel leader Abu Mohammed al-Jolani that Bahrain is ready to cooperate with the new authorities, the official BNA news agency reported Friday.
It said that in a letter addressed to Jolani using his real name, Ahmed al-Sharaa, the monarch said Bahrain, the current Arab summit president, was ready to âcontinue consultations and coordination with Syriaâ.
A Dutch court has rejected a bid by 10 pro-Palestinian NGOs to stop the Netherlands from exporting weapons to Israel and trading with Israeli settlements in occupied Palestinian territories, Reuters reports.
The Hague district court sided with the Dutch stateâs assertion that it continually assesses the risk of arms and dual-use goods exported to Israel to prevent violations of international law. âThe interim relief court finds that there is no reason to impose a total ban on the export of military and dual-use goods on the state,â the court said in a statement.
The plaintiffs, citing high civilian casualties in Israelâs war in the Gaza Strip, had argued that the Dutch state, as a signatory to the 1948 Genocide Convention, has a duty to take all reasonable measures at its disposal to prevent genocide.
The NGOs cited a January order to Israel by the International Court of Justice to prevent acts of genocide in Gaza. Israel has said the accusations of genocide in its Gaza campaign are baseless.
Fridayâs ruling appears to contradict the finding of an earlier, separate case, which saw a Dutch court order the government to block all exports of F-35 fighter jet parts to Israel over concerns they could be used to violate international law during the war in Gaza. The government has appealed that ruling.