Syria, regime fallen, rebels in Damascus. Bashar al-Assad on the run. Premier al-Jalali arrested

The flight of Bashar al-Assad not only marks the end of one of the most long-lasting, oppressive and bloody regimes in the entire Middle East, but is also a blow to Russia and Iran, who lose a key ally in the region.

As soon as word of the fall of the regime spread, thousands of people, in cars and on foot, gathered in a central square in Damascus, waving flags and chanting 'Freedom'. Eyewitnesses report seeing armed groups lining the streets in the capital's suburbs. At dawn, the city's police headquarters was empty. An Associated Press journalist filmed an abandoned army checkpoint, with uniforms lying on the ground under a poster with Assad's face. Residents of the capital's suburbs reported gunfire and explosions.

Images broadcast by opposition-linked media showed a group of protesters celebrating Assad's escape after climbing on top of an abandoned tank in the middle of one of the capital's central squares. Shouts of 'Allahu Akbar': 'God is great' could be heard from the minarets. The pro-government radio station Sham FM reported that after Assad's departure, the airport of Damascus was evacuated and all flights suspended. Insurgents announced that they had entered the notorious Saydnaya military prison, north of the capital, and freed the detainees.

The seizure of Damascus comes just hours after the fall of Homs, where the regular army effectively gave the rebel forces a free rein and retreated, paving the way towards the capital. The group that launched the surprise offensive against President Assad's regime on 27 November is called Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (Hts) and collaborates with an umbrella group of Turkish-backed Syrian militias known as the Syrian National Army.

The Hts is a splinter faction of al-Qaeda and is considered a terrorist organisation by the United States and the United Nations. However, in recent years, the group has claimed to have cut ties with al-Qaeda. Some analysts pointed out that the Hts had recently tried to redefine its image, focusing on promoting civilian rule in the areas of territory under its control.

The leader of the Hts is called Abu Mohammed al-Golani. It was he who, in 2016, distanced himself from al-Qaeda and redefined his group's identity. "Golani was more astute than Assad. He has remade his image, forged new alliances and launched a charm offensive" towards minorities, explains Joshua Landis, a Syria expert and director of the Centre for Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma.

Runaway President Bashar al-Assad has ruled Syria for 24 years, succeeding the 30-year regime of his father Hafez. Bashar was an accidental leader, elevated to the role of successor only after his older brother Basil, the heir designate, died in a car accident in 1994.

Faced with the need to give continuity to the absolute domination exercised by his family over the country, Bashar was forced to suddenly and radically change his life, returning to Syria, abandoning his medical career (he is an ophthalmologist) and embarking on a military training that quickly led him to the rank of colonel, so as to enhance his credentials at the time of succession. At the time of his father Hafez's death in 2000, Bashar was only 34 years old and the Syrian parliament wasted no time in lowering the minimum age to serve as president.

The young Assad's first months in power were characterised by openings both to the outside world and at home. Nothing sensational, but enough to mark a change of climate from his father's regime, which had gone down in history as one of the most violent and repressive in the entire Middle East.

Then in 2001 there was an initial clampdown in response to a petition signed by a thousand intellectuals calling for Syria to become a multi-party democracy. But it was the extremely violent reaction to the Arab Spring of 2011 that showed the world the true face of the Syrian dictator, who, in order to suppress the uprising and fight the civil war that immediately followed, did not hesitate to use all the firepower of his army and air force, including that of his Russian ally, against his own population.