Syria | Assad denies premeditated flight, calls new leaders 'terrorists'

(Damascus and Jerusalem) Ousted Syrian President Bashar al-Assad broke his silence on Monday, more than a week after being deposed, saying he only fled Syria at Moscow's request once the fall of Damascus and calling the new leaders “terrorists”.

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Several senior Syrian officials told AFP that Mr. Assad had fled without warning members of his family or his closest collaborators on the night of December 7 to 8, during the fall of the capital into the hands of a rebel coalition led by radical Islamists.

“My departure from Syria was not premeditated nor did it take place during the last hours of the battle, contrary to some allegations,” Bashar al-Assad said in a statement published on the Telegram channel of the presidency.

“On the contrary, I remained in Damascus, fulfilling my duty until Sunday, December 8 at dawn,” he said, in his first statement since his fall, dated from Moscow.

He claimed that the Russian base at Hmeimim on the Mediterranean coast where he had taken refuge had been attacked by drones “as the situation on the ground continued to deteriorate”.

“With no viable means of leaving the base, Moscow demanded […] an immediate evacuation to Russia on the evening of Sunday, December 8,” he added, asserting that Syria was now “in the hands of terrorists.”

Bashar al-Assad has ruled the country since 2000, before fleeing when the coalition dominated by the radical Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), led by Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, took Damascus.

Former Syrian branch of Al-Qaeda, HTS, which claims to have broken with jihadism, remains classified as “terrorist” by several Western capitals, including Washington.

But on Sunday, the United States claimed to have established “direct contact” with the new powers in Damascus.

The war in Syria, triggered in 2011 by Assad's bloody repression of pro-democracy demonstrations, has left more than half a million dead, devastated the country and pushed some six million Syrians into exile, i.e. a quarter of the population.

Israeli strikes on coastal Syrian region

The Israeli army “violently” hit numerous military installations on the Syrian coast during the night from Sunday to Monday, an NGO said, raids which caused panic among residents, according to an AFP journalist.

“Israeli warplanes launched strikes” on several sites, including air defense units and “surface-to-surface missile depots,” according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (OSDH).

The NGO claims that these are the “heaviest strikes since 2012” in the coastal region of Tartous (West), which is home to a Russian naval base.

Since the capture of Damascus by the armed coalition that overthrew Bashar al-Assad, 473 Israeli strikes have targeted military sites across Syria, the OSDH said on Monday.

In the village of Bmalkah, on the heights of the town of Tartous, the roads are littered with broken glass. In the orchards, the blast of bombing tore the leaves from the olive trees and thick smoke rose from the surrounding hills, AFP noted.

“It started shortly after midnight and continued until 6 a.m. (10 p.m. Eastern Time). It was like an earthquake. All the windows in my house exploded,” says Ibrahim Ahmed, a 28-year-old employee in a law firm.

“The village did not sleep all night. The children were crying. There are no more windows left in the houses,” says a man who refused to give his name.