From eye doctor to dictator – the rise and fall of Assad’s presidency
Bashar al Assad’s downfall marks an end to more than half a century of family rule, as rebel forces turned the tide in a civil war he had embraced.
The authoritarian president ruled Syria for 24 years, five years short of his father’s time in power, but the plan was never for him to take over the dynasty.
Before his political career began to take shape, Assad was based in the UK, where he had an ophthalmology practice.
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A family tragedy would soon thrust him into the political fray – and his early days in Damascus stood in stark contrast to his exit.
Eye doctor and computer geek
Before Damascus, Assad was an eye doctor in London and his only official position in his home country was as head of the Syrian Computer Society.
In the UK capital, he met his future wife, Asma Akhras, a former investment banker at JPMorgan who grew up in Acton, west London.
She ditched her career for Assad after a trip together to Libya as a guest of then leader Muammar Gaddafi.
Bashar al Assad and his wife Asma in 2010. Pic: AP
In 1994, Assad’s older brother – and heir to the presidency – Bassel was killed in a car crash in Damascus.
Assad was promptly ordered back home, where he was put through military training and elevated his rank to colonel to establish his credentials for ruling.
But there was never any doubt he would take over. When his father Hafez al Assad died in 2000, parliament quickly lowered the presidential age from 40 to 34.
To top it off, his elevation was confirmed after a nationwide referendum pitted him as the only candidate.
Bashar al Assad at military training games in 2000. Pic: AP
Hopes for a young reformer
Assad began his presidency with promises to fight corruption and to open up the media. He inherited a dilapidated country and lacked support from his father’s loyalists.
Viewed as something of a geek, the lanky Assad constantly tried to prove himself despite his gentle demeanour, not least to his fearsome mother, whom the president’s wife also struggled to impress.
He had quickly freed political prisoners and allowed more open discourse. In the “Damascus Spring” – briefly sprung after his father’s death – salons for intellectuals emerged to discuss art, culture and politics.
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Bashar al Assad and his wife Asma greeted by Tony Blair outside 10 Downing Street in 2002. Pic: AP
But these were snuffed out after 1,000 intellectuals signed a public petition calling for multiparty democracy and greater freedoms in 2001.
He slowly lifted economic restrictions, let in foreign banks, made way for imports and empowered the private sector.
Syrian cities began to see shopping malls, new restaurants and consumer goods, while tourism rose.
Foreign policy blow
But abroad, he stuck to the line his father had set, based on an alliance with Iran and a policy of insisting on a full return of the Israel-annexed Golan Heights.
In 2004 the UN Security Council ordered Syria to end its long occupation of neighbouring Lebanon, leaving Assad with a choice: comply and ruin some of his father’s legacy, or ignore it.
He chose the former – this angered his family.
Syria soldiers pulling out of Lebanon in 2005. Pic: AP
Gradually, Assad started to believe the West was weak and believed the more he demonstrated strength, the more he would achieve.
In 2005, former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri was assassinated, killed by a bomb while driving in Beirut. The Syrian government was blamed.
Syria was forced to withdraw its troops from Lebanon and a pro-American government came to power instead.
Syrian civil war
A few years after going against his father’s legacy, Assad would draw on his brutal tactics when protests erupted against his rule in March 2011, during the Arab Spring.
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He had until that point denied the wave of Arab uprising would spread to Syria, and even emailed a joke mocking the Egyptian leader’s refusal to step down two days after his fall.
But reality soon bit, after protesters in the southern city of Daraa were shot dead by government forces, sparking nationwide unrest.
Full-blown civil war would break out, which would become the world’s largest refugee crisis, according to the UN.
More than 14 million Syrians have been forced to flee their homes in search of safety, the body reports.
Atrocities
Since then, Assad’s rule has been dogged by widespread accusations of atrocities, including the use of chemical weapons such as sarin, chlorine, and mustard gas.
In 2013, a gas attack on rebel-held eastern Ghouta near Damascus killed scores of civilians.
There have also been widespread reports of rape, beheadings and torture.
Assad was propped up largely thanks to Russia – who stepped in to carry out decisive airstrikes in 2015 – and Iran, who both backed Syria militarily.
In 2020, Moscow backed a government offensive, which ended with a ceasefire with Turkey and froze most front lines.
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Assad held most territory and all main cities, appearing deeply entrenched, while rebels held the northwest and a Turkey-backed force stayed at a border strip.
Kurdish-led forces, meanwhile, controlled the northeast.
After government forces bombarded the northwest rebel-held region of Idlib in 2020 – killing civilians in the process – Assad had appeared to consolidate his iron-fist rule.
President Bashar al Assad and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow in July 2024. Pic: AP
The downfall
Few saw an end to his presidency in the near future, but just as Assad’s fortunes relied on Moscow and Tehran, so too was his fate tied to their geopolitical priorities.
With Russia’s invasion of Ukraine lasting almost three years and Iran rocked by Israeli attacks on its proxy Hezbollah in Lebanon, Syrian government defences were exposed.
Rebel forces launched an attack on the northern city of Aleppo, which the government had held since 2016, and within days stormed through the country.
Assad had initially vowed to fight back, with the military claiming they were preparing a counter-offensive.
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Toppled Assad statue dragged through streets
But the insurgents continued to sweep their way to Damascus, where Assad had insisted he remained as recently as Saturday evening.
He has not been seen in the capital since rebels claimed full control and Russia has said he has left the country – adding he gave “instructions to transfer power peacefully”.
While Syrians took to the streets to chant for freedom and celebrated his downfall, what comes next for the country – and who governs it – remains shrouded in uncertainty.
World
US blocks Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and 80 other officials from United Nations’ annual meeting in New York
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and 80 other officials have been blocked from attending September’s annual meeting of the United Nations General Assembly in New York.
US secretary of state Marco Rubio has revoked the US visas of delegates from the Palestinian Authority (PA) and Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), and denied others from applying for one.
It is the latest step by Donald Trump’s administration to target Palestinians with visa restrictions, and follows the suspension of a programme to allow injured children from Gaza to receive treatment in the US.
Mahmoud Abbas addressed the general assembly in 2024, but is barred from next month’s meeting. Pic: Reuters
“It is in our national security interests to hold the PLO and PA accountable for not complying with their commitments, and for undermining the prospects for peace,” a statement from the US State Department said.
It added that, to be considered partners for peace, both groups “must consistently repudiate terrorism, and end incitement to terrorism in education, as required by US law and as promised by the PLO”.
Offensive will cause ‘intolerable deaths’
Several US allies, including France, Malta, and Australia have announced plans to recognise Palestine as a state at September’s United Nations General Assembly. Canada and the UK will too, unless Israel meets certain conditions.
Israel declared Gaza’s largest city a dangerous combat zone on Friday.
The army launched a planned offensive that has drawn international condemnation.
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Thick smoke rises from Gaza City after Israeli strikes
Foreign ministers from Iceland, Ireland, Luxembourg, Norway, Slovenia and Spain released a joint statement saying the military operations in Gaza City will cause “intolerable deaths of innocent Palestinian civilians”.
Gaza latest: Israel’s Gaza City offensive condemned
Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians are sheltering in Gaza City while enduring famine.
An Israeli armoured vehicle in northern Gaza on Friday. Pic: AP
Palestinians ride a truck carrying humanitarian aid in Gaza City. Pic: AP
The Palestinian ambassador to the United Nations (UN), Riyad Mansour, said Mr Abbas had planned to lead the delegation to the UN meetings and was expected to address the general assembly at the general debate, which begins on 23 September.
He was also expected to attend a high-level meeting co-chaired by France and Saudi Arabia on 22 September about a two-state solution, a broad idea involving Israel coexisting with an independent Palestinian state.
The State of Palestine is an observer member of the UN, meaning it can speak at meetings but not vote on resolutions.
The State of Palestine cannot vote on UN resolutions. Pic: AP
US decision ‘contravenes international law’
The Palestinian Authority “expressed its deep regret and astonishment” at the visa decision, calling it “a violation of US commitments” as the host of the UN, and claiming it “contravenes international law”.
UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said the world body would be seeking clarification in the “hope that this will be resolved”.
Hundreds of diplomats left when Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu began speaking at the general assembly in 2024. Pic: Reuters
The State Department said that the Palestinian Authority’s mission to the UN, comprising officials who are permanently based there, would not be included in the restrictions.
Under a 1947 UN agreement, the US is generally required to allow access for foreign diplomats to the UN in New York.
But Washington has said it can deny visas for security, extremism and foreign policy reasons.
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The death toll in Gaza has now risen to 63,025, according to the Hamas-run health ministry, which does not differentiate between civilians and combatants.
It also reported five more malnutrition-related deaths in the last 24 hours, bringing the total number during the war to 322, with 121 of them children.
World
Brazil implores businesses to attend major climate summit, despite ‘second thoughts’ amid Trump backlash
The Brazilian hosts of the biggest climate meeting of the year have implored businesses to attend in November, amid concerns some are backing away from the climate agenda into the shadow of Donald Trump.
In an interview with Sky News, Ana Toni, chief executive of the COP30 climate summit in November, admitted some companies were having “second thoughts” about the global switch to green economies because policymakers were creating uncertainty.
The US President Donald Trump has been attacking wind farms and waging tariff wars that could slow the transition to green energy.
Banks including HSBC and Barclays have ditched a net zero alliance set up just four years ago by Mark Carney, now the Canadian Prime Minister.
Ana Toni, Brazil’s climate secretary, is chief executive of the COP30 climate talks. Pic: Reuters
But even before Trump took office, tech companies were quietly dropping climate targets to prioritise energy-hungry AI, and other businesses were “greenhushing” their climate initiatives for fear of backlash.
In this environment, there are fears fewer business leaders will attend the annual talks, which are also being hosted in a city on the edge of the Amazon that hasn’t enough hotel rooms.
On Friday, the COP30 team wrote to business leaders urging them to “step forward, not back” and travel to Belem, despite “logistical challenges” and the “background of systemic uncertainty”.
Ana Toni told Sky News: “We are very concerned that the enabling conditions must be there so that the private sector can also deliver where they do best, which is bringing in technology, bringing innovation and accelerating the process of decarbonisation.”
In August the share price of Danish wind farm developer plummeted after the US halted its Rhode Island wind farm, while the British Tories and Reform parties are also attacking net zero.
Ana Toni met with King Charles and leaders of other COP summits at Clarence House last year. Pic: Reuters
But Ms Toni there is “nothing to panic [about], because we can see that the transition is inevitable,” citing major progress in China, India and Europe and Brazil.
Referring to the US’s withdrawal from the COP process, she said: “198 countries minus one is not zero. And we will put all our efforts of working with the 197 countries that want to go forward and want to protect their population.”
“Climate action is not only [still] cool, it is necessary,” Ms Toni said.
“We all need to face reality. We are going through a huge climate crisis… If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem. Companies understand that.”
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