On 8 December 2024, the Syrian Arab Republic under Bashar al-Assad collapsed amid major offensives by the Syrian opposition (led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham and supported by allied Turkish-backed rebel groups in the Syrian National Army) as part of the Syrian civil war that began in 2011. The fall of Damascus marked the end of the Assad family regime, which had ruled Syria as a totalitarian hereditary dictatorship since Hafez al-Assad assumed the presidency in 1971 as a result of the Corrective Revolution. As the Southern Operations Room, a rebel coalition, encroached on Damascus while attempting to find the former president, reports emerged that Assad had fled the capital on a plane. The Syrian rebels subsequently declared victory against the Assad government on state television, while Russia's foreign ministry announced Assad's resignation and departure from Syria. Russia subsequently reported that it had given Assad and his family asylum.