The Assad family took control over Syria when Hafez al-Assad became president under the Ba’ath Party following the 1970 coup, and has continued to maintain it for over five decades, leading the country through political war, civil war, and international war. The Syrian Civil War began in 2011 after widespread protests on the widespread corruption, sectarian bias towards Alawites, nepotism and bribery. Demonstrators demanded democratic reforms and an end to corruption and repression by the Assad family. The Assad government responded with violent attacks, which eventually evolved into an armed rebellion. Over 500,000 people have died, and millions left without homes and as refugees. Key cities, including Aleppo and Homs, were destroyed as well. Moscow intervened militarily in 2015 at the request of Bashar al-Assad’s government to support its fight against the Syrian opposition and ISIS. On December 8 of 2024, Ba’athist Syria, led by President Bashar al-Assad, collapsed during a major offensive by the opposing forces. The offensive was spearheaded by Tahrir al-Sham and supported mainly by the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army.
Since then, Assad has had difficulty maintaining his regime, however Moscow offered refuge to him and his family. The morning of December 8th, Assad departed from Damascus International Airport to Moscow, Russia, flying in a private jet. At the time, Russian-Syrian relations were positive because as stated before, Russia had been a key ally of Assad, providing military aid, diplomatic backing, and direct intervention in the Syrian Civil War to help stabilize his government against opposition forces. Assad claimed on Monday that he had no intention of fleeing Syria at all. In fact, he says, “I wanted to keep fighting the rebel forces”. But he still ended up yielding to a request by Russia to evacuate after a military base where he was hiding had been attacked by a drone. Now in 2025, Syrians look to the future with hope as they rebuild their military from the ground up.
What us at BT are asking however is, as one 9th grade student, Abby Gurnina, says, “How does this affect Israel! Are they being attacked or are we attacking”. Benjamin Netanyahu publicly announced his support for the fall of the Assad family last month and claimed that his decision to fight Hamas and Hezbollah had contributions to, as he puts it, “changing the face of the Middle East”. Recently, Syria’s new leader Al Sharaa has spoken positively about Israel and promised to disengage from the Axis of Resistance, the tanti-Israel organization. Israel has high hopes for the positive implications of Syria’s new leadership as there is little to no apparent conflict.
