‘Syria freed!’: thousands cheer at famed Damascus mosque

Dozens of vendors around the mosque were selling three-star flags — which no one dared to lift. Government-held areas during Assad’s iron-fisted rule. Pictures of people missing or detained in Assad’s prisons were hung on the outer walls of the mosque, with the phone numbers of relatives engraved on the pictures. Asad inherited the core of the system from his father. One of Hafiz Jails and Detention CentersImprisonment was used to quell dissent. Far from the line of the ruling Baath Party. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which monitors the war, said in 2022 that more than 100,000 people had died in prisons since 2011. Islamist rebel leader Abu Muhammad al-Jolani — who now uses his given name Ahmad al-Sharaa — who took power earlier Friday, urged people tothat they took to the streets to “celebrate the victory. The revolution”. I removed Assad from power. -War Provisional Government till 1st March. On Friday, he addressed the worshipers at Umayyad Mosque.Omar al-Khalid, 23, said he fled HTS’ northwestern stronghold of Idlib, cut off from government territory for years, to see the capital for the first time in his life. “It was my dream to come to Damascus,” Darzi said. “I cannot describe my feelings. Our morale is very high and we hope that Syria will move towards a better future,” he said. He added: “People were suppressed… but now the doors have opened for us.”On Thursday, the interim government vowed to establish the “rule of law” after years of abuses under Assad. Amani Zanoor, a 42-year-old professor of computer engineering, said many of his students had disappeared in Assad’s prisons. “There is nothing worse than what was there,” he told AFP, expressing his support for a state based on Islamic teachings. Cannot be feared.”