Syria war: Plane crash rumours circulate as Assad flees – how did his regime collapse?

Speculation is circulating online that Bashar al-Assad, the dictatorial president of Syria, has been involved in a plane crash or that his aircraft has been shot down, after his regime was toppled and he fled the country.

An offensive by Islamist rebels has now seen them seize Damascus, with a plane carrying Assad leaving the capital on Sunday.

According to a report from Reuters, which references data from Flightradar, a Syria Air plane took off, made a sudden u-turn and then disappeared from the map.

The news agency cites two Syrian sources who say that if Assad was on the plane – reportedly with the flight number SYR9218 – then there’s a “very high probability” that the politician has been killed.

One said: “It disappeared off the radar, possibly the transponder was switched off, but I believe the bigger probability is that the aircraft was taken down.”

The Assad regime’s human rights abuses

With Russia and Iran as allies, Assad’s regime - which began in 2000 - has been condemned by human rights organisations for a string of abuses, and just this week a report by the United Nations noted “widespread” violations “including sexual violence and enforced disappearances”.

Robert Petit, head of the UN’s International, Impartial and Independent Mechanism, said: “Our report lays bare the harrowing reality within the Syrian government detention system. The interview records of former detainees, corroborated by forensic medical evidence, reveal the severity of the mental and physical harm that was intentionally inflicted.”

In 2013, Human Rights Watch reported that available evidence pointed to government forces being responsible for the use of chemical weapons in the Damascus suburbs of eastern and western Ghouta, killing hundreds of civilians with what was believed to be the nerve agent, sarin.

Later, the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons’ Investigation and Identification Team said Assad’s regime carried out three attacks using chemical weapons in Ltamenah in March 2017, one in Saraqib in February 2018 and one in Douma in April 2018.

The seizure of Aleppo

Opposition forces taking control of Damascus comes after they seized Syria’s second city of Aleppo last week. Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) – once aligned with al-Qaeda – said they faced almost no opposition from government forces during the assault.

Journalist Abd Alghani Al-Aryan told The Independent at the time the return of the Assad regime was “out of the question”.

He added: “Especially after losing its most critical element that was protecting it: Russian airpower, followed by the Iranian and Lebanese militias, particularly Hezbollah.”

The two Syrian allies have been weakened by their own battles lately, with Russia continuing its war in Ukraine and Israel attacking Hezbollah.

The political reaction

Deputy prime minister Angela Rayner told Laura Kuenssberg on Sunday “if the Assad regime has fallen then we welcome that news”, and that there has to be a “political solution that protects civilians and infrastructure”.

Meanwhile, US president-elect Donald Trump took to his Truth Social platform to comment on the developments and said: “Assad is gone. He has fled the country. His protector, Russia, Russia, Russia, led by Vladimir Putin, was not interested in protecting him any longer.

“There was no reason for Russia to be there in the first place. They lost all interest in Syria because of Ukraine, where close to 600,000 Russian soldiers lay wounded or dead, in a war that should never have started, and could go on forever.”

So what now?

Syrian prime minister Mohammed Ghazi Jalali said he would meet with the rebels and that the government is ready to “extend its hand” and hand over its functions to a transitional government.

The UN’s special envoy for Syria, Geir Pederson, issued calls on Saturday for urgent talks in Geneva to discuss and bring about an “orderly political transition”.

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