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EXPERT COMMENT

Syria’s president might be toppled, or a new civil war could break out with Abu Mohammed Al-Jawlani’s HTS forces. But another ceasefire seems the most likely outcome.

Bashar al-Assad has been here before. The fall of Aleppo last week in many ways resembles similar lightning advances made by rebel forces earlier in Syria’s long civil war. As in eastern Aleppo in 2012, Raqqa in 2013 and Idlib in 2015, Assad’s forces melted away within days.

But something feels different this time. The collapse was both unexpected and unprecedented. Aleppo is a valuable prize, as Syria’s second city and former industrial heartland. Assad was determined to cling onto the western half in 2012, and his troops spent years besieging the east before recapturing it at great cost four years later.

The weakness of Assad’s forces can be partly explained by the absence of Hezbollah, devastated by the recent Lebanon war, and the reduction in Russian fighters, redeployed to Ukraine. Both played a key role recapturing Aleppo. But even without allies the regime was expected to put up more of a fight, not least by the rebel coalition led by Hayat Tahrir as-Sham (HTS).

With Assad’s forces fleeing to Hama, which HTS now has in its sights, what does this mean for Syria? Could Assad’s beleaguered regime be about to fall? And is HTS primed to take over?

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