Thousands celebrate in Damascus after first Friday prayers since fall of Assad regime

DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) — Thousands of Syrians gathered Friday at Umayyad Square, the largest in Damascus, to celebrate after the first Muslim Friday prayers following the downfall of former President Bashar al-Assad.

Ahmad al-Sharaa, formerly known as Abu Mohammed al-Golani, the leader of the insurgency that toppled Assad in a lightning 10-day march across the country to Damascus, appeared in a video message in which he congratulated “the great Syrian people for the victory of the blessed revolution.”

“I invite them to head to the squares to show their happiness without shooting bullets and scaring people,” he said. “And then after we will work to build this country and as I said in the beginning, we will be victorious by the help of God.”

Al-Sharaa’s force, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, and its allied insurgents have been working to establish security and start a political transition after seizing the capital early Sunday. At the same time, they have tried to reassure a public that is both stunned by the fall of the state that had long ruled with an iron hand and concerned over extremist jihadis among the insurgents.

The Friday prayers have a particular symbolism because in the early days of the anti-government uprising-turned-civil-war in Syria in 2011 protesters would turn out en masse after going to the mosque.

“Unified Syria to build Syria,” the crowd gathered in Damascus’ Umayyad Square chanted. Some shouted slurs about the former president and his late father, calling them pigs, an insult that would have previously led to offenders being hauled off to one of the feared detention centers of Assad’s security forces.

The crowd included many families with children, and some of the demonstrators had come from far-flung areas of the country, including from Idlib — the longtime rebel enclave in the northwest of Syria, for years isolated on the other side of the civil war’s battle lines.

Wardan Aoun, who identified himself as a fighter from Idlib, said, “There is a good government now and God willing corruption will be gone.”

“We lived in Idlib under this government and there is no corruption there,” he said, referring to the rebel-led administration in the enclave.

Khaled Abu Chahine, 51, from Kafr Shams in the southern province of Daraa, where the 2011 uprising first erupted, said he hoped for “freedom and coexistence between all Syrians, Alawites, Sunnis, Shiites and Druze. No to racism.”

“The former government was a government of crime and executions,” he said, calling on foreign nations “hosting these gangs to bring them to justice, and those who are in Syria and committed crimes should face justice.”

As the gathering took place, the top United States diplomat was in the region discussing the US view on the developments in Syria with regional powers.

In the Turkish capital, Ankara, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Friday there was “broad agreement” between Turkey and the United States on what they would like to see in Syria.

That starts with an “interim government in Syria, one that is inclusive and non-sectarian and one that protects the rights of minorities and women” and does not “pose any kind of threat to any of Syria’s neighbors,” Blinken said during joint statements with Turkey’s Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan.

The insurgent groups that toppled Assad in Syria have not made clear their policy or stance on Israel, whose military in recent days has bombed sites all over the country. Israel says it is trying to prevent weapons from falling into extremist hands and has seized a swath of southern Syria along the border with the Golan Heights, calling it a buffer zone.

Blinken said it was imperative to continue with efforts to keep the Islamic State group under control.

The Turkish foreign minister said the two had discussed ways of establishing prosperity in Syria and ending terrorism in the country.

“Our priority is establishing stability in Syria as soon as possible, preventing terrorism from gaining ground, and ensuring that IS and the PKK aren’t dominant,” Fidan said, referring to the banned Kurdistan Workers Party.

The US and Turkey have different stances on the allied Syrian Democratic Forces, a Kurdish-led group in Syria that has been a key part of the fight against IS but that Turkey regards as a terrorist group.

Blinken said Washington is “very focused on Syria, very focused on the opportunity that now is before us and before the Syrian people to move from out from under the shackles of Bashar al-Assad to a different and better future for the Syrian people, one that the Syrian people decide for themselves.”

Times of Israel staff contributed to this report.

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