In an unexpected development Saturday night, Syrian rebels who had been fighting government forces for over a decade, captured the capital city of Damascus, bringing an end to a more than decade-long civil war and an even longer reign of terror by the family of President Bashar al-Assad.

Opposition forces reportedly announced on national television, “The city of Damascus has been liberated. The tyrant Bashar al-Assad has been toppled.” They added that they had also freed prisoners from the prison complex Sednaya, a major facility on the outskirts of the capital city.

The developments mark a stunning end to the 24-year reign of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, 59, whose late father, Hafez al-Assad, was president for nearly three decades. Since the start of the Syrian civil war in 2011, Assad has gone to brutal lengths to cling to power—including by deploying devastating chemical attacks on civilians, including children. All told, by 2022, more than 306,000 civilians had been killed in the war, according to the UN Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner.

According to Russian state media, Assad has fled with his family to Moscow. The Syrian Prime Minister, Mohammad Ghazi al-Jalali, reportedly said he is ready to cooperate with the opposition to facilitate a transitional government and called for free elections.

Videos show Syrians celebrating in the streets and cheering as they tore down a statue of Assad and dragged another one through the streets. Many people who had been imprisoned by the Assad regime are now reportedly being reunited with their families as rebel forces empty the prisons. Syrians around the world also gathered to mark the occasion. In London, a crowd gathered outside the Syrian embassy to demand the Assad flag be removed. In Doha, Qatar, Syrians gathered to sing and dance at the opposition embassy. Photos also showed Syrians celebrating in Istanbul, Munich, London, and Berlin.

It was an unthinkable scene just one week ago: Syrian rebels in the heart of Damascus celebrating the fall of the regime, with the whereabouts of President Bashar Assad unknown.

CBS News’ @ImtiazTyab reports from the Turkish-Syrian border: pic.twitter.com/s6AEZxGEIa

— Face The Nation (@FaceTheNation) December 8, 2024

The long conflict sparked the world’s largest refugee crisis, according to the UN Refugee Agency, displacing more than 14 million Syrians, approximately 5.5 million of whom went to the 5 neighboring countries of Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, and Egypt. Footage posted to social media Sunday showed a road full of cars, reportedly filled with Syrian refugees returning to their country from Turkey.

Syrians returning home from Turkey. pic.twitter.com/TywIQlIBXu

— Leila Al-Shami (@LeilaShami) December 8, 2024

President Biden on Sunday addressed the nation following the developments. “This regime brutalized and tortured and killed literally hundreds of thousands of innocent Syrians,” he said, in an address from the White House. “A fall of the regime is a fundamental act of justice.”

In his remarks, Biden also mentioned Austin Tice, a freelance American journalist who has been detained since 2012 after having been kidnapped while reporting in Syria. “We remain committed to returning him to his family,” Biden said. Later, in response to reporters’ questions, Biden said officials “have to identify where [Tice] is.”

The Tice family told Axios in a statement: “We are reaching out to all contacts in government and the region. We encourage everyone to help us in our search for Austin. As a family, we are all in DC working for his fast and safe return.” Axios also reported the Tice family met with officials from the Biden administration on Friday.

Human rights advocates hope the latest developments will provide an opportunity for justice for the victims of the Assad regime. “This historic opportunity must be now seized and decades of grave human rights violations redressed,” Agnès Callamard, Secretary General of Amnesty International, said in a statement, adding that suspected perpetrators of crimes should be investigated and tried if warranted, and that prison records and other documentation be preserved. According to prior research from the organization, Syrian authorities used “murder, torture, enforced disappearance and extermination” to quell dissent following the start of the civil war in 2011, and targeted civilian areas, hospitals, and medical facilities with Russia’s support.

In an epic two-part 2019 investigation, former Mother Jones reporter Shane Bauer traveled to Syria to get a firsthand look at American involvement in the conflict. In 2012 President Barack Obama declared that the use of chemical weapons was a “red line” that would prompt the US to intervene in Syria—but then did nothing after al-Assad launched a chemical attack a year later, killing more than 1,400 people. The CIA set up a $1 billion program to arm Syrian rebels, but President Donald Trump ended that program in 2017. These flip-flops embody the inconsistent response to the conflict by the US.

“The only thing that seemed worse than getting sucked into the conflict was not getting involved at all,” Bauer wrote. As a result, “American involvement in Syria has been as fragmented and volatile as the conflict itself.”

Check out our full investigation to learn more, or read a summary here.