JERUSALEM – Syrian dictator Bashar Assad, who has repeatedly used chemical weapons against his people, has fled Syria after rebels stormed the capital Damascus, according to Reuters.

According to Syrian television reports, Assad, who trained as an ophthalmologist in the United Kingdom before succeeding his father, and his British-born wife Asma al-Assad fled with their three children. It was not known where they were going.

Syria has been embroiled in a bloody civil war for 13 years as Islamist rebels tried to topple the Assad dynasty. The apparent collapse of the Assad family’s more than 50-year rule over the Syrian Arab Republic would be a monumental turning point in power politics in the Middle East.

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A photo taken on December 3 at the entrance to the Kweyris military air base in the eastern part of Aleppo province shows a portrait of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and a national flag in a dumpster following the takeover of the area by rebel groups (RAMI AL SAYED/AFP via Getty Images)

A coalition of mostly radical Islamist groups has toppled the Iranian-backed Assad regime. The US-designated terrorist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), an Islamist former al-Qaeda affiliate and part of the rebel forces, played the decisive role in the ouster of Assad, who assumed the presidency in 2000 after the death of his father, Hafez Assad.

Abu Mohammed al-Golani, the HTS Islamist leader on whom the US has put a $10 million bounty on his head, is trying to present a watered-down version of the radical Islamism that has characterized his years of fighting in Syria and Iraq Troops. Al-Golani was captured by the US military in the first decade of this century.

Syrian experts have told Fox News Digital that HTS is trying to impose a totalitarian Islamist regime on the population. Phillip Smyth, an expert on Iranian regime and Syria proxy groups who sits on the Atlantic Council, told Fox News Digital: “HTS is a group that grew out of al-Qaeda and has ties to Turkey. Their end goal is to create a Taliban-like society with a few tweaks.”

Rebels in northwestern Syria seized regime military vehicles on December 2 on the route to Kweris airport in the eastern outskirts of Aleppo. (Rami Alsayed/NurPhoto via APRami Alsayed/NurPhoto via AP)

Assad’s decision in 2011 to use force against pro-democracy Syrian activists during the Arab Spring uprisings that swept Egypt and Tunisia led to a protracted civil war. Assad’s scorched earth policy against his country’s citizens resulted in the killing of over 500,000 people. The UN recently announced it had stopped tracking the rising death toll.

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The Wall Street Journal reported Friday that Egyptian and Jordanian officials had urged Assad to flee Syria and form a government in exile. The Jordanian government denied the report.

In 2015, Assad’s regime began to falter when Russia intervened to save the dictatorship. The US-sanctioned Lebanese terrorist movement Hezbollah and its main sponsor Iran both threw their full weight behind Assad’s regime.

The rebel forces that routed Assad’s forces – with the rapid capture of the major Syrian cities of Aleppo, Hamas and Homs – shocked both Putin and Iran. Ukraine’s resistance to the Russian invasion of its territory has weakened Moscow. Israel has carried out a series of airstrikes on Iran’s military infrastructure since Tehran’s ally Hamas launched a surprise attack against the Jewish state on October 7, 2023.

Portraits of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad (left) and his late father and predecessor Hafez hang on the wall of a destroyed apartment in the southern Lebanese town of Bint Jbeil in 2006. (PATRICK BAZ/AFP via Getty Images)

The United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 2254 in 2015, which called for a ceasefire, UN-run elections and a new constitution. Assad refused to implement the resolution.

After Assad launched a shocking mass chemical weapons attack on Syrian civilians in 2013 that killed more than 1,400 people, former President Obama’s administration reneged on its promise to take military action against Assad.

The origin of Assad’s forced departure can be traced to a group of schoolboys in the dusty southwestern town of Daraa – the cradle of the Syrian revolt – in 2011. The boys wrote on a concrete wall with graffiti cans: “The people.” I want to overthrow the regime!”

Russian President Vladimir Putin (left), Syrian President Bashar al-Assad (center), Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei (right). ((Fox News/Getty Images))

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Assad’s cousin, General Atef Najeeb, oversaw an operation in which 15 captured boys between the ages of 10 and 15 were reportedly tortured. Syrian officials tore out the boy’s fingernails, burned him and beat him.