With music blaring from his car’s speakers, Damascus resident Abdallah drove up the palm-lined street to Bashar al-Assad’s palace in the Syrian capital on Sunday morning. He reached the entrance, turned off the music and strolled into the heart of the power of a dynasty that had ruled his country with an iron fist for more than 50 years.

In the marble halls, Syrians in jeans and hoodies strolled around, enjoying the surreal scenes of ornate furniture broken and stacked in the corners. “I still can’t believe it,” said Abdallah, who spent the night in fear and heavy bombing until, just before dawn, the rebels announced they had full control of the capital, ushering in the overthrow of the Assad regime.

“No one has suffered as much as the Syrian people,” he told the Financial Times in a phone call, sharing videos of his trip. “The whole city stood up for joy – everyone is in the streets, screaming and shooting.”

During the 13-year civil war, Damascus was an Assad stronghold from which the military and secret services maintained a brutal grip on the country’s citizens. But in the early hours of Sunday, euphoria swept the capital as residents woke up to the sudden fall of a dictator who survived more than a decade of war but was toppled in a stunning two-week rebel offensive.

Public squares were abuzz with celebrations on Sunday morning as many like Abdallah stormed into buildings that were once symbols of Assad’s rule, tearing down portraits and stealing everything from luxury perfume to board games.

However, with the unbridled joy came chaos. Rebels and everyday Syrians overran symbols of the Assad regime. And the takeover by rebel groups led by the powerful Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group is plunging the country into a new era of uncertainty amid unresolved questions about who will rule and how.

Many people linked to the Assad regime were nowhere to be seen on Sunday. The prime minister was filmed being escorted from his office by rebels up red velvet steps. He was apparently supposed to be taken to the Four Seasons Hotel, which belonged to a regime loyalist but was now allegedly used by rebels as a symbol of the breathtaking transfer of power.

“The military has given up, the television has given up, the palace, the security department, the state buildings,” said a Damascus resident. “Soldiers give up their weapons. The situation is very tense, they have opened all the prisons.”

Abdallah tried to enter the Assad family’s plush residence but was turned away by rebel guards who wanted to control the looting. Videos shared by Damascenes with the FT and on social media showed ordinary people strolling through the luxurious apartment, in disbelief at the opulence in which their leaders had lived, and giggling as they methodically bought everything from designer handbags to ceramic plates. packed from inside the house. “Wow! An elevator in the apartment!” a girl shouted.

Abu Sakhr al-Karak, a gift shop owner from the southern province of Deraa, where the Syrian revolution began in 2011, had not slept all night. When news of the regime’s collapse broke before sunrise, he performed his morning prayers and set off for Damascus with his brothers and friends.

The former activist, who gave up protesting when the revolution turned violent, came to the capital every week but had not been there for 14 years. So much time had passed that he could no longer remember the names of the main streets.

“The first moments were just pure happiness. All of Syria is celebrating,” he said, speaking from one of the most famous squares in Damascus as celebratory shots rang out around him. “The only thing is that it was somewhat mitigated by the state of chaos. We just hope no one gets hurt.”

Locals told the FT that while armed rebel forces guarded public institutions and banks and tried to control looting, chaos still reigned. In a statement on Sunday morning, the rebels urged residents not to shoot in the air or steal.

Al-Karak said widespread looting was the only reason for the hesitation and saw HTS chief Abu Mohammad al-Jolani as a good leader. HTS was once linked to al-Qaeda and is classified as a terrorist organization by the U.S. and others, although Jolani has sought in recent years to portray the Islamist group as a more moderate force.

The fall of the regime means thousands of Syrians in exile – both at home and abroad – can return after more than a decade. “It’s as if my soul has returned to me – we’ve been waiting for this moment for 50 years,” said Youssef Shoghr, who arrived in Damascus from Lebanon in a convoy with fireworks and rebel flags.

Shafiq Abu Talal, who is originally from Damascus but had lived in the HTS stronghold of Idlib for years, planned to return to his city immediately.

“My city was the last city that was free. The feelings are indescribable,” he said. He said his parents lived near a detention center in the capital that opened in the early hours of Sunday, a scene repeated across the country as political prisoners were released.

“Events accelerated dramatically,” Abu Talal said. “The revolution lasted 13 years and the regime ended in less than 13 days.”

After the palace, Abdallah went to the embassy of Iran, an Assad ally that, along with Russia, helped prop up the regime against the popular uprising.

After hours of wandering around his city, Abdallah’s phone broke. He stopped to attack it in the ransacked military security building, a place he said he had never passed before.

He explained that he chose the location because, unlike the rest of the population, the regime’s military buildings had an uninterrupted power supply. “It never cuts it for them, it never comes for us,” he said.

But Abdallah was still in disbelief: “I’m still afraid that this is a dream – that I’ll wake up. Or that it turns out they’re just pretending to come back and kill us all.”

Additional reporting by Raya Jalabi in Beirut and Chloe Cornish in Dubai