RUSSIA, IRAN ARE BIG LOSERS IN SYRIA

With the loss of Syria, Russia's carefully cultivated image as a great power and reliable backer is now severely damaged.

- JOHN DOBSON

LONDON he speed of events was simply breath☐☐ taking. For more than 50 years the Assad dynasty ruthlessly ruled over Syria with the help of a formidable security apparatus and the use of brutal force.

Then, in the blink of an eye it was gone, shattering its supposed impregnable hold over the country. It had taken less than two weeks for rebels of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), an anti-Assad Islamist group which evolved from Al Qaeda, to take control of Damascus from their base in Idlib, 200 miles away. HTS's timing was perfect. Syria's backers, Russia and Iran are heavily involved with their own self-inflicted problems in Ukraine and Israel and were unable, or unwilling, to support the Assad regime.

The origins of HTS go back to the Syrian civil war that began in 2011 with peaceful protests by Syrian citizens. As the war grew more violent it drew in extremist groups and quickly became internationalised, with outside powers such as Iran, Russia, Turkey, the Gulf States and the United States shipping weapons and funds to their preferred military groups. The Syrian regime's most committed allies turned out to be Iran and Russia, and with the help of Iran's proxy militias (especially Hezbollah from Lebanon) and Russia's fighter jets, entire Syrian cities were annihilated killing at least half a million innocent civilians.

Some 14 million Syrians, half the population, were displaced and more than a million became refugees in Europe.