Rebel forces claim Aleppo: ‘Preoccupied’ Russia and ‘weakened’ Iran offered ‘window of opportunity’

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00:00To get a sense of what's happening in Syria after years of relative calm, I'm joined on set by France 24's Andrew Hillier. Hi, Andy.

00:06So, why have the rebels launched this offensive now?

00:10Yeah, Jukka, I mean, to outside observers,

00:12it does seem as if the Syrian civil war has been frozen in time for the last four years.

00:17But that's not really the case for people on the ground.

00:20This offensive did take a lot of people by surprise.

00:23We can show you a map now where you can see the latest movements on the ground. You can see there in green,

00:29those are the areas that were already under the control of the main rebel group involved in this offensive, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham.

00:35That's a group that used to be a branch of al-Qaeda, used to be affiliated with al-Qaeda, split in 2016,

00:42even went to war with al-Qaeda, fighting with them since then.

00:47In blue, the areas that have fallen to this coalition of rebel groups since Wednesday.

00:52And also significantly, you can see there, three quarters of the city of Aleppo.

00:57So this map, it has to be said, this was the situation on the ground just a few hours ago.

01:02But the situation is changing so rapidly that it may already be out of date.

01:06That's something to bear in mind.

01:08Now, there are several factors at play explaining why this has happened.

01:11Now, I'm just going to show you some video of Russian airstrikes on the Syrian town of Ariha.

01:18This is in the province of Idlib in the northwest of the country.

01:21This was on November 23rd.

01:23And this is to illustrate the fact that these are bombardments that have been happening over the last eight years.

01:29So a lot of people living in these parts of Syria, very angry, have been calling on rebel groups to do something, to take up arms, to act.

01:37And Russia, of course, which intervened in the Syrian civil war in 2015,

01:42turning the tide of the Syrian civil war in Bashar al-Assad's favor.

01:46Well, Russia is preoccupied elsewhere now.

01:48It sent a lot of its military hardware that was in Syria to fight in Ukraine.

01:53Otherwise, the Syrian regime's other main backers, Iran and Hezbollah,

01:58well, they have been significantly weakened over the last year.

02:01Of course, Iran's proxies in the region have been weakened.

02:04Hezbollah's leadership has been decimated by Israel in Lebanon, as we know.

02:10Even this morning, Israeli airstrikes targeting Hezbollah weapon sites on the Syrian border with Lebanon.

02:17So rebel groups, of course, have seen this, have looked at the geopolitical situation,

02:21have seen the window of opportunity present itself, and they've decided to seize the moment.

02:27And could these rebel groups then threaten to topple Bashar al-Assad's regime?

02:33Well, the future of the Assad regime is going to be determined by several factors.

02:39Of course, you know, seizing control of a large part of Aleppo is very significant.

02:43These pictures here are from this morning.

02:45You can see Syrian rebel fighters in Aleppo's ancient citadel, you know, controlling Aleppo.

02:51Significant. It is the second biggest city in Syria.

02:53It's near the Turkish border, strategically a very important city.

02:57It is, however, far too early to predict the demise of the Assad regime.

03:01That's what people did in 2012 towards the beginning of the Syrian civil war.

03:05And of course, they were way off the mark.

03:08Assad's heartlands don't look likely to fall any time soon.

03:11A lot is really going to depend, I think, on what the Syrian regime's main backers do

03:18over the next few days and weeks, Iran, Hezbollah and Russia.

03:22Of course, Bashar al-Assad was in Moscow on Thursday at the start of this offensive.

03:29Now, we haven't heard from him since then.

03:32We haven't seen him since then.

03:33So it'll be important to keep an eye on his movements and what he says.

03:37Otherwise, of course, there are other factors at play.

03:40The Kurdish fighters, Syrian Democratic Forces, they control large swathes of the country as well.

03:45So at this stage, many different factors at play that will determine the trajectory of this offensive.

03:51But it is indeed, as I mentioned earlier, a very, very rapidly evolving situation.

03:55Events changing very quickly on the ground.

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