(13 Dec 2024)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Damascus, Syria – 13 December 2024
1. Various of crowds walking into Umayyad mosque
2. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Ibrahim al-Araby, Umayyad mosque visitor:
“We are now one of the happiest countries on the planet. I swear to god, I haven’t set foot in Umayyad mosque since 2011. We didn’t feel like going, there were checkpoints. I cannot even describe to you. I swear to god, my feelings today cannot be described. I haven’t been this happy for 11 or 12 years. But we are also sad because of the martyrs. It would have completed our happiness if we didn’t have this issue of the hostages and the detained.”
3. Various of crowds in mosque, people cheering and praying
4. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Khair Taha, Umayyad mosque visitor:
“Honestly, there is fear and trepidation for what’s to come but there is also a lot of hope that now we have a say and we can try to build. We always felt like the country was not for us, we always felt like we were guests in our own country. Now we feel like we can build it and there is hope coming. We hope that we can all live together. We hope that we don’t repeat the mistakes that the neighbouring countries went through and even what we went through before.”
5. Various of men sitting on arch
6. Various of people walking streets
STORYLINE:
Thousands of Syrians gathered Friday at Umayyad mosque, the most iconic mosque in Damascus, to celebrate after the first Muslim Friday prayers following the downfall of former President Bashar Assad.
The Friday prayers have a particular symbolism because in the early days of the anti-government uprising-turned-civil-war in Syria in 2011, protesters would turn out en masse after going to the mosque.
“We are now one of the happiest countries on the planet. I swear to god, I haven’t set foot in Umayyad mosque since 2011. We didn’t feel like going, there were checkpoints," said Ibrahim al-Araby.
"My feelings today cannot be described. I haven’t been this happy for 11 or 12 years," he added.
Ahmad al-Sharaa, formerly known as Abu Mohammed al-Golani, the leader of insurgency that toppled Assad in a lightning 10-day march across the country to Damascus, appeared in a video message in which he congratulated “the great Syrian people for the victory of the blessed revolution.”
Al-Sharaa’s force, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, and its allied insurgents have been working to establish security and start a political transition after seizing the capital early Sunday.
At the same time, they have tried to reassure a public that is both stunned by the fall of the state that had long ruled with an iron hand and concerned over extremist jihadis among the insurgents.
AP Video shot by Ghaith Alsayed
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