Syria’s new interim leader announced on Tuesday he was taking charge of the country as caretaker prime minister with the backing of the former rebels who toppled president Bashar al-Assad three days ago.
In a brief address on state television, Mohammed al-Bashir, a figure little known across most of Syria who previously ran an administration in a pocket of the northwest controlled by rebels, said he would lead the interim authority until March 1st.
“Today we held a cabinet meeting that included a team from the Salvation government that was working in Idlib and its vicinity, and the government of the ousted regime,” he said.
“The meeting was under the headline of transferring the files and institutions to caretake the government.”
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Behind him were two flags – the green, black and white flag flown by opponents of Mr Assad throughout the civil war, and a white flag with the Islamic oath of faith in black writing, typically flown in Syria by Sunni Islamist fighters.
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In the Syrian capital of Damascus, banks reopened for the first time since Mr Assad’s overthrow. Shops were also opening up again, traffic returned to the roads, and cleaners were out sweeping the streets.
There was a notable decrease in the number of armed men on the streets. Two sources close to the rebels said their command had ordered fighters to withdraw from cities, and for police and internal security forces affiliated with the main rebel group Hayat Tahrir al-Shams (HTS) to deploy there.
US secretary of state Antony Blinken said Washington fully supports Syria’s political transition process and wants it to lead to inclusive and nonsectarian governance.
The process must prevent Syria being used as a base for terrorism and ensure any chemical or biological weapons stocks are safely destroyed, he said in a statement.
Amid the steps towards normal life, Israeli air strikes hit bases of the Syrian army, whose forces had melted away in the face of the rebel advance that ousted Mr Assad.
Israel, which has sent forces across the border into a demilitarised zone inside Syria, acknowledged on Tuesday that troops had also taken up some positions beyond the buffer zone, though it denied they were advancing towards Damascus.
In a sign foreigners are ready to work with HTS, the former al-Qaeda affiliate that led the anti-Assad revolt and has lately emphasised its break with its jihadist roots, the United Nations envoy to Syria played down its designation as a terrorist organisation.
“The reality is so far that HTS and also the other armed groups have been sending good messages to the Syrian people ... of unity, of inclusiveness,” Geir Pedersen told a briefing in Geneva.
Syria’s new interim leader has little political profile beyond Idlib province, a mainly rural northwest region where rebels had maintained an administration during the long years that Syria’s civil war front lines were frozen.
A Facebook page of the rebel administration says he was trained as an electrical engineer, later received a degree in sharia and law, and had held posts in areas including education.
Israel’s incursion in the southwest and its air strikes create an additional security problem for the new administration, although Israel says its intervention is temporary.
After Mr Assad’s flight on Sunday ended more than five decades of his family’s rule, Israeli troops moved into the buffer zone inside Syria established following the 1973 Middle East war.
Three security sources said on Tuesday the Israelis had advanced beyond the demilitarised zone. One Syrian source said they had reached the town of Qatana, several kilometres to the east of the buffer zone and a short drive from Damascus airport.
Israel’s defence minister Israel Katz said he had ordered a “sterile defensive zone” to be created in southern Syria to protect Israel from terrorism.
Military spokesperson Lieut Coll Nadav Shoshani said troops were in the buffer zone and “a few additional points” in the vicinity, the first apparent official Israeli acknowledgment that they had moved beyond it. He said, however, that there had been no significant push into Syria.
Mr Katz also said Israel’s navy had destroyed Syria’s fleet. Turkey, Egypt, Qatar and Saudi Arabia condemned the Israeli incursion. – Reuters