Syrian rebels who overthrew long-time leader Bashar al-Assad announced the appointment of a transitional head of government.
This decision was made during a cabinet meeting held in Damascus, which included rebel leaders and former officials from Assad’s administration.
Mohammed al-Bashir, who previously managed a local administration in a rebel-held area of northwest Syria and is relatively unknown to many Syrians, has been selected to lead the interim government.
This transitional leadership is set to oversee the country until March 1.
“The meeting was under the headline of transferring the files and institutions to caretake the government,” Bashir said.
Meanwhile, there was some sense of normalcy returning to the Syrian capital, with a notable decrease in the number of armed people on the streets.
According to reports, the rebels said commanders had ordered fighters to withdraw from cities and for police and internal security forces affiliated with the main rebel group, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, to deploy instead.
Banks and shops reopened for the first time since Assad’s overthrow on Sunday and his flight to asylum in Russia. Traffic returned to the roads, construction workers were back fixing a roundabout in the Damascus city center and street cleaners swept roadways.
The signs of Middle East conflict remained, however, Israel launched airstrikes against Syrian army bases, whose forces had melted away in the face of the lightning rebel advance that ousted Assad over a two-week period.
Israel sent forces across the border into a demilitarised zone inside Syria, saying its airstrikes were aimed at keeping weapons from falling into hostile hands. It denied reports that its forces had advanced beyond the buffer zone into the countryside southwest of Damascus.
Abu Mohammed al-Golani, the Islamist leader who headed the offensive that forced Assad out, vowed to pursue former senior government officials responsible for torture and war crimes.
“Rewards will be offered to those who will provide information about senior army and security officers involved in war crimes,” Golani said in a statement.
