New Syrian prime minister calls for 'stability and calm'

The US-backed Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and Syria's Turkey-backed rebels have reached a ceasefire in the northern city of Manbij following days of fighting, SDF commander Mazloum Abdi said.

"We have reached a ceasefire through US mediation, to preserve civilians' safety and security," Abdi wrote on X, formerly Twitter. "The fighters of the Manbij Military Council, who have been resisting the attacks since November 27, will withdraw from the area as soon as possible."

Abdi said the SDF aimed for a ceasefire across Syria, paving the way for a political process.

The Syrian rebels who toppled President Bashar Assad said on Tuesday that they had taken control of the eastern city of Deir el-Zour, where US-backed Kurdish-led forces had deployed a few days earlier.

"Our forces have seized the entire city of Deir el-Zour," the rebels said in a statement, while the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) war monitor said that Kurdish-led forces had withdrawn.

The Associated Press cited a member of the Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) — which leads the insurgent alliance — as saying in a video that the group would soon conduct a sweep of the city's neighborhoods to secure the area.

He added that the nearby town of Boukamal had also fallen to opposition forces.

"We will advance toward Raqqa and Hasakah and other areas in eastern Syria," HTS said.

The US-backed, Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) had only held Deir el-Zour since Friday, when said it had deployed to areas west of the Euphrates river in an effort to replace Assad's forces there.

Meanwhile, the SOHR also reported that fighting between Turkish-backed and Kurdish-led forces in northern Syria has left 218 people dead in the space of just three days.

The UK-based monitor said that at least "218 members of pro-Kurdish forces and pro-Ankara factions were killed during three days of fighting in and around Manbij" where Turkish-backed factions launched an offensive.

Johann Wadephul, a member of Germany's opposition conservative Christian Democratic Union, has told DW that while authorities were correct to temporarily freeze decisions on asylum-applications from Syrians in Germany, no one would be thrown out of the country.

"At that moment, this is the correct decision from the government here in Germany," he told DW. "It's only a few days after the regime has fallen, we have to look what happens really on the ground in the country.

"Stopping the processes here of asylum doesn't mean anything directly for the asylum-seekers because they will not be thrown out of the country, and they will not have to leave Germany."

Former Health Minister Jens Spahn, a senior figure in the CDU, had already suggested offering financial incentives for Syrian refugees to leave Germany.

However, Wadephul was quick to dismiss those statements saying those settled in Germany would not be forceably removed though did not completely rule out limiting future asylum requests.

"All the Syrians who are good and fully integrated into German society, and a lot of them are really invited to stay here," he said.

"Germany has received millions of refugees in the last years since 2015. I think our hospitality is without any doubt, but the society in Germany is of course under very high pressure because also a lot of people from Ukraine are living here because we are [a] neighboring country to Ukraine.

"So [at] the end of the day, we have time to really closely look and calmly look [at] what's going on in Syria, then come to decisions."

The leader of the rebel group who overthrew Bashar Assad's regime has told Sky News that foreign countries do not need to fear Syria.

Abu Mohammed al-Golani, the head of Islamist Hayat Tahrir al Sham (HTS), was speaking in one of his first statements to a Western media organization since Assad fled to Russia. 

"The country will be rebuilt," he said. "The fear was from the presence of the regime. The country is moving toward development and reconstruction. It's going toward stability."

Al-Golani stressed that people in Syria were "exhausted from war," adding that "the country isn't ready for another one and it's not going to get into another one."

"The source of our fears was from the Iranian militias, Hezbollah and the regime which committed the massacres we are seeing today," the leader of Islamist HTS said. "Their removal is the solution for Syria. The current situation won't allow for a return to panic."

Golani was previously a supporter of al-Qaeda and has been designated by the United States as a terrorist, alongside his HTS organization.

However, he has spent years trying to distance himself from those ties. He reiterated to Sky News that he renounced his past as an extremist and now embraces pluralism and tolerance.

Syria's economy was worth $67.5 billion (€63.9 billion) in 2011, the same year that mass protests against President Bashar Assad's regime erupted and escalated into a full-blown civil war. By last year, the economy had shrunk by 85% to just $9 billion, according to World Bank estimates.

The conflict has devastated the country's infrastructure, causing lasting damage to electricity, transportation and health systems. It has also caused a significant devaluation of the Syrian pound, resulting in a huge loss of purchasing power. 

Some Syria watchers have warned that it could take nearly 10 years for the country to return to its 2011 GDP level and two decades to be fully rebuilt.

Read more: Syria after Assad: What's next for Syria's devastated economy?

Syria's new caretaker prime minister, Mohammed al-Bashir, told Al Jazeera that he's been meeting with members of the transitional government.

"We invited members from the old government and some directors from the administration in Idlib and its surrounding areas in order to facilitate all the necessary works for the next two months until we have a constitutional system to be able to serve the Syrian people," al-Bashir said.

He added that the time had come for Syrians "to enjoy stability and calm" after nearly 14 years of war.

In a message to Syria's new rulers, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel wants to build relations but won't hesitate to attack if they threaten Israel.

"If this regime allows Iran to re-establish itself in Syria, or permits the transfer of Iranian weapons or any other weapons to Hezbollah, or if it attacks us — we will respond forcefully, and we will exact a heavy price," Netanyahu said in a video statement.

"What happened to the previous regime will happen to this one," he warned, adding that Israel has no intention of interfering in Syria's internal affairs but will do what is necessary to ensure Israeli security.

The Israeli military has said it attacked Syrian army targets following the fall of the Assad regime. 

Islamic State(IS) militants have killed 54 soldiers who fled as rebels advanced against Syrian government forces, a war monitor said.

IS jihadis captured "personnel fleeing military service in the desert ... during the collapse of the regime" of President Bashar Assad and "executed 54" of them in the Sukhna area of Homs province, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

IS overran much of Syria and Iraq in 2014, declaring a so-called caliphate and launching a reign of terror.

It was territorially defeated in Syria in 2019, but its remnants still carry out deadly attacks, particularly in the vast Badia desert that stretches from the outskirts of Damascus to the Iraqi border. 

EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas has warned of the risks of sectarian violence and an extremist resurgence in Syria. She also urged international powers to support a peaceful transition after Bashar Assad's fall.

"We must avoid a repeat of the horrific scenarios in Iraq, Libya and Afghanistan," Kallas told a hearing of EU lawmakers. 

Kallas added that Assad's fall was a blow to Russian President Vladimir Putin and Iran. "For Putin and the Iranian regime, the fall of Assad is a huge blow for both," she said.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the United States reaffirms "its full support for a Syrian-led and Syrian-owned political transition."

"This transition process should lead to credible, inclusive, and non-sectarian governance that meets international standards of transparency and accountability," he said in a statement.

Outlining US priorities, Blinken said the new government must "uphold clear commitments to fully respect the rights of minorities" and allow the flow of humanitarian aid. 

He also said the United States wants the next Syrian government to "prevent Syria from being used as a base for terrorism or posing a threat to its neighbors, and ensure that any chemical or biological weapons stockpiles are secured and safely destroyed."

Blinken urged all nations to support an "inclusive" political process in Syria, saying the United States would eventually recognize a government if it meets such standards.

Meanwhile, White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said the US wants to make sure the Syrian people can determine what their future looks like and that there was a Syrian-led evolution toward "better and more representative governance."

He added that the US officials are in close touch with both Syrian opposition groups and Israeli officials as the situation develops.

According to Kirby, the US was not involved in any Israeli operations in Syria, and Israel had made clear these were "temporary measures to ensure their own security.

Turkey has expanded its border crossing capacity to cope with a surge in Syrian refugees seeking to return home after the fall of Bashar Assad, the Turkish Interior Ministry said.

Hundreds have crossed Turkey's southern border with Syria, and Ankara has moved quickly to expand its crossing facilities, Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said.

"Although we had a daily capacity to accommodate 3,000 crossings, we have increased that to between 15,000 and 20,000," he said.

According to Yerlikaya, 300 to 400 people crossed the frontier on Sunday but by midday on Monday, that number had doubled.

DW correspondent Julia Hahn reported from the border crossing, about an hour's drive from Aleppo, said that she could not witness the huge number of crossings.

"We are not seeing that the majortiy of Syrians here in Turkey, we are talking about 3 million people, are now rushing to the border to return home," she said.

According to Hahn, the Turkish government emphasized that it wanted people to return voluntarily.

"I think it will take some time for us to understand the number of people who are going back," she said, adding that many Syrians have already received Turkish citizenship and started their businesses in Turkey.

Yerlikaya said "more than 738,000 Syrians" had voluntarily returned home since 2016, with a total of 2,935,000 still in Turkey. 

Days after the collapse of President Bashar Assad's regime in Syria, debate has erupted in Germany over the possible return of Syrian migrants and asylum-seekers to their homeland.

While prominent figures on the right have been quick to demand that Syrians return home, with some suggesting offering financial incentives, left-leaning politicians have cautioned against acting rashly.

According to the German Interior Ministry, there are 974,136 Syrian nationals currently living in Germany. Some 712,000 of them have been granted refugee status, which includes asylum-seekers with pending applications and asylum-seekers whose applications have been rejected but who have been granted temporary protection on humanitarian grounds.

On Monday, Germany's Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) announced it would join several other European countries in temporarily freezing rulings on asylum applications from Syrian citizens.

Read the full story on DW.

The Israeli military hit several Syrian naval vessels in overnight strikes, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz confirmed.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported earlier that Israeli warplanes had struck naval vessels and army warehouses in and around the Latakia military port, damaging about 10 navy ships.

"The IDF has been operating in Syria in recent days to strike and destroy strategic capabilities that threaten the State of Israel. The navy operated last night to destroy the Syrian fleet with great success," Katz said, referring to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) during a visit to a naval base in the northern Israeli city of Haifa.

He also warned Syria's new rulers not to follow the path of ousted President Bashar Assad.

The UN special envoy for Syria has said European nations should not be hasty about sending refugees from Syria back to their country following the overthrow of President Bashar Assad's government. 

"The situation in Syria is still fluid," Geir Pedersen told a news conference at the United Nations' Geneva headquarters.

He said while many Syrians wanted to return home, "there are livelihood challenges still. The humanitarian situation is disastrous. The economy has collapsed."

At the press conference, the UN's refugee agency also warned against the deportation of Syrian refugees.

"No asylum-seeker should be forcibly returned," UNHCR spokesperson Shabia Mantoo said, adding that the dynamics of displacement in Syria had not yet ended despite Assad's ouster.

Their remarks come as several European countries have said they will suspend asylum applications lodged by Syrians who have fled the country's 13-year-long civil war, with some politicians even calling for their rapid repatriation.