Assad's police threatened to bury me and my reporting. Now I'm again and free

Eleven years in the past, I left Damascus with out understanding if I’d ever return.

At the moment, the town was within the grip of warfare. Intense violence, following President Bashar al-Assad's brutal crackdown on pro-democracy protests, has engulfed the capital. At any time you may to be shot in the street.

I coated the very first protests of 2011 for the BBC from inside Syria. I coated the “day of anger”then concerning the shootings, the murders, the disappearances, the airstrikes and the barrel bombs – till I personally grow to be numb and lose hope.

I’ve been arrested a number of occasions. The regime restricted my journey and threatened me, and in 2013 I needed to go away.

Over the previous decade, I’ve skilled a curler coaster of hope and despair, watching my nation tear itself other than overseas. Loss of life, destruction, detention. Hundreds of thousands of individuals are fleeing and turning into refugees.

Like many Syrians, I felt just like the world had forgotten our nation. There was no gentle on the finish of the tunnel.

When folks took to the streets on the time to name for the overthrow of the regime, I by no means imagined it will occur, given President Assad's highly effective backers in Russia and Iran.

However on Sunday, within the blink of a watch, every little thing modified.

Final week I used to be in Beirut to report on the autumn of Aleppo and Hama to anti-Assad militants, however I didn't actually assume it will convey change. I believed Syria can be cut up in two, with Damascus and the coastal cities remaining in Assad's arms.

Saturday after midnight, issues all of the sudden modified. Round 04:00, it was introduced that the regime had fallen and Assad was gone. As I write this, I nonetheless can't imagine this can be a actuality.

I attempted over the weekend to get permission to enter the nation from considered one of Syria's most feared secret police organizations, referred to as the Palestine Department. They’d an arrest warrant in my identify, because of my reporting on the protests.

I couldn’t overlook my detention in the course of the first week of the 2011 rebellion. I had seen males lined as much as be overwhelmed, recent blood on the bottom and screams of torture. A safety guard grabbed my mouth and instructed me he would “reduce it off to [me]”if I mentioned a phrase.

On Sunday, I rushed with my colleagues to the Syrian border. Now there was nobody on the Palestine department – neither the safety brokers nor the investigator who had threatened me once I final tried to enter Syria in January. He instructed me he might bury me seven tales underground and nobody would know. I puzzled the place he was now. What did he consider the 1000’s of individuals he had interrogated and threatened? Or these tortured to dying in Assad's prisons?

I crossed the Syrian border with out concern of being arrested. Whereas I used to be on the BBC from Damascus, I reported with out fearing for my security.

There’s a sense of pleasure within the air in Damascus, regardless of considerations over Islamist rebels in charge and whether or not they may guarantee safety within the nation. Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) fighters protected public establishments from looting after crowds stormed the presidential palaceand the prisoners have been launched.

An HTS group met with Christian residents of Bab Touma, a neighborhood in Damascus, to reassure them that they weren’t searching for to restrict their freedoms.

Some members of the Alawite group – who’ve lengthy supported Assad – fear about what is going to occur to them, however to this point there have been no stories of sectarian violence.

Since Sunday, family and friends members who fled have been texting me to say they may return. It looks like everybody needs to go house.

My residence in central Damascus was destroyed in 2013 once I left, after the authorities thought of me a traitor and banned me from dwelling there. Safety forces and native authorities broke in and destroyed partitions and ceilings.

Final month, I used to be in a position to repossess it after paying 1000’s of {dollars} in bribes. It should take time to rebuild it, however that's what I’ll do.

And perhaps when it's prepared, Syria will likely be prepared for us all to return again.