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July 30: Iraq’s Bloodless Coup That Was Followed by Rivers of Blood

Former Iraqi President Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr and his deputy Saddam Hussein. (AFP)
Former Iraqi President Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr and his deputy Saddam Hussein. (AFP)
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July 30: Iraq’s Bloodless Coup That Was Followed by Rivers of Blood

Former Iraqi President Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr and his deputy Saddam Hussein. (AFP)
Former Iraqi President Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr and his deputy Saddam Hussein. (AFP)

It’s unwise to corner Saddam Hussein and force him to accept a partner in governing Iraq. The Baath Party and Saddam himself don't favor partnerships.

The Baath Party, which regained power on July 17, 1968, has a history of significant and costly turning points.

The first major shift came on July 30 that year, enabling the party to consolidate power under President Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr, with Saddam as his deputy.

As a journalist, I spoke with some key figures from that time and felt it was important to share their stories with the readers of Asharq Al-Awsat.

The defeat of Arab armies in the 1967 war enraged the Arab public, who blamed their governments for what was termed a “setback” but was really a disaster.

Iraqi President Abdul Rahman Arif, who had succeeded his brother Abdul Salam, appeared weak, with a loose grip on the military and little popular support.

By the spring of 1968, rumors were spreading in closed circles about various factions plotting to seize power. Some expected the country to fall under military control.

The Baath Party leadership was keeping a close watch, fearing a coup. They began planning a return to power, seeking to avenge the 1963 events that led to bloodshed and the ousting of Abdul Salam Arif, whom they had initially helped bring to power.

Salah Omar al-Ali.

The leadership wanted to avoid a violent takeover and carefully considered their strategy.

A key figure was Col. Ibrahim al-Daoud, commander of the 20,000-strong Republican Guard. If al-Daoud resisted, a bloody battle could ensue at the palace gates. There was also the risk that such a conflict might pave the way for a third faction from the military to step in as a savior.

The Baathists decided to approach al-Daoud, hoping to win him over or at least neutralize him. They noted that al-Daoud was heavily influenced by his friend Abdul Razzaq al-Nayef, the deputy director of military intelligence, known for his strong influence and rumored ties to Western intelligence. Al-Daoud was thought to follow al-Nayef’s lead closely.

The complex task required cunning and was entrusted to al-Bakr, known for his military skills and political savvy.

The coup organizers secured the cooperation of officer Saadoun Ghaidan, who commanded a force stationed at the presidential palace, including several tanks.

Al-Bakr met with al-Daoud to reveal the plan to overthrow Arif. He urged him to keep the matter secret, swearing on the Quran that it would not be shared with anyone else, especially al-Nayef. However, al-Daoud quickly informed al-Nayef on July 15.

This leak put the Baath Party leadership in a tough spot. The secret was out, and al-Nayef, a man considered dangerous and rumored to have suspicious ties with Western intelligence, knew their plans. The success or failure of the coup now depended on his actions.

Salah Omar al-Ali, a key figure in the leadership, explained: “On the morning of July 16, we informed the civilian and military groups involved about the final details of their roles.”

“We initially planned to act on July 14, the anniversary of the 1958 revolution that established the republic, but practical issues delayed us.”

“On July 16, we retrieved hidden weapons and military uniforms for disguise. At 8 p.m., we met at al-Bakr’s house in the Ali al-Salih neighborhood on 14 Ramadan Street to finalize our plans, waiting for the operation at 2:30 a.m. Then, the unexpected happened.”

An armored vehicle is seen in front of the presidential palace after the 1968 coup. (Getty Images)

Shocking message

As the Baath Party’s regional leaders were finalizing their plans, there was a knock at the door. Al-Bakr answered and came back with a small note. He announced that it was from al-Nayef. The message read: “I know about your operation. I support you and am ready to help in any way. Trust in God.”

Al-Ali recalled that al-Bakr presented the message to the group, saying: “We need to discuss this and make a decision.”

The note, delivered by a lieutenant serving as al-Nayef’s aide, was shocking.

Although the messenger was a Baathist, his actions didn’t lessen the severity of the situation.

The group grew anxious and confused. Al-Nayef was known to be strong, very intelligent and ambitious, which made him a formidable figure. They considered the risks: if they canceled the operation, al-Nayef might reveal their plans, seeing it as a slight against him.

Canceling could be disastrous for the party, but involving al-Nayef was risky too. It was clear that al-Daoud had not kept his oath, complicating matters.

They ultimately decided to proceed and sent al-Nayef this message: “We intentionally kept you uninformed due to your sensitive position and concern for your safety. We informed Ibrahim al-Daoud to avoid putting you in an awkward position, knowing he would tell you. We are moving forward with the operation, and if successful, you will be Iraq’s Prime Minister, God willing.”

Essentially, they made two decisions: to entice al-Nayef with the prime ministership and to eliminate al-Nayef and al-Daoud as soon as possible. The task of storming the Republican Palace was given to the party’s regional leaders.

Before the operation, they gathered at the home of Abdul Karim al-Nadda, al-Bakr’s brother-in-law, who worked for the railway and lived near the radio station in the Salhiya area.

The emotions were high as the nine leadership members, including al-Bakr and Saddam, met with others, including Hardan al-Tikriti. The total number present was less than twenty. The plan required al-Daoud and Ghaidan to be waiting for them.

Storming the palace

The team put on military uniforms and officer badges. At the planned time, a military truck arrived, and they climbed aboard, while another group took two civilian cars. They reached the palace entrance dressed in their military gear and carrying rifles. Ghaidan was waiting at the tank battalion entrance and opened the gate for them. Several young party members, who had secretly trained to operate tanks, joined them.

They were surprised to find that the tanks around the palace were modern and the trainees had trouble operating them. Fortunately, one young man managed to start a tank and moved from one to another, helping them complete the encirclement of the palace.

They set up their command post at the tank battalion headquarters. Al-Bakr called Abdul Rahman Arif, who was asleep. The two men knew each other well. Surprised, Arif asked, “What’s going on?” Al-Bakr responded: “The revolutionary leadership has taken control of the country.”

“Please surrender to avoid any conflict. We guarantee your safety and that of your family. This is not a personal attack; it’s to prevent further bloodshed under your weak leadership. Surrender now.”

Finding the situation serious, Arif tried contacting division commanders outside Baghdad but got no response. Ten minutes later, al-Bakr called again, insisting Arif surrender. In a final warning, al-Bakr said: “If you don’t surrender, you’ll be responsible for your and your family’s safety.”

To reinforce the message, they fired artillery shells over the palace. Hearing this, Arif realized there was no negotiating and contacted them to arrange his surrender. Arif came out and was taken in a small military vehicle to the tank battalion headquarters.

At the start of the operation, a team was dispatched to arrest Prime Minister Taher Yahya at his home. This move marked the Baath Party’s return to power, achieved without any bloodshed.

Abdul Razzaq al-Nayef and Ibrahim al-Daoud.

Potential threats

When asked about Saddam Hussein’s actions during those crucial hours, al-Ali said: “Saddam acted just like the others; he wore a military uniform and carried a rifle, following the lead of the other party members.”

Despite his many criticisms today, Saddam’s bravery and ruthlessness were clear. At the time, he was not a dominant figure and did not control decisions. He was a loyal party member who followed orders.

After the Baath Party took power, its leaders saw Prime Minister al-Nayef and Defense Minister al-Daoud as potential threats.

Al-Ali, involved in the plot against them, described the situation: “We held a meeting to discuss our decisions, including removing al-Nayef and al-Daoud. Al-Bakr said we had to include al-Nayef because he knew our plan and could have turned against us. We promised him the prime ministership, and he did not betray us.”

“However, I was concerned that removing al-Nayef might be seen as treachery, given the bloody history with the Communists in 1963. I suggested we keep cooperating with him and reassess if his behavior changed. We agreed, and al-Nayef began his role as prime minister.”

A few days later, al-Bakr called an urgent meeting and urged the leadership to quickly remove al-Nayef. He explained that he was rapidly working against the party and had recruited military officers without realizing some were Baathists.

“Act fast before he can undermine us,” al-Bakr warned. “Plan his removal, and I’ll support whatever you decide.”

Officers salute al-Nayef before his ouster.

The next day, we met at the home of Saleh Mahdi Al-Ammash, the Interior Minister, since we feared al-Nayef might trap us if he knew our plans. We decided to remove both al-Nayef and al-Daoud.

We had military units in Jordan. We planned for al-Daoud to inspect them while secretly sending party members to arrest him and send him to Spain. At the same time, we would act against al-Nayef.

On July 30, al-Daoud was captured and sent to Spain. Meanwhile, we targeted al-Nayef. After lunch at the palace, he went to al-Bakr’s office. Saddam and I entered with rifles and demanded his surrender. At first, he resisted but then begged us, citing his family.

We needed to act quickly and discreetly. We told al-Nayef to leave as if nothing had happened and warned him not to signal his guards. He was escorted to a car by Saddam, who warned him not to resist. The car left through a rear gate, and al-Nayef was flown out to Morocco.

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Four Iranian Narratives on the Collapse of the ‘Resistance’ in Syria  

Iran's General Qassem Soleimani makes a phone call near the historic Citadel of Aleppo, winter 2016. (Fars)
Iran's General Qassem Soleimani makes a phone call near the historic Citadel of Aleppo, winter 2016. (Fars)
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Four Iranian Narratives on the Collapse of the ‘Resistance’ in Syria  

Iran's General Qassem Soleimani makes a phone call near the historic Citadel of Aleppo, winter 2016. (Fars)
Iran's General Qassem Soleimani makes a phone call near the historic Citadel of Aleppo, winter 2016. (Fars)

One hundred and ninety-two days separated the last meeting between Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and Syria’s ousted President Bashar al-Assad in Tehran from the moment the Syrian regime fell to the opposition in December 2024.

That interval was no footnote in the Syrian war. It became a sharp mirror inside Tehran, reflecting the magnitude of the wager Iran’s leadership had placed on Assad, and the limits of its ability to anticipate the trajectory of the conflict and shifts in the regional balance of power.

At that meeting, Khamenei laid out the essence of his “Syrian doctrine” amid changing realities across the “Axis of Resistance.” Syria, he argued, was no ordinary state but one with a “special place” because its identity, in his view, stemmed from its role in this axis.

Since “resistance is Syria’s defining identity and must be preserved,” he addressed Assad not as a political ally but as a partner in that identity. He praised Assad for once saying that “the cost of resistance is lower than the cost of compromise” and that “whenever we retreat, the other side advances.” Thus, Khamenei reaffirmed his full - if belated – gamble on the regime’s survival, even as signs of collapse were unmistakable on the ground.

Less than seven months later, the regime would fall. Assad’s collapse would yield several Iranian narratives: the Supreme Leader’s, the Revolutionary Guard’s, the diplomatic narrative, and a fourth voiced from within the system itself, one that raised blunt questions about the price of Iran’s Syrian gamble.

Khamenei’s narrative

In his first speech after Assad’s fall, Khamenei offered a hard-edged explanation: the event, he said, was the product of a “joint American-Zionist plot,” aided by neighboring states. He spoke of factors that he claimed prevented Iran from providing the necessary support, including Israeli and US strikes inside Syria and the closure of air and land corridors to Iranian supplies.

He concluded that the decisive flaw lay within Syria itself, where the “spirit of resistance” had eroded in state institutions.

He stressed that the regime’s fall did not mean the fall of the idea of “resistance,” predicting that “patriotic Syrian youth” would one day revive it in a new form.

This narrative rejects the notion of strategic defeat: for Khamenei, what happened is not the end of the struggle, but a harsh phase in a longer one.

Revolutionary Guard’s narrative

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) adopted a language closer to national security logic than pure ideology, though it drew from the same lexicon. In 2013, cleric Mehdi Taeb, head of the IRGC’s Ammar Headquarters think tank, framed the equation starkly: “Syria is our 35th province... If the enemy attacks Syria or Khuzestan, our priority is to keep Syria.”

With that shocking sentence, Syria was elevated to the level of Iranian strategic geography, sometimes above parts of Iran itself.

Late General Qassem Soleimani, then commander of the Quds Force, became the chief architect of this approach: confronting threats abroad by building multinational militia networks and using the “protection of shrines” as a mobilizing slogan that fused ideology with national security calculations.

A month after Assad’s fall, at a memorial for Soleimani, Khamenei reaffirmed this school of thought, linking the defense of shrines in Damascus and Iraq to the defense of “Iran as a sanctuary,” aiming to bind various fronts into a single cross-border security-sectarian struggle.

After the Syrian regime’s collapse, this narrative preserved its core: success or failure is not defined by who sits in Damascus, but by whether the IRGC’s influence networks remain intact and whether Iran still has access to Syrian depth.

Full withdrawal would amount, in this logic, to admitting that the “35th province” had slipped from the map, so the IRGC will continue to search for any possible foothold.

Diplomatic narrative

Iran’s diplomatic apparatus sought to tell a softer story. Weeks before the fall, Khamenei dispatched his adviser Ali Larijani to Damascus and Beirut with reassuring messages for Assad and other allies, publicly asserting that events in Syria and Lebanon “directly concern Iran’s national security.”

Days later, Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi visited Damascus just six days before the collapse, even posing with shawarma in a downtown restaurant to signal “normalcy” and dismiss talk of impending downfall as “psychological warfare.”

It was the peak of the gap between diplomatic messaging and a disintegrating reality.

Afterward, the Foreign Ministry adopted a defensive formula: Iran had “responded to the request of an allied government”, but “cannot decide on behalf of peoples.” Thus, responsibility was shifted toward Syrian internal failures and the external “conspiracy” often invoked by Khamenei.

This narrative treats Syria as one file among many, not an existential arena as seen by the IRGC and the Leader.

‘Open account’ narrative

The fourth narrative emerged, unexpectedly, from within the establishment itself. For the first time, semi-public acknowledgments surfaced that the economic return on Iran’s Syrian adventure was nearly nil and that the political-security “investment” had resulted in something resembling a net loss.

In 2020, former member of the Iranian parliamentary national security and foreign policy committee, Heshmatollah Falahatpisheh revealed that Tehran had spent “$20-30 billion” in Syria, insisting: “This is the people’s money and must be recovered.”

Five years later, he returned with a more bitter charge: Syria’s debts to Iran were effectively settled through “land without oil, cow farms without cows, and empty promises.”

This view is no outlier. Over a decade, Iranian protest slogans increasingly linked “Gaza, Lebanon, Syria” with bread, fuel, and economic hardship at home.

With Assad gone, critics more easily argue that Iran spent tens of billions and paid a human cost among its fighters and proxies, only to end up with almost no influence in Damascus.

For decision-makers, this narrative becomes domestic pressure against any large-scale return to Syria.

Four scenarios for Tehran

Taken together, these narratives reveal a deep contradiction: the IRGC and Khamenei refuse to concede that Iran “lost Syria,” treating the episode as one phase in a longer struggle. Meanwhile, the diplomatic and economic narratives acknowledge, implicitly, that the previous intervention model is no longer sustainable.

Four broad scenarios emerge. The first is a return through proxies, closest to the IRGC’s logic: Iran would rebuild influence from the ground up through militias - old or newly recruited - to pressure any future authority in Damascus.

The second is regional repositioning without Syria, in which Iran shifts resources to arenas where it still holds leverage, including Lebanon, Iraq, Yemen and Gaza, while limiting its role in Syria to preventing hostile entrenchment.

The third is a “gray” re-entry: a gradual, negotiated, non-confrontational return through localized deals or modest economic and security projects, allowing Tehran to claim continued presence without the cost of backing a single ruler.

The fourth is institutionalizing the loss: Iran accepts Syria’s departure from its strategic depth, but repackages the outcome within a narrative of “conspiracy and steadfastness,” using it to tighten internal control while maintaining symbolic presence through shrine rhetoric and minimal diplomacy.

Across all scenarios, one fact remains. Syria, which was once described as more vital than Khuzestan and the “distinct identity of resistance”, is no longer what it was before December 8, 2024 when the regime collapsed.

Tehran can invoke time, the IRGC can search for openings, diplomats can polish their statements, and critics can lament “land without oil.” But one question looms over every debate in Iran: Can Tehran afford a second Syrian-sized gamble after emerging from the first still trying to convince itself that the “resistance factor” remains standing, even as its Syrian pillar has broken?

Features

A Year After Assad’s Fall, Families of Missing Detainees Languish without Answers 

Amina Beqai holds a photo of her husband, who went missing after he was arrested by security forces under the rule of ousted President Bashar al-Assad, in Damascus, Syria, November 23, 2025. (Reuters)
Amina Beqai holds a photo of her husband, who went missing after he was arrested by security forces under the rule of ousted President Bashar al-Assad, in Damascus, Syria, November 23, 2025. (Reuters)
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A Year After Assad’s Fall, Families of Missing Detainees Languish without Answers 

Amina Beqai holds a photo of her husband, who went missing after he was arrested by security forces under the rule of ousted President Bashar al-Assad, in Damascus, Syria, November 23, 2025. (Reuters)
Amina Beqai holds a photo of her husband, who went missing after he was arrested by security forces under the rule of ousted President Bashar al-Assad, in Damascus, Syria, November 23, 2025. (Reuters)

A year after dictator Bashar al-Assad's ouster in Syria, little has changed in Amina Beqai's desperate quest. She types her missing husband's name yet again into an internet search box, hoping for answers to a 13-year-old question. In vain.

Beqai has nowhere else to turn.

A National Commission for Missing Persons established in May has been gathering evidence of enforced disappearances under Assad, but has yet to offer families any clues on the estimated 150,000 people who vanished in his notorious prisons.

They include Beqai's husband Mahmoud, arrested by Syria's security forces at their home near Damascus on April 17, 2012, and her brother Ahmed, detained in August that year.

Assad's overthrow initially stirred hope that prison records could tell families if, when and how their loved ones died. Mass graves dug by Assad's forces across Syria could be exhumed. Victims could be properly buried.

None of that has transpired.

"It's been a year. They didn't do anything ... Is it thinkable that they didn't even get the documents for these men? Showing us the truth is what we want," Beqai told Reuters.

FADING HOPES

As opposition fighters swept through Syrian towns last year on the way to capturing Damascus, they rushed first to the jails, flinging doors open to free thousands of bewildered prisoners.

On December 8, 2024, hours after Assad fled to Russia, the fighters freed dozens of prisoners from Sednaya, dubbed "the human slaughterhouse" by Amnesty International for the industrial-scale torture and executions undertaken there.

The emerging detainees did not include Beqai's loved ones.

"When the prisons were open, and they didn't come back – that was the shock. That was when the hope ended, it really died," Beqai said. But she demands to know how, when and where her husband and brother may have died.

With no updates from the national commission, Beqai said she had become "obsessed" with her online hunt, scouring pictures of dead detainees and scans of prison documents published by Syrian news outlets who entered jails and security branches after Assad's fall.

"All there is left to do is sit and search," she said.

Such documents have revealed crucial information.

Sarah al-Khattab last saw her husband heading into a police station in Syria's south on February 9, 2019 to reconcile with Assad's government after years holed up with insurgents.

She has had no news of him since.

A spreadsheet of dead Sednaya prisoners seen by Reuters after Assad's fall included his name, Ali Mohsen al-Baridi, dating his death as October 22, 2019 from "stopped pulse and breathing" with orders that the body not be given to his family.

Reuters passed its finding to the Syrian Justice and Accountability Center, an advocacy group working with families of the missing, who informed Khattab.

COMMISSION SEEKS HELP, OVERSIGHT

The national commission was established by new President Ahmed al-Sharaa. The commission's media adviser, Zeina Shahla, told Reuters its mandate includes any missing Syrian, no matter the circumstances.

"When it comes to the pain of the families, maybe we really are being slow. But this file needs progress to come carefully, in a way that is scientific and systemic and not rushed," she said.

Next year, the commission hopes to launch a database of all the missing using documents from prisons and other locations. Exhuming mass graves requires more technical expertise and probably won't happen until 2027, Shahla said.

The commission has met with Syrian advocacy groups and some families. In November, it signed a cooperation agreement with the Geneva-based International Committee of the Red Cross and the International Commission on Missing Persons, which have global expertise on the issue.

Syria's commission hopes that will lead to more training for its personnel and access to equipment in short supply in Syria, including DNA testing labs for exhumed remains.

"We welcome any kind of cooperation and support we can receive, as long as the issue remains under (our commission's) authority,” Shahla said.

RELATIVES, ACTIVISTS DEMAND BETTER

The government's approach has upset organizations who developed expertise on enforced disappearances while in exile during the Assad era, six rights groups told Reuters.

Many were excited to apply that knowledge on the ground with Assad gone, but say the government's centralized approach has excluded them, slowed progress and left families in limbo.

"When you have as many as a quarter of a million people missing, you can't do that. You break up the work," said Ahmad Helmi, a Syrian activist who leads Ta'afi, an initiative focused on missing detainees and prison survivors.

Activists also accuse the commission of "monopolizing" detention-related documents.

In September, Syrian authorities briefly detained Amer Matar, an activist who founded a virtual museum to preserve detainees' experiences, accusing him of illegally accessing official documents for personal purposes.

In November, the commission urged families not to believe any detention-related documents shared on unofficial online platforms, like the ones Beqai has been searching, and threatened legal action against those outlets.

"The commission wants to monopolize the file, but it lacks the tools, the competence and the transparency. It demands the trust of families but delivers no results," Matar said.

Shahla said the commission is "the central, official body authorized to reveal the fate" of missing people and that families needed one place to go to for accurate answers.

Agnes Callamard, head of Amnesty International, said the commission should issue regular updates about its progress and consider granting financial aid to relatives of missing people.

"The most important thing ... the national commission can do at the moment is ensuring that families feel they are being heard and being supported," she told Reuters.

As Syria marks a year since Assad's downfall, many people remain exhausted by the same burden that plagued them under his rule: the lack of closure.

Alia Darraji last saw her son Yazan on November 1, 2014, as he left home to meet friends near Damascus. He never returned.

In the last year, the elderly woman has spent time in "truth tents" - sit-ins demanding information on disappeared Syrians that were unthinkable under Assad. While solidarity has helped, it hasn't given her what her heart aches for.

"We were hoping to find their bodies, to bury them, or to find out where they are," Darraji said.

Features

‘It’s All Over’: How Iran Abandoned Assad to His Fate Days Before Fall

Iran was a staunch backer of Bashar al-Assad but quickly withdrew its forces once as opposition forces took over Syria. (AFP)
Iran was a staunch backer of Bashar al-Assad but quickly withdrew its forces once as opposition forces took over Syria. (AFP)
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‘It’s All Over’: How Iran Abandoned Assad to His Fate Days Before Fall

Iran was a staunch backer of Bashar al-Assad but quickly withdrew its forces once as opposition forces took over Syria. (AFP)
Iran was a staunch backer of Bashar al-Assad but quickly withdrew its forces once as opposition forces took over Syria. (AFP)

As city after city fell to a lightning opposition offensive in Syria last December, Iranian forces and diplomats supporting Bashar al-Assad saw the writing on the wall, abandoning the longtime ruler days before his ousting, sources told AFP.

During Syria's civil war, which erupted in 2011 following the government's brutal repression of pro-democracy protests, Iran was one of Damascus's biggest backers, sending Assad military advisers and forces from its Revolutionary Guards.

Iranian and allied regional fighters -- mainly from Lebanon's Hezbollah, but also from Iraq and Afghanistan -- had held key locations and helped prop up Assad, only to melt away in the face of opposition forces' headlong rush towards the capital.

Syrian officers and soldiers served under the Iranian Guards, whose influence grew during the conflict as Assad's power waned.

A former Syrian officer assigned to one of the Guards' security headquarters in Damascus said that on December 5 last year, his Iranian superior summoned him to an operations center in the Mazzeh district the following day to discuss an "important matter".

The former officer, requesting anonymity due to fears for his safety, said his superior, known as Hajj Abu Ibrahim, made a bombshell announcement to around 20 Syrian officers and soldiers gathered for the meeting.

"From today, there will be no more Iranian Revolutionary Guards in Syria. We're leaving," they were told.

"It's all over. From today, we are no longer responsible for you."

He said they were ordered to burn or otherwise destroy sensitive documents and remove hard drives from computers.

- Border bottleneck -

The announcement came as the opposition forces were making huge gains, but it still took the Syrian soldiers by surprise, he said.

"We knew things hadn't been going well, but not to that extent."

They received one month's salary in advance and went home.

Two days later the opposition forces captured Damascus without a fight after Assad fled to Russia.

Two Syrian employees of Iran's consulate in Damascus, requesting anonymity for security reasons, also described a hasty Iranian exit.

The consulate was empty by the evening of December 5 as Iranian diplomats scarpered across the border to Beirut, they told AFP.

Several Syrian employees "who held Iranian nationality left with them, accompanied by senior Revolutionary Guards officers", according to one of the former employees.

At Jdeidet Yabus, Syria's main border crossing with Lebanon, taxi drivers and former staff reported a massive bottleneck on December 5 and 6, with an eight-hour wait to clear the frontier.

Both of the former consulate employees said the Iranians told their Syrian personnel to stay home and paid them three months' salary.

The embassy, consulate and all Iranian security positions were deserted by the morning of December 6, they said.

- Russian base -

During the war, forces under Iranian command were concentrated in sensitive areas inside Damascus and its suburbs, particularly the Sayyida Zeinab area, home to an important Shiite shrine, and around Damascus airport, as well as near the Lebanese and Iraqi borders.

Parts of the northern city of Aleppo and locations elsewhere in the province were also major staging areas for personnel and fighters.

At a site that used to be a key military base for Iranian forces south of Aleppo, Colonel Mohammad Dibo said that when the city fell early in the opposition campaign, "Iran stopped fighting".

Iranian forces "had to withdraw suddenly after the quick collapse" of Assad's military, said Dibo, who took part in the opposition offensive and now serves in Syria's new army.

On the heavily damaged walls of the abandoned base, an AFP journalist saw Iranian and Hezbollah slogans, and a painting of a sword tearing through an Israeli flag.

Tehran's foe Israel had launched hundreds of strikes on Syria over the course of the war, mainly saying it was targeting Assad's army and Iran-backed groups.

The former Syrian army officer who requested anonymity said that on December 5, a senior Iranian military official known as Hajj Jawad and several Iranian soldiers and officers were evacuated to Russia's Hmeimim base on the Mediterranean coast, then flown back to Tehran.

At the abandoned site near Aleppo, Dibo said that after the city's fall, "some 4,000 Iranian military personnel were evacuated via Russia's Hmeimim base" where they had taken refuge.

Others fled overland through Iraq or Lebanon, he said.

Their exit was so rushed that "when we entered their bases" in Aleppo province, "we found passports and identity documents belonging to Iranian officers who didn't even have time to retrieve them."