Hello and welcome to NewsHour. It's coming to live from the BBC World Service Studios in London.

I'm Tim Franks. And we're starting in Syria with a story that feels

unpredictable and unpredictable. Unpredicted because it's been a shock just how far and how

fast rebel forces have advanced

and unpredictable because working out where this now leads is phenomenally difficult.

At least in this programme we'll try to ask some of the questions.

A very brief recap, it was a few days ago that an alliance of rebel forces in the north of the country

launched their offensive.

They swept south towards the city of Hamar and also up towards Aleppo, Syria's second city,

which now remarkably appears to have fallen into their control,

or at least the forces of President Bashar al-Assad have melted away.

As for Mr. Assad himself, he made his first televised

appearance since the rebel advances began on Wednesday, meeting the Iranian foreign minister in

Damascus. Let's begin with the voices of those caught up in this remarkable redrawing of the map

of control. The forces allied with President Assad do retain one advantage.

Commander the skies.

And that's the panicked sound of the Syrian volunteer civil defense group known as the

white helmet scrambling to respond to the aftermath of

airstrikes on the city of Idlib. Ismail al-Bdullah is a volunteer with the white helmets elsewhere

in northern Syria. Today, I have heard, I have seen the Russian warblins and the Assad war plans

attacking northwest Syria in Idlib, in Alibu City, in the

countryside of Idlib and the countryside of Elipo. The military escalation and the bombing

...