Eight years ago, Syria’s civil war shifted in President Bashar Al-Assad’s favor after a Russian blitzkrieg on Aleppo helped him regain control over the country’s second biggest city.

Video from Syrian opposition news outlet Shaam Network shows an empty and damaged Aleppo International Airport. Syrian rebel forces claimed to have captured the airport and large parts of the city in a surprise offensive against President Bashar al-Assad's regime.

The retaking of Aleppo marks the first major development in years in Syria's grinding civil war, which had largely fallen from the world's headlines. It also raises fresh questions about the opposing sides,