From a01a8e72acdf3cba61abe51b7408968dcc81da09 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Ilija Tovilo <ilija.tovilo@me.com>
Date: Sun, 1 Feb 2026 14:13:31 +0100
Subject: [PATCH] Fix failed assertion for assignment in expression context

This code path is reachable for all assignments expressions, not just true
variable expressions.

Really surprising we have no tests that caught this.
---
 Zend/tests/gh20628_005.phpt | 20 ++++++++++++++++++++
 Zend/zend_compile.c         |  1 -
 2 files changed, 20 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)
 create mode 100644 Zend/tests/gh20628_005.phpt

diff --git a/Zend/tests/gh20628_005.phpt b/Zend/tests/gh20628_005.phpt
new file mode 100644
index 00000000000..43b49e0c18f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/Zend/tests/gh20628_005.phpt
@@ -0,0 +1,20 @@
+--TEST--
+Failed assertion for assignment in expression context
+--CREDITS--
+Matteo Beccati (mbeccati)
+--FILE--
+<?php
+
+function foo() {
+    return ['bar' => 'baz'];
+}
+
+var_dump(($v = foo())['bar'], $v);
+
+?>
+--EXPECT--
+string(3) "baz"
+array(1) {
+  ["bar"]=>
+  string(3) "baz"
+}
diff --git a/Zend/zend_compile.c b/Zend/zend_compile.c
index 325953e158e..a013efab859 100644
--- a/Zend/zend_compile.c
+++ b/Zend/zend_compile.c
@@ -12303,7 +12303,6 @@ static zend_op *zend_compile_var_inner(znode *result, zend_ast *ast, uint32_t ty
 			zend_compile_assign_ref(result, ast, type);
 			return NULL;
 		case ZEND_AST_ASSIGN:
-			ZEND_ASSERT(ast->child[0]->kind == ZEND_AST_ARRAY && zend_propagate_list_refs(ast->child[0]));
 			zend_compile_assign(result, ast, false, type);
 			return NULL;
 		default: