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Hafez al-Assad was a Syrian politician, dictator and military officer who served as the 18th president of Syria from 1971 until his death in 2000. He had previously served as prime minister of Syria from 1970 to 1971 as well as regional secretary of the regional command of the Syrian regional branch of the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party and secretary general of the National Command of the Ba'ath Party from 1970 to 2000. Hafez al-Assad was a key participant in the 1963 Syrian coup d'état, which brought the Syrian regional branch of the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party to power in the country, a power that lasted until the fall of the regime in 2024, then led by his son Bashar.
Bashar al-Assad is a Syrian politician, military officer, and dictator who served as the 19th president of Syria from 2000 until his government was overthrown by Syrian rebels in December 2024. As president, Assad was the commander-in-chief of the Syrian Armed Forces and as well as the secretary-general of the Central Command of the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party. He is the son of Hafez al-Assad, who ruled Syria in a dictatorship from 1971 until his death in 2000.
Alawites are an Arab ethnoreligious group who live primarily in the Levant and follow Alawism, a religious sect that splintered from early Shia Islam as a ghulat branch during the ninth century. Alawites venerate Ali ibn Abi Talib, the "first Imam" in the Twelver school, as the physical manifestation of God. The group was founded by Ibn Nusayr during the 9th century. Ibn Nusayr was a disciple of the tenth Twelver Imam, Ali al-Hadi, and of the eleventh Twelver Imam, Hasan al-Askari. For this reason, Alawites are also called Nusayris.
The Hama massacre occurred in February 1982 when the Syrian Arab Army and the Defense Companies paramilitary force, under the orders of President Hafez al-Assad, besieged the town of Hama for 27 days in order to quell an uprising by the Muslim Brotherhood against the Ba'athist government. The campaign that had begun in 1976 by Sunni Muslim groups, including the Muslim Brotherhood, was brutally crushed in an anti-Sunni massacre at Hama, carried out by the Syrian Arab Army and Alawite militias under the command of Major General Rifaat al-Assad.
The Syrian Social Nationalist Party is a Syrian nationalist party operating in Syria, Lebanon, and Jordan. It advocates the establishment of a Greater Syrian nation state spanning the Fertile Crescent, including present-day Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Kuwait, Jordan, Palestine, Israel, Cyprus, Sinai, Hatay Province, and Cilicia, based on geographical boundaries and the common history people within the boundaries share. It has also been active in the Syrian and Lebanese diaspora, for example in South America. Until the fall of Ba'athist Syria it was an ally of the ruling Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party, being the second-ranking party in the National Progressive Front.
The War of the Camps, was a subconflict within the 1984–1990 phase of the Lebanese Civil War, in which the Sunni Palestinian refugee camps in Beirut were besieged by the Shia Amal militia.
The Palestine Liberation Army is ostensibly the military wing of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), set up at the 1964 Arab League summit held in Alexandria, Egypt, with the mission of fighting Israel. However, it has never been under effective PLO control, but rather it has been controlled by its various host governments, usually Syria. Even though it initially operated in several countries, the present-day PLA is only active in Syria and recruits male Palestinian refugees.
Jamil al-Assad was a younger brother of the late Syrian president Hafez al-Assad, and the uncle of former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. He served in the Parliament of Syria, called the majlis ash-sha'b from 1971 until his death. He was also commander of a minor militia.
The military occupation of Lebanon by Syria lasted from 1976, beginning with the Syrian intervention in the Lebanese Civil War, until April 30, 2005. This period saw significant Syrian military and political influence over Lebanon, impacting its governance, economy, and society. The occupation ended following intense international pressure and the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafic Hariri. The legacy of the occupation continues to influence Lebanese-Syrian relations and Lebanon's internal political dynamics.
Syria, officially the Syrian Arab Republic, is a country in West Asia located in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Levant. It is bounded by the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east and southeast, Jordan to the south, and Israel and Lebanon to the southwest. It is under a transitional government and comprises 14 governorates. Damascus is the capital and largest city. With a population of 25 million across an area of 185,180 square kilometres (71,500 sq mi), it is the 57th-most populous and 87th-largest country.
The Assad family ruled Syria from 1971, when Hafez al-Assad became president under the Ba'ath Party following the 1970 coup, until Bashar al-Assad was ousted on December 8, 2024. Bashar succeeded his father, Hafez al-Assad, after Hafez's death in 2000.
The Syrian opposition, also known as the Syrian revolutionaries, is an umbrella term for the rebel groups that opposed the Assad regime in Syria. In July 2011, at the beginning of the Syrian civil war, defectors from the Syrian Armed Forces formed the Free Syrian Army. In August 2011, political groups operating from abroad formed a coalition called the Syrian National Council. A broader organization, the Syrian National Coalition (SNC), was formed in November 2012. In turn, the Coalition formed the Syrian Interim Government (SIG) which operated first as a government-in-exile and, from 2015, in certain zones of Syria. From 2016, the SIG was present in Turkish-occupied zones while the SNC operated from Istanbul. In 2017, the Islamist group Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), unaffiliated to the SNC, formed the Syrian Salvation Government (SSG) in the areas it controlled. Rebel armed forces during the civil war have included the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army, affiliated to the SIG, the Syrian Liberation Front, the National Front for Liberation, the Southern Operations Room and the Revolutionary Commando Army. Other groups that challenged Bashar al-Assad's rule during the civil war were the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria, and the jihadist organization known as the Islamic State.
The Syrian Civil War is an intensely sectarian war. However, the initial phases of the uprising in 2011 featured a broad, cross-sectarian opposition to the rule of Bashar al-Assad, reflecting a collective desire for political reform and social justice, transcending ethnic and religious divisions. Over time, the civil war has largely transformed into a conflict between ruling minority Alawite government and allied Shi'a governments such as Iran; pitted against the country's Sunni Muslim majority who are aligned with the Syrian opposition and its Turkish and Persian Gulf state backers. Sunni Muslims made up the majority of the former Syrian Arab Army (SAA) and many held high administrative positions, while Alawites and members of almost every minority were also been active on the rebel side.
Al Mayadeen is a Lebanese pan-Arabist satellite news television channel based in the city of Beirut. Launched on 11 June 2012, it has news reporters in most of the Arab countries. In the pan-Arabist television news market, it competes against Qatar-owned Al Jazeera and Saudi-owned Al Arabiya, and also against Sky News Arabia and BBC News Arabic. At the time it was founded, most of the channel's senior staff were former correspondents and editors of Al Jazeera.
Mansur al-Atrash was a Syrian politician and journalist. Together with fellow university students, Atrash became a founding member of the Ba'ath Party and its Syrian regional branch in 1947. During the presidency of Adib Shishakli (1951–54), he became an anti-government activist and was imprisoned twice, only to be released in an unsuccessful attempt by Shishakli to gain the support of Atrash's father, Sultan. In the year Shishakli was overthrown, Atrash was elected to parliament and turned down an offer to serve in Said al-Ghazzi's government. During the period of the United Arab Republic (1958–61), Atrash became a strong supporter of Egyptian president and pan-Arab leader Gamal Abdel Nasser. He opposed Syria's secession from the UAR and turned down offers to serve in successive separatist governments in protest.
Arab nationalism is a political ideology asserting that Arabs constitute a single nation. As a traditional nationalist ideology, it promotes Arab culture and civilization, celebrates Arab history, the Arabic language and Arabic literature. It often also calls for unification of Arab society. It bases itself on the premise that the people of the Arab world—from the Atlantic Ocean to the Arabian Sea—constitute one nation bound together by a common identity: ethnicity, language, culture, history, geography, and politics.
Sa'id al-'As was a Syrian nationalist, a former officer in the Ottoman army and a high-ranking commander of rebel forces during the Great Syrian Revolt against French rule in Syria and the 1936 revolt against British rule in Palestine. He was killed in action near Jerusalem during the latter uprising.
The history of Syria covers events which occurred on the territory of the Syrian Arab Republic and events which occurred in the region of Syria. Throughout ancient times the territory of the Syrian Arab Republic was occupied and ruled by several empires, including the Sumerians, Mitanni, Assyrians, Babylonians, Egyptians, Hittites, Canaanites, Phoenicians, Arameans, Amorites, Persians, Greeks and Romans. Syria is considered to have emerged as an independent country for the first time on 24 October 1945, upon the signing of the United Nations Charter by the Syrian government, effectively ending France's mandate by the League of Nations to "render administrative advice and assistance to the population" of Syria, which came in effect in April 1946.
Zahran Alloush was a Syrian Islamist rebel leader who was the commander of Jaysh al-Islam, a major component of the Islamic Front, of which he was the military chief, and was described as one of the most powerful leaders in rebel-held Syria. He was killed in a joint Russian and Syrian airstrike on 25 December 2015 and was succeeded by Essam al-Buwaydhani as head of Jaysh al-Islam.
Law enforcement in Syria, under Ba'athist Syria, was carried out by the Public Security Police, which is a force for general policing duties; internal security duties are carried out by different intelligence agencies. The Political Security Directorate is one of these agencies and is under the guidance of the Ministry of Interior of the Syrian government. The Directorate is used for covert intelligence gathering and internal security issues within Syria. Syria has been an INTERPOL member since 1953. Since the outbreak of the Syrian Civil War, much of Syria has been outside the control of the Syrian government. Currently, the Asayish are responsible for policing in the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria, the Turkish-backed Free Syrian Police in areas under the Turkish occupation of northern Syria, and various Syrian opposition groups around Idlib
References
- ↑ Hirsch, Michael (September 29, 2015). "Obama's New Best Friend in Syria: Vladimir Putin". Politico . Retrieved October 14, 2015.
- ↑ Dilanian, Ken (October 10, 2015). "CIA-backed rebels in Syria face Russian bombardment". PBS Newshour. Associated Press . Retrieved October 14, 2015.
- ↑ Timm, Trevor (October 13, 2015). "Presidential candidates must answer uncomfortable questions about Syria". The Guardian . Retrieved October 14, 2015.
- ↑ "Support For Syrian Regime Critical In Fight Against ISIS, Putin Says At U.N." All Things Considered . NPR. September 28, 2015. Retrieved October 14, 2015.
- ↑ "Should the United States Work With Russia in Syria?". Foreign Affairs . Retrieved October 14, 2015.
- ↑ Hussein, Sara, Lapenkova, Marina (September 16, 2015). "Russia moves into Syria to boost Assad, send signal to West". Yahoo! News. Agence France-Presse . Retrieved October 14, 2015.
{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) - ↑ Bulos, Nabih (October 12, 2015). "A 'kaleidoscopic' mix of rebel alliances on Syria's battlefield". Los Angeles Times . Retrieved October 14, 2015.
- ↑ "Professor's blog keeps OU in the news, world informed on Mideast nation". OUDaily.com. 2008-11-06. Retrieved October 13, 2015.
- ↑ "Global Dispatches Podcast: Episode 141: Joshua Landis (Interview with Joshua Landis, from 26:00)". Global Dispatches Podcast. 17 February 2019. Retrieved 22 January 2019.
- ↑ "Crisis in Syria". Charlie Rose Show . February 6, 2012. Archived from the original on September 3, 2014. Retrieved October 14, 2015.
- ↑ See here via his homepage Archived 2012-03-14 at the Wayback Machine , retrieved 1 September 2014.
- ↑ "The Middle East in the Time of the Great Sorting-Out". Fondazione Internazionale Oasis. 2018-10-24. Retrieved 2024-12-27.
- ↑ "Our Man in the Middle East". 2017-06-27. Archived from the original on 2024-05-30. Retrieved 2024-12-27.
