By late 2024, with Bashar al-Assad’s regime fallen and Trump back in power, Syria had not been a US priority, with internal debate over how to engage the new al‑Sharaa administration.

Syrians have lived under the shadow of US sanctions for 46 years, spanning generations who know no other reality. These sanctions have become woven into every aspect of daily life, from banking and ...

BEIRUT (AP) — It was one of the darkest moments in the modern history of the Arab world. More than four decades ago, Hafez Assad, then president of Syria, launched what came to be known as the ...

Assad’s ‘dirty’ empire Rifaat al-Assad arrived in Europe in 1984 after having failed to overthrow his brother, Syrian president Hafez al-Assad, in a coup. There he began amassing a property empire ...

The icy winds of Moscow offer little warmth for exiled Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad, whose sudden downfall on December 8 sent shockwaves through the Middle East. Once the unchallenged ruler of ...

Ragheed al-Tatari uses his cell phone to record the aftermath of Syrian air strikes on the outskirts of Aleppo. Natalia Sancha He walks among piles of rubble in Al Mashhad, one of the neighborhoods in ...

Oscar-nominated Syrian director Feras Fayyad on the fall of Bashar al-Assad, the dictator who ordered Fayyad's imprisonment and torture.

A defaced mural on a school in Damascus once glorified Hafez and Bashar al-Assad.

Sectarian dynamics The Assad family's rule began in 1971 with Hafez al-Assad and continued with his son, Bashar al-Assad, from 2000. Throughout their tenure, the family maintained power through a ...

Hafez al-Assad, Bashar’s father, was president at the time, and he had tens of thousands of people arrested and up to an estimated 40,000 people killed.