Hafez al-Assad government
In 1971 al-Assad’s Baath Party obtained 87 seats in the so-called People’s Council and in March of that year al-Assad was confirmed as president, through a national referendum. Two years later a new constitution comes into force in which Syria is officially declared as a secular socialist state, recognizing Islam as the majority religion.
In April 1973, according to Topschoolsintheusa, the governments of Syria and Egypt, by mutual agreement, decide to attack Israel, having as the main reason that the latter had not complied with resolution 242 in which the State of Israel was ordered to return to the previous borders of Israel. the Six Day War. [8] The day of Yom Kippur, a Jewish holiday celebrated on October 6, was chosen as the start of the offensive. [3]
By the end of the first day of fighting, Syrian troops had reached one of their key targets, Mount Hermon, while most of the Israeli armor was withdrawing.
On October 8, Israeli armored units launched a counteroffensive to stop the advance on the Galilee on the northern front and finally penetrated into Syrian territory, beyond the 1967 borders, maintaining control of the Golan Heights.
At the beginning of 1976 Syria, at the request of the Lebanese government, sent its armed forces to that country, in the first instance to defend the Maronite Christians. The Syrian army remained in the country for the next 15 years trying to expel the Israeli troops occupying the south of that country. It is not until the 26 of April of 2005 that most of Syrian forces withdraw from Lebanon. [3]
In 1982, members of the Sunni religion took up arms against the government of Hafez al-Assad in the city of Hama. The Sunnis, who represented 68% of the population, had not infrequently resorted to terrorist actions in order to destabilize the government. The rebellion was carried out by Islamic groups, including the Muslim Brotherhood, and the city was the scene of violent clashes.
The rebellion was violently suppressed with huge civilian casualties. [3]
During the War of the Gulf in 1990, Syria supported the government of the United States in its campaign against Saddam Hussein.
Bashar al-Assad government
Upon the death of President Hafez al-Assad in June 2000, the Syrian Parliament amended the Constitution by lowering the mandatory minimum age to be president from 40 to 34 years. Bashar al-Assad, son of the late president, was promoted to General of the General Staff and Supreme Chief of the Armed Forces. As his brother Basil al-Assad, future heir to the country’s presidency, had died in a car accident, Bashar al-Assad was named the sole candidate by the Arab Socialist Baath Party for the Presidency of the Republic and elected by referendum on July 10. 2000 for a period of seven years.
Shortly after the new Syrian president took position, Israeli aviation attacked a Syrian radar post in Lebanon in April 2001 with the result of three dead soldiers, as a continuation of the Israeli government’s intention to fully occupy Lebanon.
In the months immediately following 9/11, Syrian intelligence provided the United States with valuable information about an Al Qaeda plan to attack a Fifth Fleet vessel anchored in Bahrain. Despite this cooperation, in 2002 Undersecretary of State John Bolton included Syria in a list in which Cuba was unfairly part, both as countries likely to accompany Libya, Iran, Iraq and North Korea in what the American government called the ” Axis of Evil ”. This list of alleged sponsors of terrorism, whose name was created by George W. Bush, was intended to create a favorable environment before the international community, for the subsequent invasion of some of these countries.
In the case of Syria, according to the governments of the United States and Israel, this country manufactured chemical weapons and supported terrorist groups. [9]
After the invasion of Iraq by the United States in 2003, the government last this continued to accuse Syria and threatening “retaliation” for they say, continue to support terrorist organizations like Hezbollah and allow the entry into Iraq of fighters willing to fight the foreign invaders.
Syria is a terrorist state, it harbors terrorists and therefore is on the State Department’s list of terrorist nations “. [10]
Syria denied the allegations and Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Buthaina Shaaban said:
“We tell him (Bush) that Syria does not have chemical weapons and that the only chemical, biological and nuclear weapons in the region are from Israel, which is threatening its neighbors and occupying their territories. [10]
In response, Israel bombed the 5 of October of 2003 a refugee camp in Ein Saheb is, about 24 km to the northwest of Damascus, claiming that the place was a base of Islamic Jihad.
The Syrian government then requested an urgent meeting of the UN Security Council to approve a resolution condemning what had been a “violation of international law” and a “flagrant military aggression.” The resolution was not approved, as the The United States, a traditional ally of Israel and one of the permanent members with veto power, rejected it on the grounds that its ally had every “right to defend itself.”
Since the outbreak of the second Intifada in September of 2000 the Israeli government publicly declared the implementation of a policy of targeted assassinations of Palestinian leaders. In September 2004, as a new provocation, Izz el Din Sheikh Khalil, one of the founding leaders of Hamas, was killed in a bomb attack in the Al Zahaar neighborhood on the outskirts of Damascus. [11] After the attack, the Zionist government confirmed to the local press that the operation had been organized by Israel.
By 2001 the Syrian government had withdrawn some 6,000 soldiers from Lebanon, handing over control to the Lebanese army. On February 14, 2005, former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri was assassinated in Beirut in a dynamite attack that killed another 22 people. The governments of the United States and France immediately accused Syria as responsible for the massacre and in Lebanon an anti-Syrian protest was unleashed demanding the departure of the rest of the troops that Syria was maintaining at the request of the government in Lebanese territory.
The US government pushed for sanctions in the UN Security Council, even talking about a possible attack on Lebanon against Syrian troops. On February 24, the Syrian government announced the staggered withdrawal of some 14,000 troops and on April 26, 2005, Syrian troops completely left Lebanese territory.
The 26 of February of 2012 89.4 percent of Syrians approved the new Constitution, the cornerstone to legitimize the comprehensive reforms promoted by the government of President Bashar al-Assad to.
