# Fame.am profile — machine-readable export
# Canonical URL: https://fame.am/person/hafez-al-assad
# Generated: 2026-09-01T11:58:34.233Z

schema: https://schema.org/Person
url: "https://fame.am/person/hafez-al-assad"
name: "Hafez al-Assad"
slug: "hafez-al-assad"
description: "Syrian president for three decades who ruled through coups, purges, and the machinery of a police state — remembered most for the Hama massacre and for engineering a family dynasty that held power until 2024."
tagline: "President of Syria from 1971 to 2000"
image: "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:FilePath/Hafez_al-Assad_official_portrait.jpg"
gender: "male"
category:
  name: "Politicians"
  slug: "politicians"
profileType:
  name: "Politician"
  slug: "politician"
birthDate: "1930-10-06"
deathDate: "2000-06-10"
livingStatus: "DECEASED"
scores:
  popularity:           69.33
  momentum:             9.951982609807558
  historical:           27.804588
  currentAttention:     5.500000000000001
  sourceConfidence:     65
  profileCompleteness:  65
  trendDirection:       "STABLE"
ranks:
  global:   null
  country:  null
  category: null
tags:
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    slug: "politicians"
  - name: "Politician"
    slug: "politician"
  - name: "Politics"
    slug: "politics"
  - name: "20th Century"
    slug: "20th-century"
platforms:
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    url:       "https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0015684/"
    handle:    "nm0015684"
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    type:  "DATABASE"
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    title: "حافظ الاسد"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    title: "Hafez al-Asad"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
  - url: "https://az.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hafiz_%C6%8Fs%C9%99d"
    title: "Hafiz Əsəd"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    title: "Хафез Асад"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
  - url: "https://br.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hafez_al-Assad"
    title: "Hafez al-Assad"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
  - url: "https://ca.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hafez_al-%C3%80ssad"
    title: "Hafez al-Àssad"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    title: "حافز ئەسەد"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    title: "Háfiz al-Asad"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    title: "Hafez al-Assad"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    title: "Hafiz al-Assad"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    title: "Hafez al-Asad"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    title: "Háfez al-Ásad"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
  - url: "https://et.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E1%B8%A8%C4%81fiz%CC%A7_al-Asad"
    title: "Ḩāfiz̧ al-Asad"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    title: "Hafez al-Assad"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    title: "حافظ اسد"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    title: "Hafiz al-Assad"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
  - url: "https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hafez_el-Assad"
    title: "Hafez el-Assad"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    title: "Wikiquote"
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    title: "Wikiquote"
    type:  "WEBSITE"
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    title: "Wikiquote"
    type:  "WEBSITE"
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    title: "Wikiquote"
    type:  "WEBSITE"
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    title: "Wikiquote"
    type:  "WEBSITE"
  - url: "https://cy.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hafez_al-Assad"
    title: "Hafez al-Assad"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"

# bio (long form, separated for readability)
bio: |
  Hafez al-Assad rose through the Syrian Air Force and helped bring the Ba'ath Party to power in a 1963 coup. He participated in a second coup in 1966, becoming defense minister, then staged a third in 1970 to seize the presidency for himself. He pivoted Syria's foreign policy toward the Soviet Union while painting himself as defender of Palestinians, fought Israel in the October War of 1973, and intervened in Lebanon starting in 1976. To maintain absolute control he built a cult of personality and crushed an Islamist uprising in a series of crackdowns that culminated in the Hama massacre, which destroyed two thirds of that city. After his brother Rifaat's failed power grab and his eldest son Bassel's death in a 1994 car crash, Assad groomed his younger son Bashar — then a medical student with no political experience — to inherit the presidency. He died on June 10, 2000, and Bashar ruled until his overthrow in December 2024.