Bashar El Assad: Power or Death

Dec 8, 2024 | This is the story of a man with two faces. The timid Doctor Bashar, who has long seduced the West and promised to move his country towards more democracy. And the terrible Mister Assad, dictator, who fights his own people in a civil war with hundreds of thousands of victims.

The terrible Mister Assad, dictator who fights his own people Thanks to the testimonies of his relatives and former executives of the regime, the film tells the rise of a man who was not supposed to be president, and deciphers a system that resembles that of the Mafia. With its godfathers, its settling of scores, and its billions in dirty money. Bashar El-Assad received Syria as an inheritance from his father, Hafez El-Assad. He is the one who built this iron dictatorship that has held the country for nearly 50 years. The film also explores the passionate ties that unite France and Syria. Leading French political figures, former ministers and diplomats, take us behind the scenes of this tumultuous relationship. A relationship that the story of Bashar El-Assad perfectly symbolises. French presidents Jacques Chirac and then Nicolas Sarkozy initially considered him a valuable ally and rolled out the red carpet for him. Before bitterly regretting it.

Directed by Christophe Widemann

Compilation: Assad Giving Reporters a Hard Time

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Inside Story - Is the War in Syria Really Almost Over?

Bashar al Assad flew to Russia for a few hours to meet his major ally Vladimir Putin. The Kremlin said Russia’s President told him that the fight against armed groups is close to finishing. And once it's over, finding a peaceful political settlement will be key.

The opposition has long demanded a future Syria without Assad. But he’s survived nearly seven years of war and is likely to remain in charge for the foreseeable future. So, will Assad detractors come to terms with that?

Presenter: Laura Kyle | Guests: Marwan Kabalan - Director of Policy Analysis, Doha Institute; Pavel Felgenhaeur - Russian foreign policy specialist and newspaper columnist; Ammar Waqqaf - British Syrian Society

Asma al-Assad – The Beautiful Face of the Syrian Dictatorship | DW Documentary

Asma al-Assad, the First Lady of Syria and wife of president Bashar al-Assad, was initially a beacon of hope. Today, she is regarded as the dictator’s accomplice.

She grew up in London, went to elite schools and had a promising career. The former ambassador of the European Union to Syria, Frank Hesske, still gets a sparkle in his eyes when he talks about Asma al-Assad. She was ‘a darling’, and comparable to Princess Diana - and not just because of her British roots: ‘We diplomats,’ the former ambassador now reveals with surprising honesty, ‘let ourselves be seduced’. Many of the diplomats, politicians and journalists from the West who met the presidential couple during the 11 years after Assad took power and before the civil war broke out shared that fate: they let themselves be duped. Torture, arrests and threats were unleashed on all those who got in the way of the regime - just as under Assad’s father. There’s the famous opposition activist Riad Seif, whose daughter talks about the regime’s humiliations and the constant fear that her family could be taken by the secret police and her father killed. While the country remains as dark as ever, this film looks at Asma al-Assad’s international role as the face of the dictatorship, the woman from London who for a long time managed to make the Assads socially acceptable.

EXCLUSIVE - Turkey's President Erdogan Blasts Macron on Syria: "Bashar Must Go, He’s a Criminal"

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U.S. Attack on Syria Cements Kremlin’s Embrace of Assad

THE NEW YORK TIMES: MOSCOW — If Russia once maintained at least a semblance of distance from President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, it rushed to his defense after the American missile strike ordered by President Trump on Thursday. The attack cemented Moscow more closely than ever to the notorious Syrian autocrat.

Even as the United States condemned Mr. Assad for gassing his own citizens and held Russia partly responsible, given its 2013 promise to rid Syria of chemical weapons, the Kremlin kept denying that Syria had any such capability.

By championing Mr. Assad and condemning American “aggression,” President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia seemed to be burying the idea that he could somehow cooperate with the Trump administration to end the conflict on his terms. » | Neil MacFarquhar | Saturday, April 8, 2017

Democrat Lawmaker Who Met with Assad Blasts Trump

Rep. Tulsi Gabbard sparked criticism a few months ago for meeting with Syria leader Assad and now tells Tucker why she believes Trump's airstrikes on Syria were illegal, 'counterproductive' and 'reckless'