Syrian Court Sentences Ex-President Bashar Assad to Death

A Syrian court sentenced ousted ‌leader Bashar al-Assad to death on Tuesday, convicting ‌him of crimes committed during the country’s nearly 14-year war, including arbitrary arrests, killings, and torture.The trial took place in absentia because Assad, who was ​ousted in a rebel offensive in December 2024, fled the capital Damascus to Russia, where he received political asylum.Assad, who is currently ‌in Moscow, faced multiple charges in the trial in Syria, where he was accused of crimes against humanity and war crimes during the country’s nearly 14-year civil war that left about half a million people dead.The Criminal Court in Damascus on Aug. 11 handed down ‌a death sentence to Assad for the crimes of “premeditated and intentional murder of more than ​one person and of children, torture, arbitrary arrest and crimes ​against humanity.”Also sentenced to death in the same case was Assad’s cousin Atef Najib, who was convicted of overseeing a crackdown in the Syrian province of Daraa that sparked an uprising that later led to civil war.From Uprising to Civil WarAssad, born in 1965, became president in 2000 following the death of his father, Hafez al-Assad, who had ruled Syria for three decades.The younger Assad maintained his family’s grip on power and the dominant role of Syria’s Alawite minority within the government and security establishment in the Sunni Muslim-majority country.Under his leadership, Syria remained closely aligned with Iran and hostile toward Israel and the United States.Although Assad’s early years in office were shaped by the Iraq war and turmoil in neighboring Lebanon, his presidency ultimately came to be defined by Syria’s civil war.The conflict began after anti-government protests erupted in 2011 as part of the wider Arab Spring. Syrian demonstrators initially called for political reforms and greater freedoms, but the government responded with force.The unrest escalated into an armed rebellion and then a sprawling civil war involving the Assad government, opposition factions, Islamist groups, Kurdish forces, the ISIS terrorist group, and foreign powers.Assad’s government survived for more than a decade with significant military and political backing from Russia and Iran before collapsing in late 2024.His rule ended when an offensive led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) and allied rebel groups swept through major Syrian cities and ultimately captured Damascus.Ahmed al-Sharaa, the former head of al-Qaeda’s affiliate in Syria and later leader of HTS, emerged as Syria’s new president following Assad’s overthrow.The transition has since brought Syria out of much of the diplomatic isolation that characterized the later Assad years.Hayat Tahrir Al-ShamHTS began as Al-Nusra Front, an affiliate of al-Qaeda, the Islamist terrorist group founded by Osama bin Laden. The group was designated a foreign terrorist organization by the U.S. State Department in 2018 but was removed from the list in 2025.In December 2024, the United States dropped a $10 million counter-terror bounty against Sharaa, who was previously known as Abu Muhammad al-Golani and Muhammad al-Julani. The decision coincided with a U.S. diplomatic visit to Syria on Dec. 20, 2024.A now-deleted bounty notice against Sharaa notes his role in founding Al-Nusra Front and leading the group through its reorganization into HTS. The bounty notice further stated that the group had taken part in kidnappings and killings in Syria over the years, including the 2015 slayings of 20 Druze villagers in Idlib Governorate.President Donald Trump and Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa (L) in the Oval Office on Nov. 10, 2025. @realDonaldTrump via Truth SocialU.S. President Donald Trump hosted Sharaa at the White House in November 2025, marking the first visit by a Syrian head of state to the White House since Syria gained independence from France in 1946.The meeting followed an earlier encounter between Trump and Sharaa in Saudi Arabia, during which Trump urged the Syrian leader to normalize relations with Israel and announced plans to lift U.S. sanctions on Syria.Trump subsequently rescinded U.S. sanctions on Syria while keeping measures targeting Assad and other former regime officials.Tuesday’s ruling marks one of the most consequential attempts by Syria’s new authorities to hold the former regime’s leadership criminally responsible for actions committed during the civil war.