Suhail Hassan and the Air Force Intelligence's Year of Massacres
Biography of a Special Operations Department soldier
On March 18, 2011, Syrian regime soldiers and mukhabarat charged at peaceful protesters in the city of Dara’a, killing at least three civilians and arresting others. Security forces continued their crackdown over the next six days, leaving at least 36 civilians dead and an unknown number forcibly disappeared, according to Human Rights Watch. The initial moments of the regime attack were caught in video, published by activists at the time, which clearly showed armed men advancing along two main axes in order to trap protestors at the front of the procession.
Playing a central role in this week-long operation was Colonel Suhail Hassan, commander of the Air Force Intelligence’s Special Operations Department. Dara’a was just the first of many deployments for his unit. Over the next 18 months, the Special Operations Department would travel across western Syria, killing and detaining protestors and armed opposition fighters in the cities and countrysides of Homs and Hama. These early deployments and the massacres the unit is linked to can be traced via two posthumous biographies of Yusuf Abdul Latif Hammad, one of the soldiers fighting under Hassan.
A short biography was published by a community page from Hammad’s hometown nearly two years after his death, providing a brief overview of the man’s first and last actions in the war. It clearly links Hammad to Colonel Suhail Hassan’s command and places his unit at the March 18, 2011 Dara’a massacre as well as the September 2012 demolition of the Masha’ al-Arbaeen neighborhood in Hama.
“In honor of the martyrs and to commemorate their names and sacrifices, the primary school in the village of Sighata was named after the martyred hero paratrooper Yousef Abdul Latif Hammad, to become the martyr Yousef Abdul Latif Hammad School for Basic Education. Here we recall a brief biography of the martyred hero Yousef Abdul Latif Hammad. He was born in the village of Sighata - Masyaf - Hama on 2/1/1988. He was one of the heroes of the special mission group that came from Damascus under the leadership of the Tiger [Suhail Hassan]. He began military action against the Takfiri groups in Daraa on 18/3/2011. He was wounded four times, but that did not deter him from continuing his national duty in fighting the Takfiri groups. On 6/9/2012, one of the terrorist hideouts in the Masha’ al-Arbaeen area in the city of Hama was attacked. An armed group, or a number of them, were present at the door during the storming and siege of the area by soldiers, who made them believe that they would surrender themselves. When one of the army's heroes approached the house, the terrorists betrayed him, and it became clear to the soldiers that it was an ambush intended to trap the group. The falcon set off alone towards the house where his comrade was injured, trying to save him. He clashed with the terrorists and killed them. However, a treacherous sniper was watching the den from afar. He fired his treacherous bullet, which was the reason for his ascension. The martyred paratrooper Youssef Abdul Latif Hammad, a hero who is still immortal, a school of heroism and manhood.”
A more detailed biography was published by a pro-regime news page on the one year anniversary of his death. This post provides some specific dates and locations where Hammad was injured, as well as a list of major operations he took part in - again, all under the command of Colonel Suhail Hassan and the Air Force Intelligence:
“The story of the martyr paratrooper Youssef Abdul Latif Hammad, who was described by his comrades as the Falcon of Air Intelligence. The martyr was born 1/2/1988 in the village of Sighata - Masyaf - Hama. He was part of the special missions group that came from Damascus under the leadership of Colonel ******”
Hammad was first injured in Khanazir, Hama, on September 14, 2011 and again on March 20, 2012 in the Maghara hamlet just south of Halfaya. His unit later moved to Hama city where he was injured in Al-Hamidiyah neighborhood on June 3, 2012 before receiving his fourth injury in Tremseh sometime after that. In addition to these deployments, the biography claims Hammad and his unit fought in Rastan, Homs after their Dara’a deployment, then moved to Baba Amr before spending the rest of his time in the Hama countryside, including fighting in Khan Sheikhoun.
It is possible to piece together a partial deployment history of Hammad and his unit, clearly placing Suhail Hassan’s Air Force Intelligence unit at four documented massacres during the first year and a half of the war.
March 18, 2011: the unit arrived in Dara’a city, participating in the documented killing of 36 protestors over the following six days.
May 29, 2011: The unit then deployed to Rastan, Homs, likely participating in the May 29 to June 3, 2011 regime operation (the second regime operation in Rastan, the siege of Rastan, began in late September at which point Hammad was fighting in northern Hama). According to Human Rights Watch, regime forces killed 75 people in Rastan and shelled mosques, cemeteries, bakeries, and homes over the course of five days. This was part of a broader regime deployment across the Homs governorate which saw hundreds of civilians killed and thousands detained over the spring and summer months.
July 2011: After one month in Rastan, Hammad deployed to Bab Amr, placing his unit in the neighborhood in early July 2011. Human Rights Watch documented five protestors killed by security forces in Wa`er, Khalidiyya, and Bab Amr neighborhoods on July 15 alone. However, it is more likely that Hammad’s unit was involved in raids and detention against activists and armed opposition fighters at this time.
September 14, 2011: Hammad’s unit had left Homs for Hama, deploying to the village of Khanazir in the southwestern countryside by mid-September where Hammad received his first injury. He spent the next six months in recovery before rejoining his unit in March near Mahradeh, northern Hama. The northern Hama countryside and adjacent Jabal Zawiyah region of Idlib had become hotbeds of opposition protest and armed activity during the fall of 2011. According to documents released by the Center for International Justice and Accountability, on September 4, 2011, the regime’s Central Crisis Management Cell (CCMC) assigned the Minister of Defense and Minister of Interior with overseeing a new operation in northern Hama. Hammad’s unit had likely been tasked with supporting this Ministry of Defense-led campaign in northern Hama.
March 20, 2012: Hammad was again injured during an operation targeting “a foreign fighter hideout” in the hamlet of Maghara, just south of Halfaya in the northern Hama countryside.
May 2012: On May 15, 2012 regime forces in Khan Sheikhoun killed more than two dozen protestors in response to an IED attack near a security checkpoint inside the city. In response, local anti-government factions besieged the intelligence office (protected at the time with a BMP and T-72 tank). Hammad’s biography claims that his unit deployed to Khan Sheikhoun to help “lift the siege”.
June 3, 2012: Hammad is injured during clashes in the Al-Hamidiyah neighborhood of Hama City.
July 12, 2012: Hammad’s biography states that after the Hama city fighting, his unit deployed to the village of Tremseh, where he was wounded again. This likely places his unit at the July 12 massacre, in which government forces and local militia fighters besieged and stormed the village, killing, detaining, and looting throughout the day. An investigation by the U.N.’s Commission of Inquiry confirmed the deaths of at least 46 people, with 15 more missing and 100 detained by regime forces. Nearly 20 homes and four shops were looted and burnt down during the attack.
September 6, 2012: Hammad was killed during the regime’s operations in Masha’ al-Arbaeen neighborhood of Hama city. Security forces cordoned off the neighborhood, “shelling the area with artillery and mortars before entering.” According to Human Rights Watch, regime forces then levelled the neighborhood over the next two months, evicting the remaining residents and ensuring none could ever return.
All four of Syria’s intelligence branches played central roles in the regime’s counter-revolution in 2011 and 2012. However, the Air Force Intelligence (AFI) stands out as the most important in both disrupting opposition insurgent activity and in killing and detaining civilians and peaceful activists. Army defectors have, in the years since, recounted the AFI’s role in disrupting their plans for mass defections throughout late 2011 and 2012, highlighting the defectors’ inability to penetrate the extremely siloed and sectarian structure of the AFI, compared with the more permeable Military Intelligence and General Intelligence Directorates.
Beyond the AFI’s legitimate counter-insurgency actions, the directorate was also central in propping up armed loyalist militias and - as Hammad’s biography shows - deploying across the country to violently suppress peaceful protests. Human Rights Watch’s December 2011 report “By All Means Necessary” documents multiple massacres and mass arrests committed by the AFI in general, and by Suhail Hassan and the Special Operations Department in particular. This includes beating, detaining, and shooting protestors in Moadamiyeh in April 2011 and in Daraya in June.
Suhail Hassan would gradually turn his AFI unit into a powerful militia network, empowering local warlords across Hama’s Alawite belt as well as integrating veteran members of the Homs National Defense Forces Center - itself responsible for many crimes against civilians in Homs throughout 2011 and 2012. The “Tiger Forces”, as they soon became known, have since been accused of countless crimes against Syria’s civilians - from arbitrary detention, beatings, theft, and murder to the systematic use of chemical weapons. They evolved once more in August 2019, when the now Russian-backed formation became the 25th Division and entered a prolonged period of restructuring and expanding. Suhail Hassan remained in command of this unit, receiving a promotion to major general, until April 2024 when he was dismissed and assigned to command the regime’s battered Special Forces. Yet no matter their different names or appearance over the years, the units under Suhail Hassan’s command have continued the legacy of criminality that began long before Yusuf Hammad’s death.