DAMASCUS: Rifaat Assad, uncle of deposed Syrian ruler Bashar Assad and dubbed the “Butcher of Hama” for suppressing an uprising in the 1980s, has died aged 88, two sources close to the family said Wednesday.
Once a pillar of the Assad family’s dynastic rule, Rifaat “died after suffering from influenza for around a week,” one source who worked in Syria’s presidential palace for over three decades told AFP.
A second source, an ex-officer of Syria’s army in the Assad era, confirmed the death, saying Rifaat had moved to the United Arab Emirates after his nephew’s government was toppled by rebels in December 2024, without specifying if he died there.
Rifaat’s role in a February 1982 massacre as part of a crackdown on an armed revolt by Islamist group the Muslim Brotherhood earned him the nickname “the Butcher of Hama,” referring to the central Syrian city.
His brother Hafez Assad, who ruled Syria at the time, launched the campaign, which government forces carried out under the command of Rifaat, who was the head of the elite “Defense Brigades.”
The death toll from 27 days of violence, which took place under a media blackout, has never been formally established, though estimates range from 10,000 to 40,000.
Swiss prosecutors had accused Rifaat of a long list of crimes, including ordering “murders, acts of torture, inhumane treatment and illegal detentions” while an officer in the Syrian army.
He also served as vice president under his brother Hafez but went into exile in 1984 after a failed attempt to overthrow him, moving to Switzerland then France.
He later presented himself as an opponent of his nephew Bashar, who succeeded Hafez in 2000.
In 2021, he returned to Syria from France to escape a four-year prison sentence for money laundering and misappropriation of Syrian public funds.
Two years later, he appeared in a family photo alongside Bashar, the ruler’s wife Asma and other relatives.
Shortly after Bashar’s ouster, Rifaat crossed into Lebanon and then flew out of Beirut airport, a Lebanese security source said at the time, without specifying his final destination.