Subscriber Essay: Hafez al-Assad and the 1963 Syrian Coup

The story of the Assad family starts, literally, with Ali Sulayman al-Assad (d. 1963, just a coincidence), who was really Ali Sulayman al-Wahhish but who was called assad ("the lion") for his work as a leader, military and political, of Mandatory Syria's Alawite population. Interestingly, the name wahhish ("wild beast" or even "monster") was also bestow…