Assad or We Burn the Country: How One Family's Lust for Power Destroyed Syria

by Sam Dagher

From a Pulitzer Prize-nominated journalist specializing in the Middle East, this groundbreaking account of the Syrian Civil War reveals the never-before-published true story of a 21st-century humanitarian disaster. In spring 2011, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad turned to his friend and army commander, Manaf Tlass, for advice about how to respond to Arab Spring-inspired protests. Tlass pushed for conciliation but Assad decided to crush the uprising -- an act which would catapult the country into an eight-year long war, killing almost half a million and fueling terrorism and a global refugee crisis. Assad or We Burn the Country examines Syria's tragedy through the generational saga of the Assad and Tlass families, once deeply intertwined and now estranged in Bashar's bloody quest to preserve his father's inheritance. By drawing on his own reporting experience in Damascus and exclusive interviews with Tlass, Dagher takes readers within palace walls to reveal the family behind the destruction of a country and the chaos of an entire region. Dagher shows how one of the world's most vicious police states came to be and explains how a regional conflict extended globally, engulfing the Middle East and pitting the United States and Russia against one another. Timely, propulsive, and expertly reported, Assad or We Burn the Country is the definitive account of this global crisis, going far beyond the news story that has dominated headlines for years.

Genres: History, Middle East, Nonfiction, Politics, War, Biography, Islam

485 pages, Kindle Edition

First published May 28, 2019

Reviews

[Mikey B. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Page 90 Bashar Assad

“There’s no other way to govern our society except with the shoe over the people’s head.”


This is an outstanding account of Syria, the Assad family, and its interactions with Middle Eastern countries and world powers starting in the 1960’s.

I knew little of Syria and the author enlightened me on its history and particularly the nefarious Assad family. Bashar’s father, Hafez took power in Syria in 1971. He was a ruthless dictator with a secret police (Mukhabarat). He was of the Alawite sect, this being distinct from the majority Sunni’s in Syria.

Hafez formed an alliance with Iran, and Syria serves as a conduit for weapons to Hezbollah in Lebanon. Most of the weapons for the Syrian army (tanks, airplanes…) were supplied by the Soviet Union, and now Russia. So this makes for a complicated set of alliances in a very dangerous part of the world.

Hafez managed to keep open sectarian strife hidden by keeping the population in fear with his army and Mukhabarat. The massacre at Hama in 1982 being a prime example of this.

The Arab Spring in 2010 was a challenge to Bashar Assad. Up to that stage there were some who thought that Bashar would ease up on the harsh dictatorship that he had inherited from his father. Even more so than his father he was very good at playing several sides of the coin – by looking good to the Western democracies with his attractive secular wife, playing a good balancing act between Iran and Saudi Arabia, but still using the Mukhabarat to violently suppress any dissension.

This hypocrisy and double game ended with the coming of the Arab Spring when Western countries (France and the United States in particular) insisted that Bashar step down from power and call for elections. With the collapse of Ben Ali in Tunisia, Gaddafi in Libya, and Mubarak in Egypt many saw the inevitable with Assad.

But little did they know him. He let out his Islamist prisoners and funneled them to Iraq where they were instrumental in forming ISIS. It should be emphasized that Assad killed far more people than ISIS. He brought in Russian military help to destroy his democratic and moderate opposition by ruthlessly bombing urban areas with barrel bombs and chemical weapons.

Page 427

By February 2016, the death toll since March 2011 approached half a million, the majority of them civilians killed by the Syrian regime, not the Islamic State, the Nousra Front, or any other group. The number of those seeking refuge abroad approached five million. By mid-2016 almost one million people were under siege, mainly by Bashar’s and Iran’s militias… after being bombed by Bashar and the Russians.


Page 325

The city of Aleppo would settle into four years of grinding, almost primordial warfare.


He let the West take out ISIS while pretending that he was preventing radical Islam from taking over Syria. Putin was only too happy to put himself in the role of strong-man saving the world from ISIS and regaining, after the demise of the Soviet Union, power status for Russia in the Middle East.

The Assad family is now one of the world’s long-lasting dictatorships. But Bashar has fragmented his country by doing ethnic cleansing. The Alawites are now the predominant group. He has also created a world-wide diaspora of Syrians who detest him and would be happy to see him go the way of Gaddafi. Assad’s alliances with Putin and Iran do not bode well for any future reconciliation with the West.

One of the few countries that has come out of this with any sort of moral standard is Germany who accepted refugees and did not make any false promises like the United States and France – or worse still, Russia by dropping bombs in urban civilian areas. China and Russia repeatedly blocked any U.N. Security Council resolutions of aid to Syria.

This is very well written book giving much insight on the sorry plight of Syria.

Page 149 (cable from the U.S. embassy in Syria in 2009)

“Whatever principles Bashar evokes in his rhetoric, his ultimate goal is to preserve his regime, which for him requires all existing options without forgoing new options. The only consistency in Syria’s foreign policy is the desire to play all sides off each other.”

[hiba ☕︎ · Rating 5 out of 5]

I almost regret reading this book. Almost. A privileged part of me hated myself for stepping out of the bliss of ignorance, for gaining this newfound knowledge about my brothers and sisters, for I see them everywhere now. In the food that I eat, I see the Syrian babies that starved to death. In the small scab on my arm, I see the bloodied bodies of Syrian protestors ripped to shreds. In the water I drink, I see Syrian prisoners forced to drink their urine. In the clothes that I wear, I see my Syrian sisters being stripped naked and raped until their death. In my leisurely walks to lectures, I see Syrian refugees dying on months-long journeys to escape the Assad regime. When I lie on my bed, I see Mazen Darwish, who woke up on a pile of dead bodies. When I hug my cat, I see Syrians forced to eat cats out of starvation. The reality is that it is an obligation upon me, upon us as Muslims, to know what is happening to our Ummah, to feel their pain, to try to ingrain my brothers and sisters—my displaced, tortured, oppressed brothers and sisters—into my everyday life.

I don't know what to say, really. Everybody has that one book that changed the course of their life, and I hope I don't sound dramatic, but this was "that book" for me. I think of these huge political powers, these presidents and rulers that hold so much power within their filthy, cursed, tyrannical hands. I think of how one decision, one word, one go-ahead, has trickled down the ladder of power, has had this huge ripple effect on the Ummah worldwide, from being called a terrorist in class to being brutally murdered and tortured in Syria for being Sunni. SubhanAllah. I have no words.

I can only say that this book has reignited my hatred for the oppressors. I am happy that Bashar Al Assad exists in my nightmares, for my adiyat against him and all these power-hungry tyrants has never been stronger. And my love for Rasulullah ﷺ, my beloved, beloved Nabi, has bloomed and expanded within me, for I appreciate the leader he was. This humble man, this man who was just and perfect, who held mercy in the palm of his blessed hands, who would never, ever, ever oppress the believers. My Nabi, Rasulullah, never will there be a more merciful, just, strong leader like him to ever step foot on this earth.

May Allah's mercy completely and wholly and beautifully encompass my brothers and sisters in Syria, and all who have been displaced and forcibly torn away from their homeland. Their plight, their oppression, is one that had me holding back waves of nausea, that had me ashamed of this privileged life I take for granted. I don't know what to say, anymore. I just want Allah to rain His punishment upon the oppressors that sit back and allow the killing of innocent muslims. I just want Allah's perfect justice to fall upon this earth and bask our eyes in satisfaction of seeing the oppressors suffer infinitely. It will come. Allah promised it. And Allah is with the believers.

[Zahra · Rating 4 out of 5]

«ای بشار! از خدا برایت روزی را آرزو می‌کنیم که در آن مـرگ را تمنا کنی اما آن را پیدا نکنی!»

«اسد یا کشور را می سوزانیم» به بدنام ترین شعار مرتبط با رژیم اسد و حامیانش در سوریه تبدیل شده. این شعار توی سرودهای سربازان و شبه‌نظامیان اسد خونده میشد، روی دیوارهای شهرهای محاصره شده و سقوط کرده نوشته میشد و توسط ربات‌ها و مزدوران آنلاین رژیم تو شبکه های اجتماعی پخش میشد. عنوان فرعی کتاب، محتوای اصلی کتاب رو هم نشون می ده: چگونه شهوت یک خانواده برای قدرت، سوریه را ویران کرد. این کتاب ما رو به داخل تاریخ خانواده و کشوری که ویرانش کردن می بره. تاریخی عمیقاً تلخ که برای سوری ها و غیر سوری ها پیام های مهمی داره و درس های مهمی رو برای ظالمان و کسانی که در برابر اونها مقاومت می کنند ارائه میده.
رژیم اسد شاید بیشتر از خیلی رژیم های دیکتاتوری دیگه یاد گرفته بود که چطور واقعیت های جدیدی رو خلق کنه: روی زمین از طریق کشتار و نابودی و در فضای مجازی از طریق پروپاگاندا و انحراف افکار عمومی.

«هیچ چیز درست نیست و همه چیز ممکن است.»

داستان سوریه حکایت ویرانی و حشت و مقاومته. این کتاب به خوبی نشون میده که ریشه مشکلات و اختلافات و ویرانی های ناشی از سرکوب وحشیانه و تضادهای قومی و دینی رو نمیشه فقط داخل مرزهای یک ملت جست و جو کرد. نابودی سوریه و پیروزی اسد بدون حمایت حامیان اصلی بشار و بدون دخالت دشمنان منطقه‌ای و فرامنطقه‌ایش و اولویت های هر گروه ممکن نبود.
نویسنده تمام تلاش خودش رو میکنه تا نشون بده که چطوری انقلابی که در سوریه ابتدا صلح آمیز بود، به‌تدریج با عوامل افراطی همراه شد و داعش و سلفی گری تبدیل به بهترین دشمن برای اسد شدن چون ناخواسته به اسد کمک کردن تا یه چهره قهرمان گونه از خودش ارائه بده که درحال مبارزه با تروریسمه و با همین ترفند، اقلیت های قومی و مذهبی سوریه رو هم با خودش همراه کرد.
نکته ای که بهش خیلی خوب پرداخته شده نقش پروپاگاندا و تبلیغات در جنگه. اسد با ظاهر سکولار خودش و زنش تونست جهان غرب رو مجذوب خودش کنه. در انتخابات سوریه، اسد تنها نامزدی بود که اجازه شرکت داشت و نتایج رو به عنوان شاهدی بر محبوبیت خودش نشون میداد و تا حدودی مدرن و طرفدار اصلاحات تلقی می شد. دقیقاً شبیه کاری که داعش در استفاده از تبلیغات، تولید مجلات و استخدام غربی‌ها برای افزایش جذابیت خودش انجام داد.
شکنجه ها و روش های اعدامی که در کتاب توضیح داده میشن شدیداً وحشتناکن. بخش زیادی به این موضوع اختصاص داده نشده اما آنچه که هست خیلی ناراحت کنندس. با این حال به نظر من، مردم باید بدونن رژیم بعث چقدر تشنه به خون مردمش بود. مردم شکنجه می‌شدن، مورد تجاوز جنسی قرار می‌گرفتن، ناپدید میشدن، دار و ندارشون غارت میشد، شهرهاشون ویران میشد و برای کوچک‌ترین چیزی کشته می‌شدن. تمامی این جنایات با آگاهی کامل اسد انجام میشد.
به دلیل اینکه داعش به تهدید بزرگ‌تری برای جهان خارج از سوریه تبدیل شد و همینطور ماهیت تبلیغات اسد، توجه به فجایع سوریه تا چندین سال متوقف شد.
کتاب، «بمب‌های بشکه‌ای» و سلاح‌های شیمیایی وحشتناک اسد که برای ایجاد حداکثر درد و رنج طراحی شده‌ بودند رو هم مورد بحث قرار میده. اسد تونست انتقادات بین‌المللی از این سلاح ها رو به سخره بگیره و با وجود همه هشدارها به کار خودش ادامه بده.
تنها ایرادی که به کتاب میتونم بگیرم بحث منابعشه. منبع اصلی کتاب یکی هست به اسم مناف تلاس که این فرد از فرماندهان سابق گارد ریاست جمهوری و پسر مصطفی تلاس، وزیر دفاع حافظ اسد و از بنیانگذاران اصلی حزب بعث و قاتل مردم سوریه، هستش. تلاس ها نزدیک پنجاه سال تا میشد از گاو شیرده حزب بعث دوشیدن و فقط زمانی که منافعشون بخاطر حضور بازیگران و سفره نشین های تازه به خطر افتاد از رژیم بعث جدا شدن و فرار کردن. بقیه منابع باقی مونده هم اکثراً شامل دسته شنیده ها و منابع دسته چندمن و خیلی کم پیش اومده که خود نویسنده شاهد قضیه‌ای بوده یا مستقیماً از فردی شنیده که خودش با چشم های خودش شاهد جنایات بوده.
فصل آخر این کتاب تو سال ۲۰۱۸ نوشته شده و بشار اسد رو سرمست از پیروزی و نابودی اکثر مخالفانش نشون میده که توی مصاحبه های تلویزیونی زیادی شرکت میکنه، مخالفینش رو به باد تمسخر میگیره، برای معدود هسته های مقاومت باقی مونده رجز میخونه و با زن و بچه هاش توی شهرهایی که ازشون یه ویرانه ساخته قدم میزنه و عکس می‌گیره. تمام کشورهایی که مخالفینش رو تجهیز و حمایت میکردن دیگه کم کم با اسد شروع به تعامل و نشست و برخواست کرده بودن و روند صلح و آتش بس جلو می‌رفت بدون بازخواست حتی یک نفر. تاریخ سوریه می‌رفت که دوباره چرخه حکومت حافظ اسد رو تکرار کنه و دنیا هم کم کم فراموش میکرد که چه فجایعی تو سوریه اتفاق افتاده. اما مردم سوریه فراموش نکردن و به قول معروف شاهنامه آخرش خوشه.
مرگ هم برای بشار و همدستان جنایتکارش کمه اما سرنگونی رژیم بعث تو دسامبر سال ۲۰۲۴، کاخ آمال و آرزوهاشون رو فروریخت و آواره کشورهای دیگشون کرد. شاید روزی یه دادگاه عادلانه حداقل بتونه بازخواستشون کنه و مرهم کوچ��کی بر روی زخم های سوریه و مردمش باشه.
و در آخر مثل همیشه جنایتی که فراموش بشه و جنایتکارانی که بازخواست نشن، راه رو برای تکرار جنایت های مشابه هموار میکنه.

[Steven Z. · Rating 5 out of 5]

In the last few years a number of important books dealing with the Syrian tragedy have appeared. They all reflect the gruesome nature of how Bashar al-Assad and his family have clung to power as they have slowly destroyed their country by killing over 500,000 people and creating millions of refugees. Many of these books are journalistic accounts of Assad’s murderous policies or personal memoirs as their authors scream on the written page for the world to listen and act. Sam Dagher, a reporter for the Wall Street Journal new contribution to this ever-growing list is his ASSAD OR WE BURN THE COUNTRY: HOW ONE FAMILIES LUST FOR POWER DESTROYED SYRIA which focuses on the generational saga of the Assad and Tlass families, once deeply intertwined and now estranged by Assad’s bloody quest to retain the country that his father seemingly bequeathed to him.

Since the 2011 Arab Spring Syria has emerged from hopes of democracy and some type of governmental reform that was the calling card for the Middle East as the west which could not make up its mind as to what should be done to stop the ongoing slaughter. President Barrack Obama’s feckless approach fearing American involvement in another Middle Eastern country as he tried to extricate the United States from Iraq and Afghanistan or President Donald Trump’s callous and amoral abandonment of the Kurds last month leaving Iran, Hezbollah, and Russia with a further foothold in the region reflects the bankruptcy of US policy in the area and raises the question of what might have been done differently.

Dagher the last western journalist to be kicked out of Syria in 2014 relies on interviews with Assad’s former army commander, Manaf Tlass, now a defector, numerous other witnesses and participants in the events described, and his own extensive first-hand experience reporting from Damascus to take the reader behind the scenes to explore a ruthless family that is responsible for the destruction of Syria and the resulting chaos that still haunts the region. Dagher puts forth a number of important themes that dominate the narrative.

First, Bashar al-Assad inner struggle to live up to his father to justify his own reign which led him to replicate the violence that had been used in the past. Second, the role of the Tlass family particularly Manaf’s evolution from childhood friend of Bashar, a key cog in implementing his violent strategy, and finally breaking with him and achieving asylum in France. Third, how the Assad family, including Bashar’s brother Maher, cousins like the Makhloufs, a number of which led different segments of the Mukhabarat ruled the country. Fourth, Bashar’s inability to manipulate the west as successfully as his father. Fifth, how the Assad family helped arm Hezbollah and its militias and allowing their patrons, Iran to protect him. Sixth, the evolution of Bashar from a young western oriented individual who many Syrians and foreign governments saw as the hope for reform in Syria to one who quickly learned that to preserve power he had to crush the aspirations for general political reform and all challenges to the system. For Bashar continued to repeat the comment; “you can only rule these people with the shoe” which became a nasty reality for the Syrian people.

Dagher provides exceptional coverage of the Arab Spring and its impact on Syria. He follows the developments of the protests and opposition and the Assad regime’s response. There is special focus on cities of Hama that feared a replication of the slaughter and destruction that resulted in the death of 10-20,000 Syrians at the hands of Hafez al-Assad in 1982; Homs, Daraa, Aleppo, and Damascus itself. As the violence spread in 2011 and 2012 different factions within the Assad government, the army, even inside the Mukhabarat began to appear. This fracturing was also evident on the part of the opposition as they tried to figure out a plan to deal with the regime’s violence. As the foreign media and You Tube began to show the truth of what was occurring Bashar resorted to describing events as “fake news,” all part of a western conspiracy to overthrow him. “Like his father before him, it was absolutely vital for Bashar to shift the narrative from one about a brutal clan and regime killing protesters and political activists to that of a state battling armed insurgents and gangs linked to a foreign conspiracy.”

Dagher is correct that once the west with its UN mandate overthrew Muhammar Gaddafi in Libya, Bashar close minded approach to the opposition became even more recalcitrant to the point that he would destroy his country instead of stepping down. The Russians felt the US had lied about its approach to Gaddafi, and Putin vowed he would not let that happen to the Assad’s. For the Bashar his vision was clear, and he would do anything to remain in power as he seemed to purposely lose territory to ISIS as a means of scaring the world even if it meant sacrificing a few thousand of his own militiamen and conscripts. Bashar was willing to pull out from peripheral areas deemed unimportant and allow ISIS to seize them and carry out their version of atrocities. This would fit Putin’s realpolitik, also as now Assad and the Russian President could argue that they were saving the world from Islamic terrorism.

The Assad regime’s duplicity whether under Hafez or Bashar is evident throughout the narrative. Dagher stresses how neither could be trusted but the west needed Syria as a means of controlling terrorism, its Middle East peace plans, events in Lebanon, and Israel. Washington at times was naïve in dealing with the Assad family and when it was obvious that something needed to be done they could not act, i.e.; Obama’s “red line” with chemical weapons which he did not enforce, refusal to provide weapons to certain opposition groups etc. Bashar craved rewards for engaging the West at the same time he fully embraced Iran, Hezbollah, and “the so-called axis of resistance against the West.” The corruption of the Assad regime is on full display as they practiced the tactics of a typical mob family. Dagher focuses on a number of interesting characters like Rami Makhlouf, another cousin who developed business partnerships with the regime and by 2010 his companies controlled almost 65% of the Syrian economy; Hassan Nasrallah, the head of Hezbollah; Hafez Makhlouf, who was deeply involved as head of the Mukhabarat when Hama was destroyed; Atief Najib, head of the Mukhabarat during the Arab Spring who implemented Bashar’s violent approach to demonstrators among many others.

Dagher performs an important service explaining what really transpired in Syria during the Arab Spring. He concentrates on a number of important personages including Bashar, Maher, his younger brother, Manaf, a host of cousins and protestors like Khlaed al-Khani, an artist who survived the Hama debacle in 1982 as a little boy in which his father was killed, Darwish Mazen, a human rights lawyer who was imprisoned and repeatedly tortured by the regime before he was released and went into exile in Germany, and Sarah Masalmeh, who survived the destruction of Daraa to join the opposition eventually fleeing the country with her brother to create an easy to understand narrative that the general reader can absorb. As the protests and violence spread Dagher has an uncanny knack of zeroing in on Bashar’s thinking, the impact of foreign interference in events, and the devastation that the Syrian people as a whole had to deal with.

The author delves out a great deal of criticism for the Obama administration, much of which is on point. When Bashar’s regime used barrel bombs on civilians, delivered chlorine bombs on opposition cities targeting civilians, among the atrocities delivered by air either by Syrian or Russian forces in 2014, Obama refused to consider a no-fly-zone. Obama did authorize non-lethal aid to rebels and hundreds of millions of dollars to assist refugees but in the end when confronted whether to deal with the Assad regime and its massacres or the Islamic State, Washington chose ISIS. However, once Donald Trump was elected any pressure on the Assad regime ended. Trump’s bromance with Putin and his own authoritarian tendencies shut the door on any assistance to the Syrian opposition that was being decimated. Trump as Dagher points out probably secretly admired Assad as he had the type of power in his country that Trump craved.


In the end the winner of the Syrian civil war was Russia as Putin was now the arbiter of the Middle East, a renewed great power, and used the war as a means of testing over 200 new weapons. Turkey also is a victor as President Erdogan made his peace with Bashar and Trump’s abandonment of the Kurds a few months ago allowed the Turkish military to root out the Kurds and set up the buffer zone Ankara had always wanted. Iran and its puppet Hezbollah remain a bulwark in maintaining the Assad regime’s rule and provides Teheran with cudgel to hammer its enemies and threaten its arch foe Saudi Arabia. Lastly, of course is the Assad regime. No matter how many crimes against humanity they engaged in, they remain in power as France and Germany have given up trying to remove him from power, and the United States is seen as unreliable as Trump continues to kowtow to Putin in all areas.

Dagher’s monograph is part memoir and part a history of the Assad family that explains how we have gotten to where we are in Syria. His easy prose and analysis is important because he has created the most comprehensive history of what has transpired which is an important service for those who seek to understand American policy in addition to why Bashar al-Assad and his cronies still remain in power and continue to inflict countless deaths on the Syrian people.

[فهد الفهد · Rating 5 out of 5]

Assad or We Burn the Country: How One Family's Lust for Power Destroyed Syria

الأسد أو نحرق البلد!! هذا هو الشعار المجنون الذي أطلقه ويطلقه مؤيدو النظام السوري، مجرد تفكير الإنسان في إحراق بلده يعني أنه وصل لمرحلة مخيفة ربط فيها مصالحه ووجوده وعواطفه بالنظام، وصار بقاء النظام يبرر أي شيء وكل شيء، التهجير والقتل والتعذيب والبراميل، يتميز هذا الكتاب بأنه يتتبع ما حدث من البداية، فصول لسيطرة حافظ على سوريا، علاقته بمصطفى طلاس، نشأة بشار وعلاقته بمناف طلاس، بداية الثورة وانشقاق مناف – أحد مصادر المؤلف الرئيسية -، الكثير من التفاصيل المهمة قدمها ويقدمها مؤلف الكتاب لنفهم الصورة التي تحولت فيها سوريا خلال السنوات الماضية.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

Assad or We Burn the Country: How One Family's Lust for Power Destroyed Syria, by Sam Dagher, is an interesting look at the inner workings of the Assad family in Syria and how they ran and run the country. Starting with Hafez Al-Assad, an early leader in Syria's history, and the transfer of power to Bashar Al-Assad, the current leader of the country. The Assad family took over from a previous government that was marred in controversy, and were heavily inspired by Nasser's Egypt (indeed, the coup leaders would briefly join Egypt and form a new nation). They were part of the creation of the Baath party, which was popular in both Syria and neighbouring Iraq. The Baath party promoted pan-Arabism, socialism, economic development, and secularism. Evens so, both Syria and Iraq would succumb to political reality, promoting nationalism and sectarianism in an effort to maintain a grip on power.

Syria is an important linchpin of power for the middle east. They have maintained a deep and lasting influence over neighbouring Lebanon, have been an important counter balance to many powers (Iraq, Israel, Iran, Saudi Arabia), and have kept up the rhetoric to see Palestinian freedom, a region free from American Imperialism, and so forth. They have done this with absolute brutality. The Assad's have kept a firm grip on power, and have frequently used violence to hold on to it, whether at home or abroad. They are rightfully on the US terrorist watchlist for supporting terroristic activities across the region. As an Alawite minority, the Assad's have often used sectarianism as a tool to divide and conquer. They support the Alawite, Druze, and Christian minorities in the nation, and have kept a firm grip over Islamist extremism coming from the Sunni population. They have maintained close ties with both Iran, and their proxy Hezbollah, and indeed the Alawite sect has recently been acknowledged as a sub-sect of Shiite Islam.

This book looks closely at the history of the Assad family in power, and gives a blow by blow account of the Syrian civil war that began in 2011, documenting each atrocity closely. It also examines the political and geopolitical sphere that Syria inhibits, looking at responses from parties that had become bogged down in the civil war - such as the US, France, Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Qatar and so forth. The Syrian conflict is fascinating, as it shows the dynamism of the region, and the ever changing political situation, as well as the triangular conflict that is engulfing the region. Qatar and Turkey are squaring off against Saudi Arabia and their clients, and Iran and the Saudi's are locked in an existential struggle for influence across the region. The US and Russia are also facing off in this civil war. Syria has been adept at playing for influence, and the Assad's seem keen on using publicity, violence, and diplomacy in quick succession. And, so far, it has worked. The Syrian civil war is still simmering, but rebels have been reduced to just a portion of Idlib province. They have thrown in their lot with Russia and Iran. Both back Syria for different reasons. Russia is looking to extend its influence in the Middle East, and has regained a strong presence in its Tarsus naval port, and strong contracts to help rebuild and rearm Syria. Iran has gained an important ally, and extended its influence from its borders, through Iraq, Syria and Lebanon. Turkey has also gained a foothold in the region. The US and the Saudi's seem to be the outperformed parties in the region. Dagher looks at the baffling blunders the US made across the region, abandoning allies, allowing red lines to be crossed, confused rhetoric and poor initial understanding, all across two presidential administrations; Obama and Trump. Saudi Arabia seems like it was outplayed, at once extending support to Sunni militias, but then shying away from the democratic Muslim Brotherhood, or the radical ISIS. Qatar seems pleased at how much money the Saudi's sunk in the conflict for little gain.

This book was interesting, fast paced, and brutal in its telling. Even so, the journalistic nature of the book leads to some credibility issues from sources. One of the main sources is an old regime ally from the Tlaas family - a family close to the Assad's. They defected during the beginning of the conflict, but having them as the main source seems suspect. Their family was implicit in many atrocities both throughout Syrian history, and into the early days of the protests in 2011. The lack of sourcing here is probably due to the contemporary nature of the subject, but does lead to issues of credibility. Even so, this was a strong read, and certainly worth a look. It is still relatively up to date, and gives good perspective on the Assad's and the conflict. Even so, in a year or so, this information may be out of date, and more contemporary sources should be considered. A solid read for anyone interested in the Middle East and the Syrian Civil War.

[wajiha · Rating 5 out of 5]

“When finished, these forces usually sprayed graffiti like this one on the walls of the ransacked villages and towns: “Assad or nobody; Assad or we burn the country”

—

heavy, insightful & a very informative read. feel like i know the situation in syria alot better even though ive been following the occurrences since 2011. investigative journalism is incredible, works like this and ‘dirty wars’ is everything - ofcourse no book can ever do justice and accurately represent what the victims of the Assad regime have/are going through but Daghers thorough research from the time of Hafez to Bashar gives one a rough idea. well written book - 460 pages and it didn’t drag, not once.

personally believe the bare minimum we can do is be *aware* of the happenings in the muslim world regardless of how it makes us feel so would recommend this book to all.

lastly, a quick reminder to remember the people of Syria in your duas, not much has changed for them since the publication of this book (2019). May we live to see the day peace and security engulfs our people & may the Assad family and the supporters of the regime rot in hell.

[Patricia Romero · Rating 5 out of 5]

Finally a real account of what is going on in Syria! And from a Pulitzer Prize nominated journalist who specializes in the Middle East. A never before heard, boots on the ground look at the Syrian Civil War that is killing the country.

In 2011, President Bashar al-Assad, decided to address the Arab Spring type protests in Syria with crushing violence on his own people. There would be no uprising here. Instead there would be a long war that so far has killed almost 500,000 and as citizens flee, terrorist groups came in and suddenly we had an enormous refugee issue. His response went against the advice of his friend Manaf Tlass, commander of the army. 

Dagher uses his own observations and experiences in Damascus and has interviewed many on both sides of this war. Including Tlass. Everything he says rings true. The campaign waged by Basheer has turned the country and the entire region into chaos. 

This book could not be more timely. Dagher has shown us what evil looks like and how easily it can be ignored by the world. There is so much false information out there and this book clears it all up very nicely.

Keep bringing us the truth and great journalism!

NetGalley/ May 28th 2019 by Little, Brown and Company

[AC · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not an up-to-date analytical study of the history of the civil war (which is what I was looking for), but an “insider’s view” of the Regime, based on well placed sources. Dagher makes a strong case for then horrible character of this Regime, and especially that of Bashar al-Assad, Asma, and his henchmen. He also explains somewhat how Putin, Erdogan, KSA, and other players fit into the picture. Informative. And a quick read, despite its relative length.

[Austin · Rating 2 out of 5]

Brutal history of the Assad regime in Syria. Insider accounts depicting the tragic implosion that destroyed a country and became an incubator that spawned the evil organization known as ISIS. The authors political bias is clearly evident and somewhat erodes his credibility. His one-sided narrative is mostly just a litany of crimes committed by this despotic regime that lacked objectivity. All the chapters on this horrible story are yet to be written, but Dagher does sets the stage for the final act. AP 2019

[eny · Rating 5 out of 5]

“They are trying to bury us, but they do not know we’re the seeds of a revolution.”

this book depicts the events occurred in Syria from the ascent to power of the Assad family starting with Hafez, to the subsequent hand-down of this to his second son Bashar and his rule for the following two decades, up until the year of publication.

this book does an amazing job at laying out these events, while maintaining a well-informed and well-structured narrative, as well as a great in-depth understanding of the different actors at play and their own individual goals and agendas.

Syria, a country yearning for freedom in the wake of the arab spring, eventually became the ground zero for the war of many countries and their proxies, which was waged solely to prefect their own personal interests within the region: from the barbaric and savage militias of Iran and Hezbollah, to the schizophrenic and double-faced approach of the US, and Russia’s greed to monopolise powers in its favour, all these factors and players had a consequentially detrimental effect on the country and the people of Syria. All this ultimately enabled for one of the most ruthless and bloodthirsty regime of the century to maintain its chokehold on a nation that was butchered, starved, raped and tortured for decades by Bashar Al-Assad, who was inspired by the legacy of his predecessor and actively supported by a multitude of his allies.

some of the witnesses’ accounts and narrations presented in this book are beyond horrific, all of which happened under the eyes of the international community that decided to turn their eyes away amid these brutalities. it is therefore imperative that justice is served so that the victims, and the entire country at large and in its totality, can heal and rebuild in the wake of the recent overthrow of the regime, and bring the perpetrators of these crimes to be rid of their long-standing and abhorrent impunity and to finally face justice.

lastly, it is important for us, people outside of Syria, to support the syrian people in their right of self determination in a way that complies with their moral values and religious beliefs, and protect them for the scaremongering often perpetrated by westerner leaders and media that targets (mostly muslim) nations once they obtain freedom from their oppressors, in order to discredit them and undermine their efforts.

may Allah bless and protect the syrian people from all those that wish harm upon them, from outside or from within, and through the words of the mother of the martyred child Hamza Al-Khatib (may Allah have mercy on him): “I hope he (Bashar) will pay the price and that God will take revenge on him, and on his children."
Ameen

[Megan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve read many books on the Middle East, a few on Syria, and a few which had sections devoted to Syria. But never have I read a more fluid, comprehensive account of the al-Assad family’s regime of terror over the past half century against their own people. Until reading Sam Dagher’s book, of course.

He’s incredibly detailed and relies on several sources (which he cross-checks multiple times) as he provides a extensive historical record from around 1970, the year Bashar al-Assad’s father, Hafez, took over the country in a violent coup - up until the present, where Hafez’s son Bashar has now ruled using the same brutality manual as his father since being installed in the position in 2000, upon Hafez’s death.

While I’ve always known that Bashar was an incredibly manipulative and duplicitous man, I don’t think I was ever quite aware of just how chillingly monstrous this man is until reading this entire book. What he wants you and the rest of the world to believe, basically, is that he and his wife (who was raised in London and even speaks with a British accent!) are a thoroughly modern couple. After all, he wasn’t even supposed to reign over Syria upon his father’s death! That job fell to his much more charismatic and politically-oriented older brother, Bassel... well, until Bassel was fatally injured in a car wreck, that is. Then immediately Bashar was yanked out of practicing ophthalmology in London to come back and assume the family duties. All with the handpicked beautiful Asma by his side (even though they tried to claim the romantic notion that they’d always been friends, since childhood).

And yes, with their porcelain white skin, light blue eyes, glamorous and modern attire - the “new Assad” family looked very much the complete opposite of the old Assads (his father). These ones seemed more civilized (western), more reform-minded. Asma even did a spread with Vogue! However, while the new couple seemingly held a lot of promise for the country’s broken down Syrians, exhausted from the nonstop violence and tyranny inflicted upon them by Bashar’s father, that notion was quickly dispelled the minute civilians dared to protest (peacefully) for any change in the old order/the Assad regime.

In fact, some may even say Bashar has more ruthlessly crushed any opposition to him. After all, many of the old guard from his father’s generation had constantly vocalized opposition to his rule and him being “too soft” to rule Syria the way his father did - and the way it “needed to be ruled” - if the Assads were to keep their iron grip on power. Which was essential, of course, for all the regime loyalists, the pseudo-government figures and Mukhabarat officers only able to sustain their elevated status and wealthy lifestyles thanks to their proximity to the Syrian presidential family.

Bashar proved that he was every bit as tough (if not tougher) than his father, and just as clever and wise. He immediately ordered protestors to be shot dead, locked up in prisons akin to medieval torture dungeons, or simply “disappeared.”

Thanks to America and the rest of the west failing to stop Putin, Iran, and Bashar’s allies, his reign of terror continues - with Putin being the sole arbiter in the region, allegedly “keeping the peace” - after Trump handed him what has been called “an early Christmas gift” after pulling the few remaining American troops out of Syria. Of course Obama and other western officials carry blame, too - while it’s understandable that Obama may not have wanted to intervene militarily in Syria and create “another Iraq” (and even if he had, it’s doubtful he would obtain any congressional support for military action) - he certainly never should have made his infamous “red line” speech... all but daring Bashar and the Russians to keep using chemical weapons on the Syrian population. Of course, once Bashar and Putin realized America and the west were all talk and no military intervention would follow, the Syrian people were abandoned to their cruel fate.

Relying on a host of sources like inner-circle regime member and Bashar childhood friend Manaf Tlass (who defected in 2013 and now lives in France) human rights lawyer and protest leader Mazen Darwish, and a few other Syrians who have long tried to battle the tyranny of the Assads, Dagher paints a fantastic and easy to follow portrait of a power hungry family that will use any means necessary to stay in power. If that means freeing Islamic State terrorists so that Assad can cast all opposition fighters as “terrorists” and claim to the rest of the world that he’s merely doing his job to fight the war on terror, so be it. The sad part is, the majority of the rest of the world has seemed to accept Bashar’s lies - even if they know the truth, they’re choosing willful denial. It’s sickening and I can only pray that ordinary Syrians someday, somehow, find their freedom and peace from that brutal and oppressive regime.

5/5 stars. Highly recommend to all of those that want an intimate and unbiased look inside modern-day Syria - and just why over 500,000 people have been killed since the first uprising of Syria’s Arab Spring in early 2011 - along with at least 5 million displaced or fled as refugees. And just why the country continues to suffer, with no help from the many western countries who had once decried Bashar’s actions against his people as despicable, atrocious, and unacceptable.

[primrose✨ · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 stars.
I only hope that one day justice will be served to the butcher Assad, his family and his associates who brutalised their own people and country, trying to stay in power no matter the cost… i hope one day he will be dragged in front of court and answer to the crimes he committed. As a middle-eastern, this book was not merely a new story, but another one set in tragedy but i hope that since he was ousted finally after more than two decades of power(his father had three decades in power), the people can move on while never forgetting about these horrors.
This is a heavy book and very informative as well. I hope the wronged people of Syria can finally find some peace after decades of repression and suppression.
And that one day, perhaps one day, the middle east will finally not be known for its wars and conflicts and know some peace that was denied to us for centuries.

[Jonathan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not going to lie, I picked up this book based on the title alone, as this was the best title I've seen in a while, and was not disappointed.
This is a very concise and interesting history of the Assad regime in Syria as well as a detailed recounting of the mostly concluded Syrian civil war.
Dagher had access to various players in the events described in the book, including very high-ranking Syrian officials, which makes this a very compelling look into the inside workings of a besieged dictatorship.
This book reads at times as a fantasy novel, set in a different world and narrated by a third person omniscient narrator. I think this is credit to how well sourced and meticulous Dagher was in compiling this book into a narrative. And how far removed we in the first world from the horrors of civil war.
This is, however, not a book written by a historian, but rather a journalist and as such it tends to skew towards the sensational and personal, to illustrate the big picture. This has the effect that it causes in the reader a feeling of being manipulated into taking the author's side. Nevertheless this book tells the story from a unique perspective and you come out the other side better informed about the conflict.

If you haven't followed the Syrian news, then big spoiler alert: the bad guys win. So this is, in summary, a pretty depressing read. But an important one, at least.

[Muhammad Ahmad · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ll be writing later about this book in detail. For now suffice it to say that this is the most richly detailed, panoramic, and insightful account of the rise of the Assads and the course of the revolution. Encyclopaedic, yet immensely readable. The sheer range of Dagher's sources is impressive. It includes regime brass, Assad's coterie, dissidents, civil society figures, revolutionaries, intelligentsia.... A far richer and dimensional account than you'll find in the thin polemics of western hacks like Patrick Cockburn or Charles Glass.

[Peg - The History Shelf · Rating 5 out of 5]

The country that brought us the 21st century’s worst humanitarian disaster — and the family responsible for it — come under the microscope in Sam Dagher’s masterpiece of journalistic reporting, Assad or We Burn the Country. Dagher, a Pulitzer-Prize nominated journalist with more than 15 years’ experience reporting on Middle East affairs for such publications as the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, chronicles in detail Syria’s descent into chaos under Bashar al-Assad. A chunker of a book (nearly 600 pages), Dagher’s account is prodigiously footnoted and impeccably researched; however, it is not for the faint of heart. It is a relentless chronology of the Syrian regime’s sundry atrocities, international double-dealing and manipulations, and the unspeakable suffering of Syrians whose only crime was asking for basic human rights.

Dagher’s subtitle is “How One Family’s Lust for Power Destroyed Syria” and family is a dominant theme running throughout. The author describes it as Syria’s “sons and daughters wrestling with their parents’ choices and legacies.” For Bashar, his father’s legacy was one he not only wanted to live up to but also surpass. The “father” of modern Syria, Hafez al-Assad ruled Syria with an iron fist, using his widespread citizen surveillance arm of government, the mukhabarat (chillingly modeled on the East German Stasi) to tamp down opposition. Syria suffered under Hafez for nearly 30 years until his death in 2000, but little did they or the world know the worse was to come with his son. The quiet and unassuming ophthalmologist possessed a ruthless ambition to not only pay tribute to his father’s legacy, but to surpass it. Violently, if necessary.

By a cruel twist of fate, Bashar (the third of five children), was never meant to inherit his father’s position, but rather his older brother, Bassel. Bassel seemed to many observers the most suited: tough, popular, handsome, and a lover of beautiful women and fast cars. Bashar, on the other hand, was a gangling, awkward, and introverted young man, always in Bassel’s shadow. He eventually broke away from his less-than-promising prospects at home to study abroad. He entered an ophthalmology residency program in London in 1992. In 1994, he was studying for board exams to practice in the United Kingdom when news came of Bassel’s death. He was called home to comfort his grief-stricken father, but more importantly, to start the grooming process for succession.

From the beginning of his presidency in 2000, Bashar positioned himself as a reformer. As such, he was greeted warmly on the international stage. Promising to bring much needed economic and educational reform to Syria, he said nothing about political reform. Indeed, it was never on the table. While the major powers courted Bashar’s assistance in Middle Eastern matters (after 9/11, America needed help quashing terrorist insurgents within Iraq, while France focused on stability in Lebanon and business enterprises within Syria), the people at home began to grow discontent with Bashar’s rule following the mass protests in Iran in 2009.

Citizens like Mazen Darwish, a Damascus human rights lawyer and activist, believed the uprisings in Iran over a fraudulent election could be replicated in Syria. Afterall, “…what happened in Iran made me think it was also possible in our region ruled by police states and ideological and sectarian regimes,” he recalled.

Peaceful gatherings of protesters demanding basic rights began in earnest in 2011. By March of that year, those groups became targets of the mukhabarat and regime defenders. Bullets flew, people died, and the civil war was underway. Dagher does yeoman’s work in relating the many complexities of Middle Eastern sectarianism and how it impacted Bashar’s ability to play different groups and nations off one another. This goes a long way toward explaining why Bashar is still in power.

In the book, Dagher takes us on this sad journey using two different perspectives: those from inside the palace and those outside the palace. From inside, our point of view is Manaf Tlass, the son of Mustafa Tlass and the best friend of Bashar. Bashar’s father, Hafez, seized control of Syria along with his best friend Mustafa in the 1970s, and were partners in power until Hafez’s death in 2000. The generational friendship of the Assads and Tlasses continued with their sons. But as Bashar’s reign of terror upon his own citizenry ratcheted up, Manaf increasingly grew frustrated and alarmed at Bashar’s pivot to Iran and Hezbollah and his unwillingness to dialogue with protesters. “You can only rule these people with the shoe,” Bashar coldly replies to Manaf’s concerns.

Their unusual friendship unfolds in a surprising way as the reader will discover, but the stories from outside the palace are truly the most gut-wrenching. Dagher deftly weaves in their experiences and sufferings in a respectful manner that never veers into the exploitative. Still, the image of Mazen, the human rights activist, waking up on top of a dead body after a horrendous beating is something that stays with you. And there are others…so many others.

What one comes away with after Dagher’s 600 pages of civil war, repression, torture, chemical attacks, red lines drawn and erased, Alawite vs. Shia vs. Sunni, the beginnings of ISIS, and a Middle East generally on fire is the aching need for a little hope…somewhere, anywhere. But hope is a hard thing to come by in Syria, where the Lie rules over Truth. Bashar al-Assad still holds the shoe over his people. But in Assad or We Burn the Country, Sam Dagher reveals the truth of those closest to the fire and warns the world to look away at its own peril. Fittingly, he dedicates his book:

"To the Syrians who rose up to demand freedom and dignity: Your heroism, sacrifice, and story will never be obscured by lies."

[Heba Malik · Rating 5 out of 5]

I DID IT!!!! WOHOOOOOO!!!! This is such a 5/5, I really don't know why I left it by the wayside for three years. I would recommend to anyone working in Middle East affairs, or international affairs, or is any way a curious individual about the rest of the world. Sam Dagher is an exceptionally engaging writer. The account is vivid, moving, at times, grotesque but necessarily so. Just such a good read.

[Scott Shertzer · Rating 4 out of 5]

In elementary school around 5th grade, I had to write a report on a country. This would have been around the early 1980's. I don't remember much from that report, but I'm sure what I just read about the history of the Assad family was not in that report on Syria.
This book is disturbing, eye-opening, frustrating, and sickening all in one shot. Most importantly, it should be an awakening to those who need to speak up and represent those in dictatorships and can't speak themselves.
I decided to read this book after reading How to Be A Dictator by Frank Dikotter. I feel compelled to really understand countries where a dictatorship resides regardless of how it is dressed. My next books will be The Great Successor: The Divinely Perfect Destiny of Brilliant Comrade Kim Jong Un and Mr. Putin: Operative in the Kremlin (Geopolitics in the 21st Century). If you've read these books, I'd be curious of your thoughts. But back to Bashar Al-Assad. This leader (leaders can be good or evil) employed the same tactics that all of the leaders covered in Dikotter employed...pictures of themselves everywhere, censorship of media, fear within the ranks to prevent others from gaining an upper hand, and more.
I would place Bashar in the same despicable ranks as Hitler and Stalin with his senseless killing of citizens. But far worse in the actions of the US, France, and Britain as they turned their backs on these poor people. In particular, it highlights how poor of a leader Barack Obama was and also shows how our current administration is even worse than the previous. In fact, the author draws comparisons between the actions of Trump and Bashar. Interesting.
The book does jump around quite a bit and makes it a little difficult to follow. In addition, I think the points could have been made in much less pages, but this book should be a must read for all people so these atrocities end and aren't repeated.

[Waddah Arafat · Rating 5 out of 5]

I cannot speak highly enough of this book and how accurate it depicts the history of the Assad regime starting from the decade of the 1960s leading into the Hafez Assad (the father) capturing power and eliminating all forms of political life in Syria, down to the bloody "cleansing campaign" carried out by the regime against Assad's political rivals starting with the unions, secular parties with the Pinnacle being the Hama massacre in February 1982.

It then covers the period of the 1990s with the ailing Hafez arranging for transition of power to his eldest son Bassel who was killed in a car accident in January 1994, forcing the father to make a tough choice of selecting his second son Bashar, who is an incompetent weird person and the process of grooming him to succeed his father.

Most importantly, this book covers the Syrian revolution starting in March 2011 from the days of peaceful protesters demanding for freedom in the brutal crackdown that Bashar elected to carry and the systematic campaign of killing all the civil right peaceful protestors and forcing people to carry weapons to defend their families against the systematic massacres carried out by the regime and his loyal sectarian militias and paramilitary forces. It provides an important insider account of the direct responsibility of Bashar in ordering another "cleansing campaign" which fulfills all the criteria for ethnic cleansing and genocide.

It then covers the way this regime manipulated the West by facilitating terrorism and exporting it to Europe and promising more chaos if Bashar is not recognized or at least accepted as a de facto eternal ruler of the country.

In all, this is an extremely accurate account of how things went in Syria with intricate details of the Mukhabarat (Secret Service and Police State) interfering in every single detail of daily life and the hell of the Mukhabarat basements. This makes George Orwell's (1984) a paradise compared to the horors in Syria.

[Heron Mouaz Himmelspiegelung · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the few books that exhibits the Syrian war the way I would say, most Syrian experience it. While ISIS & Terrorism had caught most of the world's attention, factual information infers that Assad is the main reason for all the tragedies and the devastation. Sam Dagher laid out the facts and the details of how the Assads leveraged everything they could to stay in power and presented intentionally themselves to the world as the modern alternative for terrorism. The book included also too many stories on the mentality of the ruling family.
I highly recommended for the ones who want to know more about the cause of the Syrian war and Syria in general.

[Joseph Stieb · Rating 5 out of 5]

I said I needed a history of the Assad regime and of the SY civil war, and boy did this book come through. This is a great combination of journalism and history as well as the analysis of both personality and large social and global forces shaping events in the Middle East. It's an accessible, well-paced, and thorough history of the worst civil war of the 21st century.

Let me start with an analytical point: the Assads are evil. Ignore the modernist facade of his regime: the fake secularism, the pretty, hijab-eschewing women, the stage-managed public appearances. Ignore that Bashar became our de facto ally in the fight against IS. This is a man and a regime that will do anything and everything to cling to power and to hoard resources. He, his father, and his whole family are in the Saddam Hussein tier of blood-strained Arab despots, except that the Syrian regime is smarter than Saddam. This book is mind-numbingly full of torture, mass executions, the indiscriminate bombing of civilians, assassinations, and lies and propaganda that would put any decent person to shame. This regime isn't just instrumentally cruel, it is gratuitously cruel, and it inflicted tortures I had never even heard of on innocent people and political opponents. This is a regime that is responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths as well as for the rise of the Islamic State itself given that Assad funneled extremists from his own society into Iraq to fight the US forces there and then even permitted IS to take Syrian territory (where they massacred and enslaved inhabitants, including Syrian conscripts that the regime callously abandoned) in order to build them up as the greater enemy so that the rest of the world would tolerate his murderous crushing of the opposition.

Dagher takes you inside the regime's decision making apparatus to show how when the protests started in 2011, they responded to largely peaceful demonstrations with brute force and steadily helped radicalize the opposition. This was a deliberate tactic that stemmed from Bashar himself: he knew that by radicalizing the opposition he could get more international tolerance for many of his actions. Of course, he also had the protection of powerful, essentially soulless allies like Putin's Russia, Iran, and Hezbollah, who by the mid-2010s were doing much of the dirty work for the exhausted regime forces. Again, we should contemplate the ruthless evil of someone like Putin, who, in his deluded conviction that the US is trying to take down his regime feels the need to "balance" against the US by expanding his power into the Middle East and defy U.S. attempts to do anything to punish Bashar or alleviate the suffering of the Syrian people. This is someone who benefits politically from the millions of refugees streaming from Syria into Europe and whose actions, such as the deliberate massacring of civilians from the air, has helped ensure that the refugee crisis continued. The Syrian crisis was just one of many illustrations of just how dangerous and ruthless modern Russia is.

The only place I disagree with Dagher was his implied criticism of Obama's Syria policy. Overall, I think Obama navigated the Syrian crisis pretty well. I am skeptical that there was all that much of a democratic resistance: there was a peaceful resistance which didn't last long, and peaceful doesn't mean democratic necessarily. Dagher profiles admirable human rights activists who played big roles in the protests, but those . As we learned in Iraq, brutal sectarian regimes tend to produce population that mirror that brutality and sectarianism, so we have to be careful about immediately jumping in to help, especially when our presence is likely to be resented. Obama probably should have not issued the red line threat, but he did the smart thing in backing off that threat. A no fly zone would have tempered but not solved the conflict, tempting us toward more engagement. Obama always asked "what next?" when his aides proposed those kinds of things, and he never got a great answer. We like to imagine that the Free Syrian Army A. could have actually defeated the regime and its powerful backers and B. were moderate liberal Democrats, but neither of those things was likely. Obama was equally right to avoid giving them weapons like anti-aircraft missiles that could one day end up in the wrong hands and be used against a civilian airliner. Dagher seems to wish the US had acted more boldly in Syria, but I think that Obama pursued a sensibly restrained policy, at least toward the Assad regime. I don't think there was much we could have done besides a full invasion to stop the civil war, and that would have risked both a superpower conflict and a repeat of the Iraq War, all against a regime that, while evil, wasn't threatening us.

You can probably tell this isn't my normal dispassionate review. This book made me mad, particularly because in the Syria case the bad guys one. No scare quotes there; we unfortunately will have to deal with this regime for the foreseeable future, but they have been exposed as among the most evil regimes on the planet. It is equally disturbing that many on the European and American right see Bashar as an ally of Christians against Muslim extremists; that was a situation Assad deliberately cultivated, and gullible culture warriors in the West fell right into his trap. So when you see the Assad family smiling its propaganda, claiming to be advancing women's rights, or hobknobbing with the world's elite, don't forget they are murderers, rapists, arsonists, torturers (including of children), liars, and nihilists and that they would do it all over again to stay in power.

[Abidha · Rating 4 out of 5]

Review pending on this because it was one hell of a rollercoaster.

[Bilal Yassine · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fantastic account of the brutality of the Assad regime’s dictatorship. Dagher gives a well-detailed history of the Assad family in Syria and the build-up of the revolution. He also does a good job of showing how, for over 50 years, Syria was one of the most brutal, oppressive, and intricate authoritarian police states on the planet. The Assads and related families truly held an entire country hostage - establishing a mafia facade of a government to extract as much as they could out of one of the most historic and vital nations in the region.

Also shows just how obviously the international order lost all moral credibility in Syria - how the US, France, Russia, and all relevant powers decided to sacrifice millions of Syrians & embrace barbarism in pursuit of personal interests.

Vindicating to read after the fall of the regime earlier this month.

"There is no other way to govern our society except with the shoe over people's heads" - Bashar al-Assad

[Jacob Stelling · Rating 5 out of 5]

A difficult and harrowing read, but an outstanding piece of investigative and exposé journalism at its best. The author draws on first-hand experience of the regime, as well as telling the personal stories of Syrians who have suffered at the hands of the regime. A great read.

[Sarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

http://www.bookwormblues.net/2020/06/...

There are a lot of times when I see things happening in the Middle East and I just get completely overwhelmed. It seems like there are so many factions, and factions of factions, and such a long, rich history and all these people… it’s just a lot. So, while I want to understand the roots of (insert conflict here) I have a hard time actually doing it. This is all made worse because I generally feel like every book or article I really read seems to, at its core, have some sort of political bend. I usually end up giving up.

Now, I will say off the bat that this book is not very friendly to the Assad family. The people who were interviewed were defectors, and/or witnesses to events that transpired. None of them, as far as I’m aware, are currently standing in the arena going, “WOO! GO ASSAD GO!” This book is very critical. Recently I had a discussion with someone who lives in Jordan (so not a Syrian) who said that he thought people were far too critical of Assad, that while he is ruthless, look at all these good things he’s done, and then he listed off these progressive reforms and all that. To which I gesticulate wildly at, “but he gassed his own people” and then… well, the conversation goes in circles. So there is that side, too, and that’s not extensively examined in this book.

However, this honestly is one of the most comprehensive breakdowns of a Middle Eastern dynasty and numerous crises that I’ve read in a while.

Assad, or We Burn the country is not just about Bashar. Rather, this book starts out with his father, Hafez, who wrested control of the country away from numerous other powers vying for it and then managed to keep his power through coup attempts and various social and military unrest. He was a brutal man (he literally wiped a city off the map, for example, killing thousands upon thousands of people in the 1980’s), who kept an iron fist wrapped tightly around what he considered his own, borrowing ideas from other governments to create his own uniquely Syrian system. He borrowed ideas from the Nazi Youth, for example, to create his own weird kid’s club where they basically sang songs about how wonderful he was and wore special clothes. He liked the idea of the Stassi, the Russian arm of the KGB that operated in occupied Germany, and from that he formed the Mukhabarat, or the Syrian state police that have just a shocking amount of oversight and control over the Syrian people. He liked a lot of Ba’ath party ideas, so as Sadam was rising up in Iraq, Hafez watched with interest and borrowed some of his ideas as well.

While Hafez was interesting, Bashar was really the one who captivated me. Perhaps this is because I don’t remember Hafez at all. It’s also because Bashar was the second son, and he was pretty content to be left alone to become an eye doctor in London while his dad forgot he existed (They weren’t close.). However, after his brother died in a car accident, Syria turned its attention to this second son who was meant to inherit. At first, there was a lot of hope hanging on Bashar. He was westernized and therefore enlightened (or so people thought) and he would certainly come to Syria and change things for the better. He would be the young breath of fresh air the country needed, and perhaps for a time, that was the case. He even married a woman who had spent her entire life living in the United Kingdom. How much more modernized could a person possibly get? A lot of hope was hung on Bashar’s shoulders. However, the book follows his path, from London, to Syria. His quest to fill his brother’s shoes, to become the ruler of this country, and the various things that caused him to move from the hope of the Syria, to… what he is now.

There were a whole lot of things I wasn’t aware of before this book, but perhaps that connection between Syria and the United States was one of the most surprising. I had no idea the regime had been supported by the United States for so long. I also had no idea that the Syrian government had their fingers in so many different pies. For example, Bassel, the older brother that would have inherited if he hadn’t died in a car accident, had hundreds of millions of dollars stashed in bank accounts all over Europe, from money he made by funding some of the drug trade, and by having a corner on the illegal archeology and relics market coming out of Lebanon, and this was, by and large, just something that people in the Assad family did. So, punish people for drug trafficking, while also making money from the same market they are criminalizing. It is, for all intents and purposes, a very lucrative way to live.

Dagher was the last journalist kicked out of Syria in 2014, and so he has a lot of perspective about how the Arab Spring impacted the country, how vying political forces from other countries (read, Russia, Iran, United States) had a hand in what happened next, and how it all played out. How Bashar reacted when he saw his power was being threatened. Once Ghaddafi was toppled, Bashar tightened his hold on his own country, and became almost paranoid that the same would happen to him, so he flexed his iron fist and did what daddy did: He retained control, no matter how hard he had to work to do so. Gaddafi laid out the playbook for dictators in the region, and Assad watched, very closely, to see what he had to do to keep control of his country. And we all know the results.

"Gaddafi laid out in no uncertain terms what Arab leaders must do if they wished to overcome what he called a conspiracy by traitors and foreign enemies. Notwithstanding his cartoonish persona, Gaddafi’s words were a precise roadmap for any dictator determined to stay in power at any cost: spread lies to sow confusion and manipulate the narrative, kill to illustrate the cost of defiance, and stoke paranoia to drive a wedge between people and make them fight each other. Keep the conflict going even if it means destroying the country: either the leader stays or the country burns."

One thing that makes Syria so complex, at least in my mind, is how many outside forces there are playing on the battleground of that particular country, and Dagher breaks it all down nicly. He is even handed with just about everyone, from Obama’s rather clumsy response to Syria’s civil war, to Trump’s callous and sudden removal of support and protection from the Kurds. Then there’s the Russian and Iranian interests, and how the removal of the United States from this particular region gave Putin a massive toehold in the Middle East, making him a huge powerbroker in the region. A lot of this stuff was very complex before, hard for me to understand, hard for me to outline on my mental map, but Dagher made it easy to digest.

The Syrian civil war was horrible, and brutal, but due to so many things, the winners were less Syria and more everyone but the west. Russia now has a huge amount of power and influence in the Middle East, and also used the conflict to test hundreds of weapons in the region. Turkey also made peace with Bashar, and now, with the loss of US protection, they were able to root out the Kurds in Ankara like they’d always wanted. There’s also Hezbollah, which is the arm of Iran. They have close ties with the Assad regime (Truthfully, Syria has always cultivated their contacts in Lebanon, but I think the civil war has strengthened them) and works as a flexed muscle to threaten the power of Saudi Arabia, their arch nemesis in the region. Now that just about the world has given up trying to overthrow Bashar, and the United States is seen as unreliable at best. The Assad regime has weathered quite an impressive storm and come out the other side stronger, in a lot of ways, and far more sure of their place in the world. Hafez would likely be very proud of what his son has accomplished.

And yet.

And yet.

There are still people, like the person I spoke to in Joran, who cry out, “But look at all the progress and reforms Bashar has done for the Syrian people! Look at all the good his regime has accomplished!”

This book is captivating. Part memoir, part historical study, this is the most comprehensive breakdown I’ve read of a very complex struggle in the region. If you’re one of those people interested in foreign events, foreign policy, or even if you’re wondering how the Assad family remain in power despite everything that has been lined up against them, this might be the best book currently on the market to read. Dagher has a bird’s eye view of the conflicts, and the regime, and a knack for breaking down complex issues into relevant and easy to understand bites.

[Bridget · Rating 5 out of 5]

What an ASTONISHING book. Jeremy read this a month or so ago, sharing bits with me along the way, and then I practically live-texted it all back to him as I read it over the past week. Every page brought with it a name or a place or an event that we know, or lived in, or lived through. In that sense, it was almost...dishy? That's not quite the right word but it did feel scandalous at times to finally know the details of how a lot of shady stuff went down, and who was involved. Remember how when Girls of Riyadh came out and Saudis who got their hands on a copy were trying to figure out which part was about who, etc., and everyone was scandalized? It was like that, but with a nonfiction book. One of the peripheral frustrations of trying to understand the war in Syria over the past almost-9 years has been the lack of specificity in Western news sources - something happened "in Damascus" and it involved "local authorities." Um, ok? This book, on the other hand, tells you EVERYTHING - it was this street, these buildings, person x, with the tacit approval of person y. The level of local knowledge is just astounding, with Dagher never hesitating to name exact streets, neighborhoods, mosques, landmarks - I gobbled it all up, with Google Maps right beside me.

And there is a scope of understanding here that I haven't seen yet in any other book on this topic. We are far enough removed now from the start of the war, and from a few of the major turns, for a coherent narrative to have emerged of what has passed, and Dagher does an excellent job laying it all out for the reader. There are a few key people whose perspectives we follow and that made it easier to keep track of who is who and what everyone's motivations are. (One of these people is heavily relied upon as a source for most of the book and I can see an argument being made that the book is therefore biased. For sure you can read other books and make up your own mind but Dagher did his homework and for the most part I am taking Tlass at his word.)

It is remarkable to me how many times, according to this book, Syria's war vs. peace balanced on a knife's edge. There are several key moments early on in the conflict where it really could have gone either way, depending on whose advice Bashar took. Those moments were so hard to read about because, of course, we know how it turned out.

I also got chills thinking of how blessedly ignorant we were when we lived in Syria, how blissfully unaware we were of how on or off the mukhabarat's radar we were at any given time. How we knew those men in suits with guns lined the streets of x neighborhood but never really why, and we knew better than to ask. We saw posters of the late martyr Bassel, son of Hafez, every day and it wasn't until I read this book that I learned the details of how he actually died because again, in Syria, we knew better than to ask someone. We sighed with relief when our assigned minder finally stopped following us from Lattakia to Aleppo and laughed it off, because what else can you do? US policy for years and years had been 'let Bashar be, he provides stability, plus how bad could an eye doctor be' and it was true right up until it wasn't.

[Matt · Rating 5 out of 5]

The phrase “History is stranger than fiction” has never been more true than with the recent history of Syria. I have tried to keep up with the news coming out Syria, but Dagher’s work opened my eyes in a way that I have found nowhere else. I received this book from a Goodreads giveaway, but I would have gladly spent the money to buy it from the store.
Dagher’s strength lies not just in the vast number of interviews he conducted but in his ability to tie modern events to their historical roots. The reader is given a detailed description of not just the atrocities committed since 2011 but how those atrocities were affected by, and copied from, atrocities in the 1970s and ‘80s. Interviews by protestors and defectors give a human side to a war that is either ignored or “spun” by many media outlets. Perhaps the most depressing part of all, however, was the damning evidence that Dagher showed regarding Western indifference to the atrocities committed by the Assad family and its backers.
To his credit, Dagher did not spare condemnation for any Western leaders who sat by while Syria has been oppressed and destroyed. He shows the faults of leaders on both sides of the “aisle,” from the far-right to the far-left. I must admit that I was expecting a heavy bent towards one of the political extremes, but the author managed to remain remarkably neutral and focused on the topic.
One of the most important aspects of this book is how Dagher showed Assad’s ties to terror organizations as well as the Syrian regime’s role in the rise of ISIS. To the world, Assad has tried to show himself as the only one who can stop ISIS, even though he was the primary cause of its rise and early successes. Assad played the political game perfectly, much like Hitler did, in creating chaos and then emerging as the “savior” who could stop it.
Some aspects of this book were not new, such as the role of Russia in propping up Assad’s regime. However, Dagher does a good job in showing just how much regional powers (Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Turkey) have worked both for and against the rebels as well as the influence and role of Iran and Hezbollah in supporting Assad. Israel and Jordan also make appearances, though less than the other “major players.”
Sadly, this book must end with a note of gloom, since as of 2019, Assad is still firmly in power and has not been made to answer for his crimes. Still, Dagher gives a ray of hope as he speaks about the displaced Syrian protestors and the work that they are still doing to make sure that the actions of the Assad regime are not forgotten.
With the publishing of this book, no government (or regular citizen, for that matter) can claim ignorance regarding the civil war in Syria and the nearly fifty years of the Assad family’s rule. A simple reading of this text reveals the nature of the Assad regime and how masterfully they have been able to manipulate the world to achieve their goals for absolute control. My sincere hope is that this book will refocus the world’s attention on Syria and what is still occurring there.

[Yazeed Mujahed · Rating 1 out of 5]

When i bought the book, I hoped the author is going to present a solid and clear case about what happened.
Authors have duty to search for the truth, which means present well proven facts, or to put both sides perspective. Allowing the reader to reach a reasonable conclusion.

The author is building his argument around what Manaf Tlass has said... Tlass family was part of the regime till the relation broke due to many reasons, one of them is not getting allowance for financial benefits like others (this is mentioned in the book btw).
I stopped reading the book at page 200, cause clearly i felt the author was fooled by Manaf's recall of what happened.

From pages 195-197, the regime delegate was kicked out when he tried to pay condolences in Duma, then Manaf (who was one of the top regime figures) was welcomed for a discussion and they reached a common ground, then he had food with ppl of Duma who kicked out the delegate few days back (this is can't be believed)

On another level the author claims to be an expert in the middle East politics. I find that's a laughable statement. The complexity of the Arab world is what makes it so unique on all the levels. While western use "Thank you" Arab will use "shokran", "yslamo eidk", "Tslm", "ya'atiek el A'afyah"...(any many others) that just to show the complexity on the language level, and the politics level can be doubled.

Arab world politics complexity can't be captured over a plate of Hummos and Taboola.

So disappointed, still in the search for a good book covering this tragedy.

[Fatima H. Barazi · Rating 4 out of 5]

As someone who has lived through the Syrian war from the very beginning until the end, this book was one hell of an emotional roller coaster! I was practically glued to the screen as I couldn’t put the iPad down. Yet at times, I found myself choking on my tears as it was too exhausting to continue particularly with the mention of massacres (including the one committed in Hama,1982.)
“Bodies littered the street as they walked away from Amiryeh. They reached the Omar bin Khatab mosque. They encountered more carnage next to the mosque. There was a man who seemed to have been crushed to death by a tank and the body of a woman with missing hands, likely cut off by a soldier to remove her gold bracelets. Another man had been split in half.”
Going through it all over again leaves me with contradicting emotions. Gratitude for surviving these atrocious events physically (I am guessing the psychological damages are there but yet to be discovered.) And guilt over surviving when others couldn’t.
May the Assad burn, and long live our country.
عاشت سوريا حرة أبية

4 points out of 5, as some events were discussed back and forth instead of a neat chronological order.

[Dr.sam · Rating 5 out of 5]

(الأسد أو نحرق البلد)، تلك العبارة الحقيرة التي كنت أراها على الجدران في شوارع دمشق أينما اتجهت. شكراً سام داغر على هذا الكتاب وعلى وقوفك إلى جانب الشعب السوري. أتمنى أن تقوم دور النشر العربية بترجمة هذا الكتاب، يكفينا هذا الكم من كتب الأبراج و التنبؤات و الشعوذة على رفوف المكتبات.

في هذا الكتاب، يسرد المؤلف حكاية وصول الأسد الأب إلى السلطة مروراً بتوريث بشار و انتهاءاً بالحرب السورية. الكتاب كان مليئاً بالتفاصيل (التي استقيت من مصادر متعددة وإن كان مناف طلاس من المصادر الرئيسية لها) التي كنت أجهل بعضها و بعضها الآخر كان معلوماً لكل السوريين.

توقفت عن قراءة الكتاب عدة مرات لكثرة الذكريات المؤلمة التي أعادها لي. قراءة هذا الكتاب كانت مليئة بالقلق و الألم النفسي و لكني آثرت مواصلة القراءة بالرغم من كل ذلك. لأجل الحقيقة و لأجل سوريا.