Hafez, Amin al-
Hafez or Hafiz, Amin al-
(ämēn` äl-hä`fəz), 1921?–2009, Syrian army officer and politician. He served (1963–65) as chief of state in Syria's Ba'athist government (see Ba'ath partyBa'ath party, Arab political party, in Syria and in Iraq. Its main ideological objectives are secularism, socialism, and pan-Arab unionism. Founded in Damascus in 1941 and reformed, with the name Ba'ath, in the early 1950s, it rapidly achieved political power in Syria.
..... Click the link for more information. ) but had to flee to Lebanon (1965) after radical Ba'athist military officers, led by Nurreddin Attassi and Hafez al-AssadAssad, Hafez al-
, 1930–2000, president of Syria (1971–2000). He graduated (1955) from the Syrian Military Academy and advanced through the army ranks to become a general.
..... Click the link for more information. , toppled his government in a coup. He moved his exile to Iraq in 1968 and was sentenced to death in absentia in 1971. Under Bashar al-AssadAssad, Bashar al-
, 1965–, Syrian political leader, son of Hafez al-Assad. A medical doctor, he left Syria (1992) for an ophthamology residency in London when his elder brother, Basil, his father's designated heir, was killed (1994) in an automobile accident.
..... Click the link for more information. , who became president in 2000, Hafez was permitted to return (2003) to Syria.