Massacres and resilience in Hama, Syria's insubordinate city

The Hama of Mohammed Hisham Barazanji’s mind no longer exists. Some features of his paintings are still recognizable: the pointed arch-covered alleys like those near his studio, and the black and white stone ablaq features that adorn some of the old buildings. However, much of the cultural heritage he depicts in shimmering pastels has been erased.

Many cities in Syria have been ravaged by the fifteen-year civil war. As Bashar al-Assad and his government fall, the Syrian people are struggling to rebuild their homes. Hama’s devastating blow came earlier, in 1982, in a massacre that began on February 2 and lasted 27 days, a history that has been hidden during the Assad family’s 54-year rule. Then 20-year-old Barazanji witnessed firsthand as soldiers under the command of Assad’s uncle, Rifaat, besieged the city, bombed it with airstrikes, and massacred an estimated 40,000 people.

In the aftermath, Barazanji barely recognized his hometown. “I was shocked. Nothing was there. Half the city was destroyed,” he told Middle East Eye. “These neighborhoods have been there since the 12th century, and their stones exuded a special energy, a feeling of release,” he added. “I paint to show the world what Hama used to look like.”

The Orontes River meanders through Hama, its waters powering the famous medieval water wheels that turn with a creaking sound. In Arabic, the river is known as “al-Asi,” meaning “the disobedient one,” a popular legend holds, because it flows in the opposite direction of all other nearby rivers. The people of Hama have embraced this characteristic. “The people of Hama are known for their preservation of tradition, their generosity, and their resilience in the face of adversity,” said Fadel Abdul Ghany, director of the Syrian Network for Human Rights and a son of Hama. “The city’s history and the spirit of its people reflect strength and the desire to survive in the face of difficult challenges.”

Since the Ba’ath Party seized power in a 1963 coup, Hama has repeatedly been at the center of unrest, often with deadly consequences. In 1964, as people across Syria protested the new Ba’athist leadership, Hama was at the forefront of the movement. The ensuing crackdown resulted in the deaths of many in the city and contributed to the rise of the “Fighting Vanguard,” an armed group with ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. By the early 1980s, Bashar’s father, Hafez al-Assad, had launched a coup within the Ba’ath Party and led Syria for a decade. As Hafez consolidated his rule over the country and the military, repression, corruption, and sporadic armed resistance led by the Fighting Vanguard grew.

In April 1981, the army searched houses in Hama for members of the Muslim Brotherhood and affiliated militants. Security forces stormed the city, killing more than 300 people. Ten months later, Hafez, Rifaat, and the army came to the city again. Faced with popular protests, strong criticism from local notables, and tensions with the Muslim Brotherhood, the Assad government decided to make an example of Hama, its residents, and the few hundred armed militants who were stationed there, through a harsh crackdown. Barazanji’s paintings depict some of the suffering of those days of siege and slaughter: women crying, a child thanking God for a piece of bread. His words paint an even bleaker picture. “They would round up young men, line them up against a wall, and kill them. I remember seeing soldiers put people’s heads in a press and crush them,” he said, his voice choking.

Maher Mohammed, 66, sells clothes from a stall on the Obesy Bridge, a place filled with the clamor of informal vendors. For most of Hama’s 3,000-year history, the city has been a market town, and it still attracts traders from the surrounding countryside. “Under Assad, the army would come and take whatever they wanted from your stall without paying,” Mohammed recalled ruefully. Mohammed participated in the 1964 protests, although he was just a child at the time. He remembers soldiers responding to his stone-throwing with gunfire. Later, in 1982, he was one of the thousands of young men ordered to stand in a line against the execution wall. “Somehow, the bullets didn’t hit me, and I survived,” he said with an incredulous laugh.

Although both Mohammed and Barazanji survived, their origins from Hama and their devout Sunni faith made them targets, and they were both eventually imprisoned. Barazanji was arrested in 1985 and spent years in some of Syria’s most notorious prisons. For the first four months, his hands were tied behind his back, and he could only pick food up from the floor with his mouth. “I would write poems for the birds on the windowsill. When my fellow prisoners died in my arms, I would read my works to them,” he said. After the massacre, Syria’s prisons were filled with people from Hama. Former prisoners from across the country told Middle East Eye that they had formed close bonds with the people of Hama. “The imprisonment of many Hama residents in the 1980s and 1990s contributed to the widespread Syrian perception of Hama as a symbol of resistance against injustice,” said Abdul Ghany. “This perception strengthened the solidarity of many Syrians with the people of Hama, but the regime tried to distort their image by portraying them as extremists and terrorists.”

Bashar al-Assad inherited the presidency in 2000 after the death of Hafez. But the government’s methods of oppressing Hama remained unchanged. Sporadic arrests, sham trials, and strict surveillance continued. The city was also politically and economically marginalized. As a result, when the Syrian revolution broke out in 2011, Hama became a stronghold of the opposition. The city hosted some of the largest protests, drawing half a million people. Abdul Basset Sarout, a footballer-turned-singer, referenced the massacre and the ensuing silence in his revolutionary song, “Paradise, Paradise.” “Oh, Hama city, forgive us. Because we owe you, you are one of us,” he sang. The government, well aware of its symbolism, crushed the city’s uprising in one of the earliest bloody crackdowns.

Maher Baz, a 64-year-old taxi driver, remembers how the army blocked all the streets as soldiers and tanks closed in. “They were shooting at everyone, including children. I saw many dead bodies,” he told Middle East Eye. Mahmoud Ibrahim Saeed was only 15 when the war broke out. He lived in Kafr Zein, a small village north of Hama. After his brother was killed in an attack on his village, Saeed joined the rebel forces to seek revenge. He said that the history of the Hama massacre and oppression also motivated him to take up arms. “The 1982 Hama massacre had a profound impact, not only on us, but on all Syrians and the world, especially the residents of the city of Hama and its suburbs,” he said. Throughout the civil war, Hama remained in the hands of Assad until a shocking rebel offensive late last year. Syrian soldiers, impoverished and demoralized, fled as rebel forces poured out of the Idlib province north of Hama. Within days, the front lines reached the city’s doorstep, and Assad’s forces began to dig in, preparing for a last stand.

The battlefield is now scattered with abandoned tanks, which curious children climb over. Shrapnel holes and spent cartridges hint at the five days of fierce fighting in early December, which Saeed also participated in. “When we liberated Hama, we deeply felt the end of the regime,” he said. “We never thought we would ever return to Hama in our lifetime. We dreamed of the city, our land, and our villages. When we saw the city and our homes, we really had tears in our eyes.”

Syria’s new rulers are left with a broken and traumatized country. Bringing the perpetrators of the atrocities to justice is just one of the many priorities that rebel leader Ahmed Shala, now interim president, needs to address. But 43 years have passed since the Hama massacre, and most of those behind it are dead or missing, with the exception of Rifaat al-Assad. The 87-year-old, known as the “Butcher of Hama,” is believed to have fled to Russia like his nephew, Bashar. Anwar al-Bunni, a human rights lawyer from Hama based in Berlin, hopes that justice can be served. He fled the city in the year of the massacre in 1981 and is now part of a team pursuing Syrian officials, including Rifaat, in European courts. “We have filed a case against him in Switzerland, and there is an arrest warrant out for him,” he told Middle East Eye. It is unlikely that Russia will hand over Rifaat anytime soon. After Bashar fled Syria on December 8, Moscow granted the Assad family asylum on “humanitarian” grounds. However, a trial in absentia may still take place in Switzerland. “No one will forget the massacre,” said Bunni. “No one will allow Rifaat to escape punishment.”