Origins of the Crisis
The al-Assad regime first came into power in 1970 after a bloodless military coup put the government in the hands of Hafiz al-Assad, the father of current Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. Hafiz al-Assad established an authoritarian regime and kept the country under an emergency law that was first implemented in 1962. Under the Syrian constitution, the president is granted the right to call a State of Emergency, which strips citizens of most constitutional rights and gives the government almost unlimited power in regards to domestic security. With the ability to arrest, detain, and execute dissidents whenever it sees fit, the government under Hafiz al-Assad was able to intimidate Syrian citizens and deter them from protesting en masse. As a result, al-Assad was able to quell popular resistance with relative ease until 1976, which marked the beginning of an insurrection headed by the fundamentalist Sunni organization, the Muslim Brotherhood.
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