Shabiha

According to defectors privately interviewed by The Star in 2012, 'Shabiha mercenaries' were established in the 1980s by Rifaat al-Assad and Namir al-Assad, President Hafez al-Assad's brother and cousin. They were originally concentrated in the Mediterranean region of Syria around Latakia, Banias and Tartous, where they allegedly benefited from smuggling through the ports in the area. The shabiha, who were named for the Arabic word for ghost or for the Mercedes-Benz W140 that was popular for its smuggling sized trunk and was called the Shabah, During the late 1980s and early 1990s, they smuggled food, cigarettes and commodities, subsidized by the government, from Syria into Lebanon and sold them for a massive profit, while luxury cars, guns and drugs were smuggled in reverse from Lebanon up the Bekaa Valley and into Syria's state controlled economy. By the mid-1990s, they had gotten out of hand, and President Hafez al-Assad had his son Bassel al-Assad clamp down on them, which he did successfully. In 2000, when Bashar al-Assad came to power, they were apparently disbanded, but following the uprising that began in March 2011, the shabiha gangs, which evolved into the shabiha militias, were again approved by Assad's government. == Syrian Civil War ==

in Aleppo, July 2012 Upon the outbreak of the Syrian Revolution in 2011, the regime deployed the Shabiha death squads upon the demonstrators, ordering them to execute sectarian attacks on the protestors, torture Sunni demonstrators and engage in anti-Sunni rhetoric. This policy led to large-scale desertions within the army ranks and further defections of officers who began forming a resistance movement. In March 2011, activists reported that Shabiha drove through Latakia in cars armed with machine guns firing at protesters, and then later of taking up sniper position on rooftops and killing up to 21 people. The Syrian opposition, foreign governments, and human rights organizations accuse the shabiha militia of being a tool of the Syrian regime, operating as mercenaries to track down political opponents.The shabiha are accused of committing several atrocities and massacres in Syria after the revolution, including the Houla massacre and the Qubeir massacre in 2012. A month later in June, witnesses and refugees from the northwestern region said that the shabiha have reemerged during the uprising and were being used by the Assad regime to carry out "a scorched earth campaign […] burning crops, ransacking houses and shooting randomly." The Washington Post reported a case in which four sisters were raped by shabiha members. The shabiha are described to wear civilian clothes, trainers and white running shoes and often are taking steroids. A physician explained that "many of the men were recruited from bodybuilding clubs and encouraged to take steroids. They are treated like animals, and manipulated by their bosses to carry out these murders". One militiaman said he was ready to kill women and children to defend his friends, family and president: "Sunni women are giving birth to babies who will fight us in years to come, so we have the right to fight anyone who can hurt us in the future". In July 2012, a captured alleged shabiha member admitted looting and murder, stating that it was for "money and power". The newspaper Toronto Star describes Shabiha as "mafia militia […] smuggling commodities, appliances, drugs and guns between Syria and Lebanon at the behest of Assad’s extended family" and the Telegraph as "a group that suffers from a dangerous cocktail of religious indoctrination, minority paranoia and smuggler roots". In December 2012, NBC News reporter Richard Engel and his five crew members were abducted in Latakia. Having escaped after five days in captivity, Engel held a Shabiha group responsible for the abduction. Engel's account was however challenged from early on. More than two years later, following further investigation by The New York Times, it however came out that the NBC team "was almost certainly taken by a Sunni criminal element affiliated with the Free Syrian Army," rather than by a loyalist Shia group. The Syrian opposition, foreign governments, and human rights organizations accuse the Shabiha militia of being a tool of the Syrian regime, operating as mercenaries to track down political opponents. The Shabiha are accused of committing several atrocities and massacres in post-revolution Syria, including the Houla massacre and the 2012 al-Qubeir massacre. Houla massacre On May 25, 2012, 78 people, including 49 children, were killed in two opposition-controlled villages in the Houla Region of Syria, a cluster of villages north of Homs. and that witnesses affirmed that the Shabiha were the most likely perpetrators. Townspeople described how Shabiha, from Shia/Alawite villages to the south and west of Houla (Kabu and Felleh were named repeatedly), entered the town after shelling of the ground for several hours. According to one eyewitness, the killers had written Shia slogans on their foreheads. The U.N. reported that "entire families were shot in their houses", Others had been shot or knifed to death, some with their throats cut. The fifteen nations of the U.N. Security Council unanimously condemned the massacre, with Russia and China agreeing to a resolution on the Syrian Civil War for the first time. The U.S., U.K., and eleven other nations–the Netherlands, Australia, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, Bulgaria, Canada and Turkey–jointly expelled Syrian ambassadors and diplomats already 4 days after the massacre took place. Alleged role in Al-Qubair massacre Another massacre was reported but not investigated by local villagers and activists to have taken place in the Syrian settlement of Al-Qubair on June 6, 2012, only two weeks after the killings at Houla. According to BBC News, Al-Qubair is a farming settlement inside the village of Maarzaf. According to activists, 28 people were killed, many of them women and children. The day after the massacre, UNSMIS observers attempted to enter Al-Qubair to verify the reports, but were fired upon and forced to retreat by Sunni armed militia that had entered the city the day before. Reports published by the German newspaper FAZ in June 2012, claimed that the Houla massacre was instead perpetrated by rebel militias antagonistic to the Syrian government. == Leadership ==

In the coastal region, the group is reportedly led by Fawaz al-Assad and Munzer al-Assad, first cousins of President Assad. In Aleppo: Abdul Malik Bri, Zeno Bri, and the Bri gang. In Damascus: Issam Zahreddine, Moataz Shamso. In Hama: Talal Daqaq, Ali Al-Shala, Salah Al-Asi. In Latakia: Hilal al-Assad, Muhammad Tawfiq al-Assad, Haroun al-Assad, Fawaz al-Assad, Jaafar Shalish, Muhannad Hatem, Ayman Jaber == Accusation of looting and outside analysis ==

Aron Lund, a Swedish journalist specializing in Middle East issues, says that post-2011 the term "Shabbiha" is generally used as a generalized, insulting description of an Assad supporter. British newspaper Sunday Times and pan-Arab network Al-Arabiya have reported on Shabiha militia stealing Roman antiquities and selling them on the black market in Syria and Lebanon. == See also ==