1973-1982: Israel and Jordan Support Muslim Brotherhood Terrorism Against Syria

In 1973 Hafez Assad approves a new, secular constitution for Syria, and declares that the country is a “democratic, popular, socialist state,” creating a backlash of violent Islamist demonstrations. Beginning in 1976, the Muslim Brotherhood carries out hundreds of attacks in Syria in an attempt to bring down the secular government. Israel and Jordan provide generous support for these operations, for example establishing training camps for the Muslim Brotherhood in Lebanon and Jordan near the Syrian border. In one incident in 1979, a gang of Brotherhood militants murders 83 military cadets by locking them inside a buliding and attacking it with automatic weapons and firebombs. Newsweek reports in 1981 that “over the past five years the Brotherhood has assassinated hundreds of Alawite members of Assad’s ruling Baath Parthy along with their relatives, Assad’s personal doctor, and a number of Soviet advisers.” In 1982, the Syrian army brutally suppresses the Muslim Brotherhood and their supporters, massacring thousands in the city of Hama, a strong center of support for the Brotherhood. This puts an end to the wave of violence. [Dreyfuss, 2005, pp. 199-205]