A Dangerous Dynasty: House of Assad, review: 'Confronts the viewer with their crimes, but tries to understand'

In a series of interviews with Syrian exiles, western diplomats and experts, a portrait of this dynasty of monsters is constructed

Hafez (seated) with Bashar (second from left) and the rest of the Assad family (AFP/Getty)

There is a quite unbelievable claim made in the documentary A Dangerous Dynasty: House of Assad about Hafez al-Assad, President of Syria from 1970 to 2000, and father of the present despot, Bashar.

The allegation is that Hafez required his male soldiers on military parades to stab puppies in front of him; and for his female recruits to bite the heads off live snakes. This, apparently, was to demonstrate their loyalty to him, and maybe give the old boy some kind of kick.

“Unbelievable”, that is, in the sense that it sounds like CIA or Mossad propaganda, or “fake news” as we call it these days. But then you reflect on what Assad and son have done to the human beings in their country and it seems quite credible. Moreover, in a remarkable collection of home movies, interviews and archive material, the documentary makers also found what looks to be original, slightly wonky video footage of these sickening events. So cruelty to animals was one of Hafez’s many sadistic character traits.

Sadism, yes, but also the raw cunning to retain his grip on power until his death – and, after all, so few dictators do get to die peacefully, it must be adjudged an achievement of sorts.

He was also able to engineer the succession of his second son, Bashar, to the presidency. As one Middle East expert explained, a dynastic succession is essential for a ruling family to evade prosecution for its crimes, continue to enjoy power and retain its wealth.

In a series of interviews with Syrian exiles, western diplomats and experts, a portrait of this dynasty of monsters is constructed. Warts and all. For Bashar was by no means the only psychopath around the Assad family dinner table. Bashar’s late mummy Anisa, for example, was by accounts an even tougher cookie than the menfolk, and her advice to Bashar to grow some balls (or Arabic words to that effect) will have cost the lives of many a Syrian.

Then there was Bashar’s brother, Majd, a drug user with mental health problems. Another sibling was Maher, Anisa’s favourite, but judged too hot headed even for the Assads.

Bashar’s only sister, Bushra would probably have been Hafez’s first choice to succeed him as head of the family and of the nation, but for her automatic disqualification on account of her gender. Then there’s the elder president Assad’s brother Rifaat, Bashar’s uncle, who was for many years Hafez’s loyal accomplice. The pair, siblings from a family of 11 brought up in grinding poverty, used the army as their ladder of social mobility, planning coups and executing rivals all the way. Then Rifaat tried to take power though a coup of his own while Hafez was recovering from a heart attack. Thoughtful of him. Rifaat was lucky to have got away with just being exiled.

The obvious choice for the succession was Hafez’s eldest son, the handsome Bassel, a fine horseman and lively personality who had been groomed for the role from an early age. However, this spoiled young man had an addiction to fast cars, and died in a genuine (for a change) car accident on his way to the airport in 1994, driving, as usual his Mercedes recklessly in the fog. “Is it a coup?” were the first words of Hafez when told of his son’s death.

Which meant that the succession fell to the unlikely figure of Bashar al-Assad. He was shy, physically unprepossessing, all gangly with that oddly elongated neck, and occupied in pleasant obscurity as a surgeon at the West London Eye Hospital. Nicely playing over some atmospheric shots of London in the early 1990s were the strains of “In the Air Tonight”, by Phil Collins. No Jacket Required was apparently the LP of choice for the future Butcher of Syria to relax to after a hard day in the operating theatre. Now he was to be given a crash course in how to be a Middle East dictator: jacket, and full military fig, definitely required.

Was he a good student? He made it from kindly doctor to barrel bomber in about two decades, and is hanging on in Damascus, so yes.

How so, this transformation?

The programme makers dug out the psychologist employed by the CIA to analyse Bashar’s personality, who concluded that Bashar is driven by having his “father sitting on his shoulder”, pushing him on to ever more ruthlessness and inhumanity, including, as we now know, chemical weapons.

The contrast was drawn between father and son by one who knew both. Hafez was “a modest, brutal, cold leader ... thoughtful and pragmatic about how he applied himself ... Bashar acts on impulse”.

There is a temptation to regard Bashar’s wife Asma, nee Akras, as some sort of Middle Eastern Lady Macbeth. She grew up in a Syrian family living in Acton, and her mother, who worked at the Syrian embassy in London, made sure that the pretty and smart Asma caught the eye of the president’s boy. Asma seems to have had some mother-in-law issues after the wedding, but what influence this ex-investment banker has over Bashar remains unclear, so far, even with the forensic examination given to her life in this first of three episodes psychoanalysing the dynasty.

This documentary could easily be one of those History Channel-style sketches of the autocrats of history, pornographic in its detailing of atrocities but offering little real insight. Here was the opposite approach, confronting the viewer with their crimes, but trying to understand too the political, social and personal factors acting on the Assad family. Will the Bashar Assad regime survive long enough for Bashar to be succeeded by his son, Hafez (named after his granddad)? Maybe, in fact, we don’t really want to know the answer to that question.