Syrian court sentences two to death over 2025 coastal violence

A court in Syria has sentenced to death two supporters of the ousted Bashar al-Assad regime for inciting an uprising last year, and handed hefty sentences to members of the current government’s security forces for the killing of hundreds of civilians from the Alawite religious minority.

The Military Criminal Court at the Justice Palace in the northern city of Aleppo gave death sentences to Al-Waddah Ismail and Maher Ali, according to state media.

The Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) reported that the pair were convicted of seeking to incite civil war and sectarian fighting and for leading armed gangs with the intent to attack public forces.

A third defendant, Maher Othman, was sentenced to 12 years in prison, the court also announced on Thursday without immediately specifying the charges on which he was convicted.

In separate rulings, the court sentenced Mohammed Bakour, a member of the Defence Ministry’s 82nd Division in the new government, to 20 years in prison after convicting him of intentional homicide.

It also sentenced Ammar Abdul Aal to three years for torture and acquitted Abdul Raouf Bakrjan and Mohammed Zarzouri, SANA said.

The rulings concern investigations carried out by a government committee into attacks in March last year. At least 1,426 people, mostly civilians, were killed in several days of sectarian violence in the predominantly Alawite areas of Syria’s coastal regions.

The defendants included loyalists to the former al-Assad regime and members of the new government’s security forces. It is the first time government-linked personnel have been put on trial for acts of violence.

The government committee said it had identified 298 suspects implicated in serious violations during the violence in the Alawite heartland.

The committee’s investigation documented “serious violations against civilians on March 7, 8 and 9 [2025], including murder, premeditated murder, looting, destruction and burning of homes, torture and sectarian insults”.

The committee said 238 members of the army and security forces were killed by pro-Assad fighters in the attacks in the provinces of Tartous, Latakia and Hama.

About 200,000 pro-government military reinforcements then converged on the area, carrying out alleged revenge killings.

Al Jazeera’s Heidi Pett, reporting from the Syrian capital, Damascus, said the uprising was started by individuals still loyal to the regime of al-Assad, who himself is from the Alawite religious minority.

“After the Assad regime fell and its leadership fled the country at the end of 2024, supporters including loyal soldiers from the ousted regime as well as militia members fled to the mountains from where they launched an uprising in March 2025 against the new government”, Pett said.

She added that forces loyal to the new government are accused of killing civilians from the Alawite minority group in revenge attacks.

“These trials are for seven men who took part in the initial pro-Assad uprising, and also seven members of the new government’s security forces who were subsequently deployed into the area and are accused of carrying out revenge attacks,” she said.