Mr. Abdullah Hassan was killed and another person was injured on December 8, 2025, as a result of an attack targeting homes of civilians from the Alawite community in the Al-Qouz neighborhood in the city of Baniyas in Tartus Province in western Syria, after direct gunfire carried out by armed men on several houses inside the neighborhood.
According to the information received, the gunfire struck a number of scattered homes inhabited by members of the Alawite community in the Al-Qouz neighborhood. One fatality and one injury were recorded in two different houses. Although some parties described the gunfire as “random” and resulting from celebrations, the circulating accounts within the neighborhood indicate that the homes were directly targeted and that the shots struck specific locations inside the neighborhood.
Residents also reported that the attacks targeted homes whose occupants were not participating in the celebrations linked to the first anniversary of the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime, reinforcing the impression that the targeting was punitive or intimidating in nature.
The incident coincided with a general strike witnessed in cities and towns in western Syria, affecting various aspects of life, during which residents stayed in their homes in response to a call by the head of the Supreme Alawite Islamic Council in Syria and the Diaspora, Sheikh Ghazal Ghazal, who announced a five-day strike for the Alawite community from December 8 to 12, 2025.
The call for the strike came at a time when the interim authority, “Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham,” called for celebrating the anniversary of the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime and its assumption of power on the same date.
Initial information reveals that the killing of Abdullah Hassan and the injury of another civilian occurred in the context of general tension between calls for a strike and imposed celebrations, amid direct targeting of homes of members of the Alawite community in the Al-Qouz neighborhood in the city of Baniyas.
