The Fourth Criminal Court at the Palace of Justice in Damascus held the first session in the trial of Syria’s former Grand Mufti Ahmed Badr al-Din Hassoun on Thursday, June 25, on charges related to incitement, urging, moral assistance, and providing religious and political legitimacy for the actions of the former Syrian regime, its allies, and affiliated militias.

The charges presented during the session included:

• Hassoun’s broad ties with pillars of the former regime, his use of the mufti post for personal positions, and his relations outside official frameworks with ousted regime head Bashar al-Assad, former General Intelligence Directorate chief Ali Mamlouk, senior army officers, and leaders of sectarian militias that fought in Syria.
• Delivering lectures before hundreds of officers in the former army, urging them to support the regime against its opponents.
• Taking part in media interviews and statements that included incitement against civilians in areas that rose up against the regime and against refugees.
• Asking civilians in eastern areas, through the official al-Ikhbariya channel, to evacuate their areas.
• Asking the former army to annihilate areas from which shells were fired
• Threatening residents of Idlib governorate with killing and displacement by saying, “We will come to you, and the Turkish army will not protect you.”
• Praising former army Brig. Gen. Issam Zahreddine, who was killed in Deir Ezzor, through recorded clips, while he was involved in “war crimes,” killing, and destruction in the Douma area and the Syrian Jazira.
• Supporting Russian and Iranian intervention in Syria and the massacres against Syrians that accompanied it.
• Supporting Iranian Revolutionary Guard commander Qasem Soleimani, who was killed in a US strike in Iraq, while he was involved in “war crimes” and extermination in Aleppo city and other Syrian cities.

The judge said during the session that these repeated statements amounted to incitement against “revolutionary” civilian areas and support for the crimes carried out by the regime and its allied militias. He said the statements were made by Hassoun in his official and religious capacity and within his symbolic status as Syria’s mufti.

The judge added that the statements were issued in the context of an armed conflict, when Hassoun, by virtue of his position, was expected to know that the forces he addressed or whose actions he supported were committing “crimes” on a wide and systematic scale. This made his statements an incentive and a religious cover, according to the judge.

The judge also said the statements amounted to support for the regime in recruiting militias to back the killing machine, which ultimately led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of victims at the hands of various military forces affiliated with the Assad regime, in addition to the disappeared, the forcibly disappeared, and dozens of cities destroyed completely.

According to the judge, this makes Hassoun a partner in the consequences resulting from these operations.

Rulings Linked to the Charges

The judge said these crimes are subject to the following rulings:

• War crimes and crimes against humanity are not subject to statutes of limitation, an established rule in customary law given their exceptional gravity and their impact on the international community as a whole.
• Pardons are not permissible because these are grave crimes that affect the international community.
• Accountability continues regardless of the passage of time or changes in legal systems.
• Reliance is placed on what was stated in the temporary constitutional declaration, which excluded war crimes, crimes against humanity, and all crimes from the exception related to the non-retroactivity of laws.

“Not an Ordinary Person”

The public prosecutor said during his pleading that the trial was not of an ordinary person, but of someone who had held a senior religious position and was expected to be a symbol of calm and the sparing of bloodshed, yet slipped into the discourse of incitement, justification, and legitimization of killing, according to his description.

According to the public prosecutor, Hassoun’s file established that he exploited his position as mufti of Aleppo city and later as Grand Mufti of the republic by building a strong network of relations with state officials and security branches, most notably Assad and Mamlouk. Mamlouk established a security institute to train officers in the army and security services, where Hassoun delivered lectures, making him responsible for the crime of abuse of influence, according to the public prosecutor.

The public prosecutor also said Hassoun appeared in several media interviews that incited against the Syrian revolution and the killing of its men.

In one interview, Hassoun threatened that Syrians and Lebanese would head to Europe as “martyrs” if Europe fired a missile at Syria.

The public prosecutor noted that European countries witnessed bombings around two months after the statement, killing many civilians, which he said made Hassoun responsible for the crime of incitement to intentional killing.

He also pointed to Hassoun’s closeness to Iran, which he visited several times to sign agreements under the pretext of “combating terrorism,” while what was meant at the time was “fighting revolutionaries in Syria,” according to the public prosecutor.

The public prosecutor also accused him of recognizing Shiites as a sect rather than as a jurisprudential or doctrinal school.

Lawyer Abdulrahman al-Tabbaa is representing Hassoun, while the personal claimant is Mohammed al-Ali bin Ramadan.

The Ministry of Justice did not broadcast the full session, showing only the charges and the public prosecutor’s pleading.

According to a correspondent for the official al-Ikhbariya channel, the session was postponed until July 16.

“Mufti of the Barrels”

Ahmed Badr al-Din Mohammed Adeeb Hassoun was born in Aleppo city on April 25, 1949. He served as mufti in Syria during the era of the former Syrian regime, which abolished the position in 2021 in favor of strengthening the role of the “Jurisprudential Scientific Council” and expanding its powers.

During his tenure, Hassoun was known for his support and absolute backing of the former regime and his loyalty to Iran. He met with several leaders of Iranian militias that fought in Syria, particularly in Aleppo.

Because of his support for the regime, activists nicknamed him the “Mufti of the Barrels.”

After the regime’s fall, Hassoun disappeared for an initial period, leading to speculation that he had fled to a European country after a widely circulated image appeared to show him in France. A later recording documented that he was still in Syria.

After the recording appeared, a number of activists gathered around his house in Aleppo to demand his arrest and accountability.

According to his relatives, Syrian security arrested Hassoun while he was heading to an Arab capital for treatment.

Hassoun studied at the al-Khusrawiya Sharia School in Aleppo during preparatory and secondary school, then obtained a doctorate from Egypt’s al-Azhar University.

He worked as a preacher and imam in several mosques in Aleppo city, most notably the Umayyad Mosque and al-Rawda Mosque.

According to the Syrian Memory website, Hassoun headed the Association for Raising the Health and Social Standard in Aleppo, which opened several hospitals and health centers in the city.

According to Enab Baladi’s monitoring, these associations stopped operating after the regime’s fall, while organizations took over support for centers that had belonged to the association.

Hassoun ran for membership in the Syrian People’s Assembly on the independents’ list in 1990 and won membership for two consecutive terms that ended in 1998.

He was appointed director of endowments in Aleppo city in 2007. Before that, he was appointed Grand Mufti of the republic after the death of former mufti Ahmed Kuftaro on July 16, 2005.

In addition to this position, Hassoun headed the Sharia Advisory Board of the Money and Credit Council at the Central Bank of Syria and the general assembly of the World Forum for Proximity of Islamic Schools of Thought. He was also a member of the World Forum for Proximity of Islamic Schools of Thought in Iran, according to Syrian Memory.

A Series of Trials

Hassoun’s trial comes as part of a series of trials at the Fourth Criminal Court in Damascus for figures affiliated with the former regime, most notably Atef Najib and Wassim al-Assad, relatives of the ousted president.

On Wednesday, June 24, trial sessions began for Wassim al-Assad, the cousin of the ousted regime’s president, who faced a broad set of charges linked to events Syria has witnessed since the start of the revolution in 2011.

The court also resumed the trial of defendant Atef Najib, holding the fourth session on June 23, which was attended by representatives of international and human rights organizations.

It was a closed session that media outlets did not attend and was devoted entirely to hearing statements from public prosecution witnesses, according to the Syrian Arab News Agency, SANA.

Syria Trials to Include Atef Najib, Hassoun, Wassim al-Assad