Fahd Jassem al-Freij (Arabic: فهد جاسم الفريج;[1] born 17 January 1950) is a retired Syrian military officer and the former Minister of Defense of Syria, took office on 18 July 2012 and left office on 1 January 2018.[2]
Early life and education
Freij was born in Rahjan in a Sunni Arab tribe on 17 January 1950. He joined the Syrian Arab Army in 1968, and graduated as an armoured corps lieutenant from the Homs Military Academy in 1971.
Freij attended different courses and a higher military education:
On 8 August 2011, Freij was appointed Chief of Staff of the Syrian Arab Army during the Syrian civil war. In December 2011, defected Syrian Army officers reported that prior to his appointment of Chief of Staff, al-Freij commanded the Syrian Army Special Forces in the regions of Daraa, Idlib and Hama during the Syrian uprising.
However, on 18 July 2012, after Defense Minister Dawoud Rajiha was assassinated in the 2012 Damascus bombing, Freij was appointed by Bashar al-Assad to succeed Rajiha.[1] He was also named as Deputy Commander-in-Chief of the Army and the Armed Forces.[3]
On 1 January 2018, Lieutenant General Ali Abdullah Ayyoub was the successor of al-Freij as Minister of Defense.[2]
War crime charges
In October 2023, French prosecutors at the Judicial Court of Paris charged Fahd Jassem Al-Freij and his successor Ali Ayyoub for their culpability in a barrel bomb in southwestern Syrian city of Daraa that killed French-Syrian national Salah Abou Nabout at his home in 2017.[4]
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