‘Houdini – only better’ is how Syrian gymnast Lais Najjar describes himself on his Instagram profile. He is one of the six Olympic participants that Syria’s official news agency SANA proudly reported on in mid-July.
Najjar has been awarded a so-called ‘Universality Spot’. According to the official website of the Olympic Games, these are reserved for ‘nations that are traditionally underrepresented’ to ensure more diversity at the Games. As laudable as the intention may be, in the case of Syria the question arises as to how much the low number of Olympic participants is a home-made problem. For one thing, there are almost twice as many Syrian athletes actually competing in Paris in 2024, eleven in total. So the country is not lacking in talent. But the official regime count ignores five of those of whom the nation could be proud – because they are not competing under the Syrian flag, but as part of the international team of refugees. This is emblematic of Syrian demographics, as around half of the Syrian population is displaced.
Secondly, in a state characterized by corruption, even the ability to participate in sports is traditionally based on loyalty and personal connections. This has little to do with fair play, and sometimes international sports associations also contribute to the politicization. It is particularly macabre, for example, that FIFA adopts the regime’s claim that the Syrian national team is ‘neutral’. Steve Fainaru quoted the Syrian sports reporter Anas Ammo in his 2017 article on ‘The Dictator’s Team’ saying 38 top Syrian footballers alone had been shot, killed in bombings, or tortured to death by the regime by then. Thirteen more, according to Ammo, had disappeared, and four had been murdered by ISIS.
Members of the Assad regime and their friends have a particular penchant for horse riding. This applies to both Bassel Assad, the older brother of Bashar who died in his Mercedes when speeding on the last bend before Damascus airport, and his younger brother Maher. The late Bassel Assad, the son originally intended to be his successor by his father Hafez, loved to be portrayed with horses. An equestrian statue was even erected to honor him in the border town of Chtaura in the part of Lebanon occupied by Syria at the time. This in turn was of such national importance that it had to be dismantled and taken away during the hasty Syrian withdrawal in 2005 due to Assad’s alleged masterminding of the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri. In 2020, when Syria had long been in a deep economic crisis after nine years of war, the regime opened a museum for the ‘martyr, the “Golden Knight Basil al-Assad”’ in its stronghold of Latakia. On 8,000 square meters, visitors can admire trophies, his riding gear, saddles, and other objects devoted to the late speedster.
Whether we believe Syrian regime athletes deserve to participate in the Olympics or not, we can look forward to Paris 2024 in terms of show jumping, as a colorful figure from Maher Assad’s inner circle, Amre Hamsho, will be competing.
It appears, however, that sporting rivalries may have taken a less dramatic turn since then. In 2019, Bashar Assad’s niece, the daughter of his younger brother Maher, inspired a plethora of mockery with photos in which she balances on the first and second steps of the winner’s podium with one leg each, holding the corresponding awards in her hands. “Thoughts & prayers with the official who didn’t also give her the third place,” “Is it because #2 was ‘accidentally’ run over by a car a minute before climbing on the podium?” and “Fortunately she doesn’t have three legs,” were some of the sarcastic comments being made by long-time observers of Syrian politics on Twitter at the time.
Whether we believe Syrian regime athletes deserve to participate in the Olympics or not, we can look forward to Paris 2024 in terms of show jumping, as a colorful figure from Maher Assad’s inner circle, Amre Hamsho, will be competing. Assad’s younger brother Maher is responsible for the notorious 4th Armoured Division – an elite unit of the Syrian army with particularly close ties to Iran, which has made a name for itself in recent years, less for its fighting power than for its business acumen in the regime’s profitable drug trade with Captagon.
When Amre Hamsho qualified for the 2024 Olympic Games, the magazine of the International Equestrian Federation cheered Destination Paris: A Syrian star’s dream comes true!.
If the USA wasn’t so preoccupied with itself, the Hamsho family coming to Paris for the 2024 Olympics could ignite a transatlantic scandal. Amre and Ahmad, like their parents, are subject to the so-called ‘Caesar Sanctions Act’.
Last autumn, a Syrian official of the Syrian Olympic Committee – Omar al-Aroub, who himself has now been banned from the Olympic Games because he is involved in human rights violations – described Amre and his brother Ahmad Hamsho’s participation in the Asian Games in Hangzhou, China, as a ‘message of peace, of hope’. The Hamsho family is considered to be closely intertwined with the regime, and they are profiteers of the war. The fact that the Hamshos are said to have made a fortune by dismantling infrastructure and property is particularly explosive when it comes to the question of who should pay for reconstruction in Syria. According to the Financial Times, they have provided the equipment to tear ironwork from the structures of houses in cities recaptured by the regime in order to sell it as scrap metal, especially in Daraya, once Syria’s seventh largest city, which was depopulated as a punishment because of its clear stance against the regime.
If the USA wasn’t so preoccupied with itself, the Hamsho family coming to Paris for the 2024 Olympics could ignite a transatlantic scandal. Amre and Ahmad, like their parents, are subject to the so-called ‘Caesar Sanctions Act’. The US government uses this to target those Syrians who are particularly implicated in human rights crimes. The regime sanctions are named after a photographer who took more than 55,000 photographs of the victims tortured to death on behalf of the regime before defecting and smuggling the images out of Syria. In case of doubt, the coercive measures of the USA under these regime sanctions can also extend to third countries.
Amre’s father Mohammad Hamsho, a businessman and former member of parliament in Syria, is not likely to cheer on his son from the stands: He is also on the EU sanctions list because of his profit-orientated support for regime crimes. His brother Ahmad, who, at the age of 19 competed at the 2012 Olympic Games in London, took the opportunity to give an interview at the time. ‘My government only defends the country against people with weapons,’ Ahmad said, presenting the regime’s violent crushing of the initially peaceful revolution as if it was only a matter of fighting “terrorists”, effectively parroting the regime’s propaganda. At the time, more than 10,000 Syrians who had taken to the streets for freedom and dignity had already fallen victim to the regime’s arbitrary violence. For many Syrians, Amre Hamsho’s “dream” of participating in the Olympics is more akin to their worst nightmares.
