Hama: Assad appoints new head for security committee

(Zaman Al Wasl)- Head of the security and military committee in Hama, Abdo Issa Ibrahim, has been dismissed only two months after appointing, and the former Head, Jamal Yunus has been re-appointed for the position.

Appointing Yunus for the Head of Security and Military committee is the third change for this position in less than a year, which reflects the disruption in decisions made by Bashar al-Assad and his security consultants, added to the heated competition among different forces in Hama, which is considered on of the most important provinces in Syria for its position as a connecting point between the coastal region and inland.

It seems that forces benefiting from the province’s advantages like position, harvests, connecting routes between northern, coastal and inland areas, have been playing main role in decisions related to appointing the Head of the security and military committee, because he would protect them and provide them with the legal cover for their operations like armed robbery, smuggling, enforcing illegal fees. All these circumstances have created new wealthy and influential people like: Ali al-Shila, Talal Daqaq and his brother Tareq, Salah Asi and many others. 

Returning Yunus to the position came after the defeat of the regime’s forces and allied militias in the Northern countryside of Hama. He was in the same position 2014-2015. 

Yunus appeared in the controversial picture of former minister Kinda Shamat, and Colonel Suhail al-Hasan, known as “Nimr”, that picture resulted in dismissing the minster from her position few days later.

Although, at the time of taking the picture, Yunus was in higher rank than “Nimr”, but the later was focused on in media and comment about the picture. 

Jamal Yunus’s name was mentioned in a report for Human Rights Watch published end of 2011, in a testimony confirmed his participation in shooting peaceful demonstrators, when he was the commander of the Troupe 555 of Paratroopers, affiliate of Fourth Band, controlled by Maher al-Assad.