On February 23, 1966 the neo-Baathist Military Committee led by army chief of staff Salah Jadid overthrew the ruling National Command of the Baath Party and its figurehead President Amin al-Hafiz, in the deepest schism in the party's history. The clash pitted the party's pan-Arab old guard, founders Michel Aflaq and Salah al-Din al-Bitar, against a radical, largely Alawite and Druze military faction favoring accelerated socialist transformation and a Syria first orientation. After the National Command tried in late 1965 to bar the Regional Command from moving officers, Jadid staged a ruse on February 21, reporting a mutiny on the Golan front that lured al-Hafiz and defense minister Muhammad Umran there; when they returned exhausted to Damascus, Jadid struck at dawn on February 23, sending tanks against al-Hafiz's residence.
In a roughly three hour shootout in which al-Hafiz was wounded and two of his children seriously injured, his guards ran out of ammunition and surrendered. Air force commander Hafez al-Assad secured the air bases. Al-Hafiz was jailed at Mezzeh prison until 1967, then exiled; Aflaq and Bitar fled abroad.
Jadid ruled from the shadows until Assad's 1970 coup.
Researched Details
Researched
Independent research, added record by record. Hover any label for what it means.
Target identified in Coup Atlas research: President Amin al-Hafiz, wounded in the roughly three hour shootout at his residence (two of his children seriously injured), then arrested and jailed at Mezzeh prison in Damascus until 1967 before exile to Iraq.
RESEARCHED NAME
Key figures
Amin al-Hafiz (president wounded, then jailed)
Salah Jadid (army chief of staff, coup leader and de facto ruler)
Hafez al-Assad (air force commander who secured the air bases, became defense minister)
Michel Aflaq and Salah al-Din al-Bitar (old guard founders driven into exile)
Sources
The 1966 Syrian coup, also known as the 23 February Movement, saw the ruling National Command of the Baath Party removed by a union of the Military Committee and Regional Branch under Salah Jadid; on 21 February old guard supporters ordered the transfer of their rivals, and two days later the Military Committee launched a coup involving violent fighting in Aleppo, Damascus, Deir ez-Zor, and Latakia, in the deepest schism in the Baath movement's history.
On 23 February 1966 President Amin al-Hafiz was overthrown by a radical Baathist faction under chief of staff Salah Jadid; after being wounded in the three hour shootout that preceded the coup, in which two of his children were seriously injured, al-Hafiz was jailed in Damascus's Mezzeh prison, later exiled to Iraq and given asylum by Saddam Hussein.
An account of the coup records that Jadid staged a crisis by telling defense minister Umran on 21 February that fighting had broken out among officers on the front, forcing Umran, al-Hafiz, and the chief of staff to rush to the Golan Heights to prevent a mutiny that was a hoax; when they returned to Damascus on 23 February, Jadid attacked al-Hafiz's private residence with a squadron of tanks at 5 am, resulting in a shootout in which two of al-Hafiz's children were injured, and his forces surrendered after running out of ammunition.
SOURCE REVIEWEDMiddle East Monitor, Remembering the 1966 Syrian coup d'etatopen source ↗
A history of the event records that on 23 February 1966 the neo-Baathist Military Committee carried out an intra-party rebellion against the Baathist old guard of Aflaq and Bitar, imprisoned President Amin al-Hafiz, and designated a civilian Baath government on 1 March, with Nureddin al-Atassi as formal head of state while Salah Jadid was Syria's effective ruler until November 1970, when Hafez al-Assad deposed him.
Fate coding: the dataset's combined injured and arrested or jailed fate is directly documented: al-Hafiz was wounded in the roughly three hour shootout at his residence and then jailed at Mezzeh prison until 1967. Some accounts frame the wounding as occurring during his forces' defense; the injury to two of his children is consistently reported and noted. Arc links: this ties to the two prior Syria records enriched in batch 14, the 8 March 1963 Baathist coup (which brought al-Hafiz's faction toward power) and the 27 July 1963 events; the February 1966 coup is the neo-Baathist turn that purged the Aflaqite founders. Arc forward: Jadid ruled from the shadows until Hafez al-Assad's November 1970 Corrective Revolution, a later dataset event.
Cross-Reference
Datasets agree. At least two of the three reference datasets we check against carry this event, and none of them disagrees about its date or its result.
Identifiers for finding this same event in the other datasets:
Coup Atlas research identifies the target as: President Amin al-Hafiz, wounded in the roughly three hour shootout at his residence (two of his children seriously injured), then arrested and jailed at Mezzeh prison in Damascus until 1967 before exile to Iraq..
Baseline coding: Incumbent executive removed from power. Recorded leader fate: deposed; injured; arrested or jailed. The baseline file does not name individual targets; researched names are kept in a separate layer.
Baseline Dataset Citation
Cline Center Coup d’État Project Dataset, v2.2.2
Peyton, Buddy, Joseph Bajjalieh, Michael Martin, and Andrea Gerald. 2026. Cline Center Coup d’État Project Dataset. Cline Center for Advanced Social Research. V.2.2.2. February 17. University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. doi: 10.13012/B2IDB-9651987_V10
“Syrian Strongman is Reported Ousted in Damascus Coup,” February 23, 1966
“SYRIA ISSUES LAW TO GUARD ECONOMY Jail Decreed for Hoarders and Negligent Workers $200-Million Smuggled Out,” May 17, 1966
This is the citation trail carried by the baseline dataset, grouped by outlet and rejoined from the line-wrapped original. Coup Atlas has not independently re-checked every document; read the original before citing a specific claim. URLs the import damaged beyond safe repair are shown as plain text and listed in citations-report.md. How this list is built →