Syrian politician The Syrian leader Amin el-Hafez who led the Ba'ath government of the mid-1960s passed away, in Aleppo, in his 80s. Amin al-Hafez took over as president of the National Council of the Revolutionary Command, the Ba'ath government's equivalent of head of state, in 1963, after the party crushed a coup attempt. He served as deputy prime minister and interior minister in the government. The Ba'ath government nationalised all Arab-owned banks in Syria, as well as the country's oil and mineral resources and other industries. Close to the pan-Arab leadership of the Ba'ath Party el-Hafez's government ran into increasing opposition from the party's left wing, and in 1966 he was overthrown in a coup and placed under arrest. He spent most of the rest of his life in exile in Iraq, where a 1968 coup brought the pan-Arab wing of the Ba'ath party to power. El-Hafez returned to Syria after the US-led invasion of Iraq, in 2003, overthrew Saddam Hussein and the Ba'ath government.