Career
Supported by independent sources
According to The Syrian Memory, al-Halabi was born in Quneitra governorate in 1961, graduated in medicine from Damascus University in 1987 and specialised there in obstetrics and gynaecology, then studied reproductive biology and laparoscopic surgery in France and obtained a doctorate in embryology and reproductive medicine in 1997. He was vice-dean for scientific affairs of Damascus University’s Faculty of Medicine, medical director of the fertility unit at al-Sharq Hospital, which he co-founded, and from August 2022 director of the Biological Therapies Research Centre. He was appointed Minister of Higher Education on 29 March 2025. 1
His published biography lists academic and medical posts only. 1
The 2026–2027 admission announcement
Supported by independent sources
The ministry’s admission announcement for 2026–2027, published on 30 September 2026, ends with his name, signature and the ministry’s seal. In its signed body it lists the land, naval and air military colleges and the Faculty of Humanities and Administrative Sciences of the new National University for Defence Sciences — management and economics, legal sciences and social sciences — and the Faculty and Technical Institute of Security Sciences of the Syrian University for Security Sciences as open to men only (“males only”). 2
On the same day, according to the state broadcaster al-Ikhbariya, he set out the general rules of the admission round, telling applicants to the two new universities that they must first pass their entrance tests, and applicants to the nursing schools and the oil, gas and railway institutes to check the age conditions and special conditions of each programme. 3
In July 2026 he called the presidential decrees creating the two universities “a strategic step” in specialised higher education in security and defence; in June he had met a Defence Ministry delegation led by Maj. Gen. Salim Idris to discuss cooperation in military training and academic development. 4 5
As of 6 October 2026, Al-Modon, Al Arab and Snack Syrian reported that the ministry had given no public explanation for restricting these programmes to men. 6 7 8 The announcement does not say which institution set each condition; the two universities were created by presidential decree, and the Defence Ministry says the defence university is the result of its months of work. 2 4
