Muhammad Talab Hilal: Syrian Ba'athist functionary and author of the Arab Belt ethnic cleansing policy

He was a cabinet minister in the Ba'athist government of Yusuf Zuayyin and continued to be a cabinet minister in later governments. Before that, he was governor of Hama. Before that, Hilal was the chief of police in al-Hasakah. While he was a chief of police, Hilal wrote a book on Syria's Jazira region (part of Mesopotamia). This book was important for the Syrian government's plan for the "Arab Belt" ethnic cleansing programme in Syrian Kurdistan.

Hilal completed his National, Political, and Social Study of the Province of Jazira on 13 November 1963.^{: 22–24 : 471 : 283, 342–345} This book said that the Syrian government should begin the "Arab Belt" programme. Hilal wrote that the government should force Kurdish people who lived near the borders between Syria and Turkey and between Syria and Iraq to move. Then, the government could move Arab people into the area to take their lands.^: 22–24 The Arab Belt ethnic cleansing programme began in 1973 and continued until 1976.^{: 22–24 : 471 : 263} The government accepted Hilal's plan in 1965. When Hilal's National, Political, and Social Study of the Province of Jazira became public in 1968, the Syrian government claimed that these were only Hilal's ideas. The Arab Belt programme did not begin before 1973 because the government had not yet built the Tabqa Dam [en]. In 1975, after the dam was complete, the government moved 4000 Arabs of the Walda tribe from the valley of the Euphrates into the "Arab Belt" area.^: 60–62

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