There's a simple explanation for how the American far-right became curiously infatuated with the Arab totalitarian leader: Their hearts were won over by the Assad family's years-old propaganda campaign at home in Syria. Assad's authoritarianism uses the same buzzwords as the far-right to describe the society he's trying to build in his own country -- a pure, monolithic society of devotees to his own power. American neo-Nazis see Assad as a hero.

As the chaos of Charlottesville and its aftermath was unfolding, Assad addressed a group of diplomats in Damascus about the ongoing war in Syria. "We lost many of our youth and infrastructure," he said, "but we gained a healthier and more homogenous society."

Whereas white nationalists aim to create a healthy and homogeneous society through racial purity, for Assad it means a society free of any kind of political dissent, excluding any Syrian living outside the territory his regime controls. Anyone who does not fit Assad's specific definition of what it means to be Syrian is up for execution.

Alexander Reid Ross, a lecturer of geography at Portland State University and author of the new book, "Against the Fascist Creep," said Assad is a figure that is central to a realization of "Eurasianism." The notion "holds that Russia will lead the world out of a dark age of materialism and toward an ultranationalist rebirth of homogenous ethno-states federated under a heterogeneous spiritual empire," Reid Ross said.

In other words, the Assad dynasty, with the strong backing of Vladimir Putin's authoritarian state in Russia, is the Middle East's leading force toward creating a society that is spiritually, socially, and politically "pure." Cosmopolitanism, with diversity in political thought and social identity, is an obstacle for those aiming to realize this vision.