[2] Freij was born in Rahjan in a Sunni Arab tribe on 17 January 1950.

He joined the Syrian Arab Army in 1968, and graduated as an armoured corps lieutenant from the Homs Military Academy in 1971.

Freij attended different courses and a higher military education: On 8 August 2011, Freij was appointed Chief of Staff of the Syrian Arab Army during the Syrian civil war.

[3] On 1 January 2018, Lieutenant General Ali Abdullah Ayyoub was the successor of al-Freij as Minister of Defense.

[2] In October 2023, French prosecutors at the Judicial Court of Paris charged Fahd Jassem Al-Freij and his successor Ali Ayyoub for their culpability in a barrel bomb in southwestern Syrian city of Daraa that killed French-Syrian national Salah Abou Nabout at his home in 2017.