Syrian authorities announced on Friday the apprehension of a former intelligence officer who was featured in a leaked video four years ago, showing him and his colleagues executing numerous individuals during the country’s civil conflict. Amjad Yousef was captured in the central region of Hama, where he had been concealing his whereabouts, according to the Interior Ministry, which shared a picture of him in prison attire.
Following the removal of Bashar Assad by insurgents in December 2024, numerous members of the ex-president’s security units, accused of committing atrocities throughout the war, have been detained. Assad sought refuge in Russia. The civil war, which commenced with anti-government demonstrations in March 2011 before escalating into an armed conflict, has resulted in the deaths of half a million people and over one million injuries.
Yousef was identified as one of several Syrian security agents who were reportedly depicted in a leaked video from 2022, where numerous restrained and blindfolded men were executed and thrown into a pit. The capture of Yousef was praised by U.S. special envoy to Syria Tom Barrack as a significant move towards accountability, reflecting a new approach to justice in post-Assad Syria.
The video footage, lasting six minutes and 43 seconds, features members of Syria’s infamous Military Intelligence Branch 227 lining up around 40 captives in an abandoned structure in Tadamon, a suburb near Damascus. The prisoners, blindfolded with their hands tied, were ruthlessly pushed or shot into a trench by the Branch 227 operatives.
Subsequently, the bodies were set ablaze in an apparent attempt to eliminate any traces of the massacre. Residents of Tadamon, including Ahmed Adra and Shahoud, expressed relief and a sense of justice with Yousef’s arrest, although uncertainties remain regarding the full accountability of all perpetrators involved in the atrocity.
Security forces in Syria disclosed last year the detention of three individuals linked to the same killings. The Interior Ministry affirmed its commitment to pursuing all those implicated in the Tadamon incident to ensure they face legal consequences. In March 2023, the U.S. State Department imposed a ban on Yousef, his spouse, and immediate family members from entering the United States.