Thread connecting Newroz crime in Syria’s Jindires with ISIS

QAMISHLI, Syria (North Press) – Since Turkey and its affiliated armed opposition factions, also known as the Syrian National Army (SNA), took control over areas in Syria’s north, including Afrin in 2018, and Sere Kaniye (Ras al-Ain) and Tel Abyad in 2019, human rights violations against civilians have never ceased.

Both military operations against Afrin (Olive Branch) and against Sere Kaniye and Tel Abyad (Peace Spring) caused the total displacement of about 700,000 individuals.

The Turkish-backed SNA factions in these areas have committed an endless series of violations mainly targeting the original inhabitants – Kurds, Yazidis, Christians, and Alawites – in addition to committing systematic violations that amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The factions have posted footage of militants stealing, seizing civilians’ properties, and inciting the killing of the areas’ residents.

Although these factions have violated international and human rights laws and international norms since the date they occupied these areas, and though many documentations and human rights reports prove their involvement in arbitrary arrests, kidnappings, killings and many other crimes, they have never been held accountable.

Jindires crime

On the eve of Newroz, on March 20, the new year that is celebrated by Kurds all over the world, militants of Jaysh al-Sharqiya, a Turkish-backed SNA faction, carried out a systematic crime in the town of Jindires of Afrin countryside, shooting to death five civilian Kurds, four from one family – Farah al-Din Othman, 43, Nazmi, 38, Muhammad Nazmi, and Muhammad – and wounding a child, for igniting the Newroz flame, which is a key ritual of celebrating the holiday, in front of their house.

According to the victims’ sister, the militants shot at her brothers and nephew with more than five bullets. The sister said in a video that went viral on social media, “ten bullets were removed from the body of my brother.”  

She went further adding that the Turkish-backed militants were about to attack residents of Jindires when they gathered in front of a hospital, where the dead and wounded were brought to, while shouting the names of the victims, expressing their anger over the crime.

The victims’ another sister stressed that this is not the first time SNA militants have attacked her brothers. In 2018, during the invasion of Afrin, they fled strikes by Turkish aircrafts. When they returned after Afrin was occupied, they were shocked to see that the factions had seized the house of one of her brothers. When he demanded that his house be returned, he was arrested and tortured, before being released.

The Liberation and Construction Movement (LCM), a coalition of factions headed by Ahrar al-Sharqiya, denied that the perpetrators were affiliated to their faction. In a statement issued on March 21, they indicated that the perpetrators of the crime were two individuals, one of whom was arrested, while the whereabouts of the other is unknown.

In another statement, the LCM announced that three IDPs had been arrested as the perpetrators of the crime, and later it announced that a fourth person, who was also involved in the crime, had also been arrested.

Despite the contradicted statements of the First Legion within the Syrian opposition Interim Government’s Ministry of Defense, residents and eyewitnesses stressed that the perpetrators are affiliated with Jaysh al-Sharqiya. One of them is called Hassan al-Dabaa, nicknamed ‘Abu Hamza al-Khasham’. Another is Ali Khalaf, nicknamed ‘Abu Habib al-Khasham’.

The North Press Monitoring and Documentation Department, based on eyewitnesses and the victims’ family members, reported that the criminals are from Jaysh al-Sharqiya, which is affiliated with the Turkish-backed SNA.

Human Rights Watch (HRW) also commented on the opposition factions and said that the Turkish-backed opposition factions rarely hold their factions responsible for the series of human rights violations committed in the past five years. The HRW also emphasized in its report that Jaysh al-Sharqiya is the mainly responsible for the crime.

The HRW called on Turkey, as an occupying power and as a backer of the local factions operating in areas under its control in northern Syria, to investigate these killings and ensure that those responsible are held accountable.

It also stressed that Turkey should cut all support to SNA factions implicated in recurring or systemic human rights abuses and international humanitarian law violations.

155 Syrian organizations signed a statement condemning the crime committed on the eve of Newroz. They called on the UN to take all necessary measures to protect the civilians in Afrin and throughout Syria, and immediately cease the violations against them.

They also called on the UN to pressure Turkey as an occupying power to assume its legal responsibilities in ensuring public order and safety, and to stop the demographic changes in Afrin and all the Turkish-occupied areas of Syria.  

Faction’s connection to ISIS

On December 7, 2022, an unidentified drone targeted two members of Jaysh al-Sharqiya riding a motorcycle in the countryside of Jindires. Later, the Pentagon clarified that it was a US drone and that it had targeted one of the top five ISIS leaders, Maher al-Agal, along with one of his senior assistants. Al-Agal was carrying an ID from the local council of Afrin under a pseudonym.

Al-Agal was responsible for the development of ISIS networks outside of Iraq and Syria and was in charge of a region in Raqqa under ISIS’ rule. He moved to Tel Abyad, which is under the control of SNA factions. Later the leader of Ahrar al-Sham, which was designated as a “terrorist” group, ordered his removal to Afrin.

According to sources from Afrin and publicly available information, the man responsible for the Jindires crime, Hassan al-Dabaa, has connections with ISIS and is closely connected with the leader of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS, formerly al-Nusra Front), Abu Muhammad al-Jolani, who in turn was a member in ISIS and worked with Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Activists released photos of al-Dabaa accompanied by al-Jolani.

A military source confirmed to North Press that a great number of Jaysh al-Sharqiya militants are former ISIS and al-Nusra members that are designated as terrorist groups.

Violations by SNA factions   

Jaysh al-Sharqiya has a long history of violations, such as murder, kidnapping, torture, expropriation of property, cutting down trees, blackmail, in addition to hundreds of assaults since 2018, particularly in Jindires and its countryside.

In 2015, the faction slaughtered two defectors from the Syrian government forces after arresting and torturing them on the Azaz-Tel Rifaat road in the northern countryside of Aleppo.

Jaysh al-Sharqiya committed many violations alongside other factions before detaching itself from Ahrar al-Sharqiya. They committed blackmail, arrests, abduction of civilians in return for a ransom, and robbed public and private property. They also executed and killed many civilians under the charge of working with the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

According to human rights organizations, the group is responsible for kidnapping more than 200 civilians in Afrin in return for ransom. It is known they killed the civilians Sharaf al-Din Sido, Rashid Hamid Khalil, and his disabled son, Muhammad Khalil, in 2022 after subjecting them to physical torture, as their relatives were not able to pay the ransom for their release.

The faction participated in the execution of Hevrin Khalaf, secretary-general of the Future Syria Party, and several of her companions on the M4 Highway, between Tel Abyad and Sere Kaniye, on October 12, 2019.

The harassment and actions of the factions against the people of Afrin are inhumane and amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity. They have been ongoing for more than five years, and the perpetrators of these violations have not been punished or held accountable, which has exacerbated the situation in the region and increased the frequency of violations.

The deputy director of the Middle East and North Africa division at Human Rights Watch, Adam Coogle, said, “these killings come after over five years of unaddressed human rights abuses at the hands of Turkish forces and the local Syrian factions they empower. Turkey has allowed these fighters to abuse people living in the areas under their control with impunity, risking making itself complicit in the violations.”