BERLIN: Two Syrian men have been arrested in Germany on suspicion of membership in extremist groups, and one of them is suspected of involvement in a 2013 attack in eastern Syria in which more than 60 Shiite fighters and civilians were killed, prosecutors said Thursday.
The suspects, identified only as Amer A. and Basel O. in line with German privacy rules, were arrested on Wednesday, the federal prosecutors’ office said. Both are accused of membership in a foreign terrorist organization — Liwa Jund al Rahman, or Brigade of the Soldiers of the Merciful God, an armed rebel group that prosecutors said Amer A. formed in February 2013 and led.
Amer A. is also accused of committing war crimes by means of forced displacement and of membership in the Daesh group.
The war crimes charges relate to a June 2013 attack on Hatla, in Syria’s eastern Deir Ezzor province, that killed about 60 Shiite residents. At the time, the attack underlined the increasingly sectarian nature of Syria’s civil war. Prosecutors said the attack was carried out jointly by Liwa Jund al Rahman under Amer A.’s command and other jihadi groups.
Survivors of the attack were forced to flee to elsewhere in Syria or abroad “by intentionally stoking fears of death — also by means of arson and looting,” prosecutors said in a statement. “This forced displacement meant the end of all Shiite presence in Hatla.”
Amer A. joined IS in July 2014 and put his group under its command, prosecutors said. They said Basel O. took a “prominent military position” in his group by late 2013 and commanded units of the organization in battles with Syrian government forces in December that year and in April 2014, particularly at Deir Ezzor’s military airfield.
A judge on Wednesday ordered the two suspects held in custody pending a potential indictment.
Germany’s application of the rule of “universal jurisdiction,” allowing the prosecution of serious crimes committed abroad, led last year to the first conviction of a senior Syrian official for crimes against humanity.
And in February, a German court convicted a Palestinian man from Syria of a war crime and murder for launching a grenade into a crowd of civilians waiting for food in Damascus in 2014.
Germany arrests 2 Syrians, one of them accused of war crimes related to a deadly attack in 2013
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Germany arrests 2 Syrians, one of them accused of war crimes related to a deadly attack in 2013
- One of them suspected of involvement in a 2013 attack in eastern Syria in which more than 60 Shiite fighters and civilians were killed
First responders enter devastated Aleppo neighborhood after days of deadly fighting
- The US-backed SDF, which have played a key role in combating the Daesh group in large swaths of eastern Syria, are the largest force yet to be absorbed into Syria’s national army
ALEPPO, Syria: First responders on Sunday entered a contested neighborhood in Syria’ s northern city of Aleppo after days of deadly clashes between government forces and Kurdish-led forces. Syrian state media said the military was deployed in large numbers.
The clashes broke out Tuesday in the predominantly Kurdish neighborhoods of Sheikh Maqsoud, Achrafieh and Bani Zaid after the government and the Syrian Democratic Forces, the main Kurdish-led force in the country, failed to make progress on how to merge the SDF into the national army. Security forces captured Achrafieh and Bani Zaid.
The fighting between the two sides was the most intense since the fall of then-President Bashar Assad to insurgents in December 2024. At least 23 people were killed in five days of clashes and more than 140,000 were displaced amid shelling and drone strikes.
The US-backed SDF, which have played a key role in combating the Daesh group in large swaths of eastern Syria, are the largest force yet to be absorbed into Syria’s national army. Some of the factions that make up the army, however, were previously Turkish-backed insurgent groups that have a long history of clashing with Kurdish forces.
The Kurdish fighters have now evacuated from the Sheikh Maqsoud neighborhood to northeastern Syria, which is under the control of the SDF. However, they said in a statement they will continue to fight now that the wounded and civilians have been evacuated, in what they called a “partial ceasefire.”
The neighborhood appeared calm Sunday. The United Nations said it was trying to dispatch more convoys to the neighborhoods with food, fuel, blankets and other urgent supplies.
Government security forces brought journalists to tour the devastated area, showing them the damaged Khalid Al-Fajer Hospital and a military position belonging to the SDF’s security forces that government forces had targeted.
The SDF statement accused the government of targeting the hospital “dozens of times” before patients were evacuated. Damascus accused the Kurdish-led group of using the hospital and other civilian facilities as military positions.
On one street, Syrian Red Crescent first responders spoke to a resident surrounded by charred cars and badly damaged residential buildings.
Some residents told The Associated Press that SDF forces did not allow their cars through checkpoints to leave.
“We lived a night of horror. I still cannot believe that I am right here standing on my own two feet,” said Ahmad Shaikho. “So far the situation has been calm. There hasn’t been any gunfire.”
Syrian Civil Defense first responders have been disarming improvised mines that they say were left by the Kurdish forces as booby traps.
Residents who fled are not being allowed back into the neighborhood until all the mines are cleared. Some were reminded of the displacement during Syria’s long civil war.
“I want to go back to my home, I beg you,” said Hoda Alnasiri.
