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In Assad’s footsteps: Media restrictions make northwestern Syria another ‘kingdom of silence’

In the last opposition-controlled parts of Syria, journalists and media activists face restrictions, red lines and retaliation. 


11 November 2022

PARIS — The assassination of media activist Muhammad Abdul Latif (Abu Ghannoum) in northwestern Syria on October 7, by a group affiliated with the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army (SNA), sparked widespread public anger over violations committed by opposition factions. But the killing also served as a stark reminder of the dangers of journalistic work in the last opposition-controlled parts of Syria.

In al-Bab, the same city in northern Aleppo province where Abu Ghannoum was shot and killed by members of the SNA’s Hamza Division, a group of journalists were beaten by the civil police this past August. They were covering a sit-in organized by medical staff at al-Bab Hospital, to protest wage disparities between Syrian and Turkish staff. 

After the killing of Abu Ghannoum—since nicknamed the “martyr of truth”—the SNA’s Third Legion launched a military campaign against the Hamza Division, locally known as al-Hamzat, which was implicated in his death. In response, Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) intervened in the fighting on the Hamza Division’s behalf. As a result, the hardline group was able to extend its influence, previously limited to Idlib province and parts of the northern Hama and western Aleppo countryside, into northern Aleppo.  

Ultimately, Ankara intervened to force HTS to withdraw its military forces from Turkish areas of influence in Aleppo. But HTS retains security and military influence there through its allies. In an already fraught media space, this continued influence raises additional concerns among local activists and media workers—especially those opposed to HTS policies, or who have demanded that the Hamza Division and its commander, Saif Boulad Abu Bakr, be held accountable. 

“In recent months, northwestern Syria saw increased pressure on media freedoms, and an increase in the number of violations committed by the dominant forces,” said Mohamad al-Satouf, a lawyer and researcher at the Syrian Center for Journalistic Freedoms at the Syrian Journalists Association.

Over the past three months, from August through October, the Center for Journalistic Freedoms documented 28 violations—such as threats, injury or interference—against members of the media in northwestern Syria, compared to 22 violations in the same area over the preceding seven months. 

Between 2011 and July 2022, the center documented 126 violations by HTS, mostly in Idlib province. Other opposition factions committed 63 documented violations, mostly in Aleppo, al-Satouf told Syria Direct.

Media freedoms in SNA areas

At the al-Bab Hospital sit-in in August, hospital staff invited journalists and activists to cover the event. “We arrived at the same time as a civil police patrol. The officer in charge ordered us to leave and prevented us from filming, on Turkish orders,” said Hassan al-Abdullah (a pseudonym), one of the journalists who were beaten in the incident, told Syria Direct. He requested anonymity for security reasons.

Following verbal altercations between the police and journalists, “the patrol worked to expel us by force, beat us and tried to arrest some journalists,” al-Abdullah said. 

Hours later, the civil police in al-Bab summoned three of the journalists who were assaulted, including al-Abdullah. He says the officer in charge indirectly threatened them to dissuade them from filing a complaint. “Before you make a complaint, you should know that we may have to arrest you if we investigate the incident to find out the details, and you won’t be released until the investigation is over. So do you want to file a complaint?” al-Abdullah recalled the officer as saying. 

They chose not to file a complaint against the police, “for fear of retaliation against us later,” al-Abdullah said. He was particularly worried because he is not from the al-Bab area, and believes “the civil and military police are here to protect the commanders and factions, not to protect us.”

In theory, Turkish-backed Syrian opposition military bodies and factions in the Aleppo countryside have not announced any red lines for media coverage in the area. But “our past experiences demonstrate that the red lines are the factions, their commanders, security authorities and all those associated with Turkey, directly or through Turkish intermediaries,” said Fadi Shubbat, a journalist living in the al-Muhammadiya camp, in the Jenderes countryside of Afrin.. 

However, the way local authorities treat those who work in the media field varies, and depends on “how influential the journalist is,” Shubbat said. “The more influence a journalist has, the more exposed that person becomes to harassment.” 

Still, and despite documented violations against members of the media, Shubbat feels “there is media freedom in the liberated areas to some extent, especially in written journalism.” He cited a level of “indifference from the controlling forces towards what is said in the media.” 

But he criticized the “lack of a clear media law—we don’t know what law media work is subject to,” in addition to obstacles some journalists face “accessing information.” 

Legally, courts in the northern Aleppo countryside adopt “Syrian law and the 1950 Constitution, applying it in their rulings regarding the media, and laws and legislation guarantee freedom of media work,” according to Yousef Hussein, secretary of the Free Syrian Lawyers Association. 

Hussein acknowledged that many abuses against workers in the media sector have taken place in northern Syria. He attributed that to “the multiple authorities in the liberated areas, [which are] ruled by factionalism, and the [armed] factions consider[ing] themselves above the law.” Therefore, “the judiciary is often unable to hold them accountable,” he said. 

Any journalist can seek out one of the association’s lawyers “to follow up on a complaint filed by or against them in the courts,” Hussein said. But to date, no journalist has done so, “despite a signed memorandum of understanding with most media entities, and the association affirming its readiness to defend journalists and media workers” 

The problem is not whether there is a judiciary or not, but rather “the constant pressure from the de facto authorities on media freedoms, to run the sector according to their agenda,” al-Satouf said. This approach leaves media workers exposed to “assassination or arbitrary detention, not to mention preventing them from working or seizing their equipment—which has happened time and again in northwestern Syria.” 

In the northern Aleppo countryside, the policy of Turkish-backed military and security institutions towards the media is “crude,” as al-Abdullah put it. He started working as a journalist in Syria’s southern Daraa province in 2012, “and didn’t face any harassment during my work there, until we were displaced [to the north] in 2018,” when the Assad regime retook control of the area. 

Shubbat, displaced from south Damascus to the northwest, shares a similar view. Press freedoms in south Damascus during the period of opposition control were better, he said. Although a publication he ran in the al-Hajar al-Aswad neighborhood “directed sharp criticisms at the institutions born during the revolution, we encountered few problems” until the Islamic State took control of the neighborhood in 2015. Shubbat stopped publishing, and left for the neighboring town of Yalda, which was controlled by the Free Syrian Army (FSA) at the time. 

‘Looking for something incriminating’

This past March, the intelligence forces in Jenderes city sent Shubbat a written summons, stressing the “need to bring the mobile phone with you.” At first, he felt relieved. They had not raided his house to take him, but only sent a summons. 

But the interrogation session, which lasted for an hour and a half, “left a negative impact,” he said. “The investigator searched my phone, as if looking for something incriminating against me,” he said. The interrogator “focused on Facebook pages and anonymous Telegram groups that publish news of the area, but didn’t ask me about my own work!” 

In a separate incident this past August, al-Abdullah received a message from an anonymous number, two days after the incident in which he was beaten by the civil police at the sit-in in al-Bab. “The caller identified himself, and [said] he lives in Raqqa,” which is controlled by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). “He indicated he knew me, and knew my name.” 

The caller “offered me a gold coin, and sent me a picture of it. He claimed he wanted to sell it, and had contacted me because I work in the antiquities trade,” al-Abdullah said. He told the caller he had nothing to do with trading artifacts, and that he lives in SNA areas. “So the caller said, ‘send someone from your side, or come and maybe I can smuggle you into the area.’” 

Al-Abdullah described the incident as a “trap,” one he believes was orchestrated by members of the police, since “dealing with the SDF is the most serious charge you can face here.” 

Media freedoms in HTS areas

On October 30, the General Directorate of Media in the HTS-affiliated Syrian Salvation Government (SSG) issued a decision banning journalist Adnan Faisal al-Imam from working for three months and stripping him of his press card. Al-Imam had produced a report for Orient News, which HTS banned from working in its areas of influence at the beginning of the month. 

This incident, and the closure of Orient in HTS areas, reveals a different image from the one the SSG has tried to project by creating the General Directorate of Media as part of its administrative structure. In February 2022, the directorate approved a “media work law, which aims to regulate media work, preserve the rights of workers in the media field and the rights of others from being attacked through the media.”

Muhammad Abdulrahman (a pseudonym), a journalist living in the Idlib countryside who requested anonymity for security reasons, said there is no press freedom in HTS areas. There are red lines and sensitive topics “that cannot be broached,” he said. “I refrain from covering many events, to preserve my life.” 

When a journalist wants to cover a story in HTS areas, “even if it is service-related, or covering a natural disaster—such as a camp being hit by a storm or flooded with rainwater—you need approval from the [SSG] media directorate,” Abdulrahman said. The requirement to obtain written approval from the directorate “complicates media work,” as “some journalists are forced to come to Idlib city from far-off areas to get the approval, and then go back to cover the event.” 

Worse still, according to Abdulrahman, is the directorate meddling in the content of journalists’ coverage, which he said happened with him, and led him to stop working on those reports. “The media in Idlib is in the hands of a Jordanian citizen named Khattab,” he said. 

Given this atmosphere, Abdulrahman is careful about what he says, which impacts his professional life. On social media, “you can see all my posts are ordinary, or they might carry veiled words [of criticism], indirectly,” he said. “HTS forces always make me feel that I am being watched.” 

Sila al-Wafi, another journalist in Idlib, said she does not quite know how to describe the media situation in the northwest. “It can’t be described as positive or negative: there is a space to work professionally and monitor the lived, economic and political reality. [But] there is some harassment and restrictions, and sometimes prohibitions that limit our work.” 

Al-Wafi has not personally faced any harassment while working as a journalist in Idlib, she told Syria Direct. Still, she said there are “challenges facing men and women journalists alike.” 

A changing map of control

Hassan al-Abdullah took an open stance against violations by the Hamza Division after it was implicated in the killing of media activist Abu Ghannoum. He took part in demonstrations that broke out in al-Bab city calling for accountability for those involved, and supported the Third Legion’s operation to expel al-Hamzat from their headquarters in the city. 

But when the Third Legion was defeated, after HTS intervened on the Hamza Division’s behalf, the opportunity for the latter to return to al-Bab became possible. For al-Abdullah and others like him who openly opposed the faction, that means they themselves could face retaliation for their calls for accountability. 

“Today, we’re afraid to cover any event connected even one percent to the factions,” al-Abdullah said. “You have to think a thousand times before taking any step.” He has also lost the ability to access many areas that “I used to be able to go to, such as the towns of Bazaa and Qabaseen, which the Hamza [Division] controls.” 

That impacts his work, as he will not be able to “cover any breaking news in the areas of influence of al-Hamzat, which I have received threats from,” al-Abdullah said. In late October, a Facebook account using a pseudonym, that had the Hamza Division logo as its profile picture, sent al-Abdullah a threatening message. The message, which Syria Direct obtained a copy of, read: “you dog, the days are coming. You’ll pay for something you did. Al-Hamzat are bigger than you and your family, you mercenary.”

Because of that, he is thinking of leaving northern Aleppo for Idlib province. “It isn’t a better situation, but there is a single controlling party and its red lines are known. That is better than the Aleppo countryside, where every fighter is a state and authority in himself,” he said. 

To allay the fears of al-Abdullah and other journalists like him, the state of media work in northern Syria could be improved by “unifying the security and judicial apparatus in the area, and unifying the factions within the SNA,” he said. “With the state of factionalism, things are heading for the worst.” 

Shubbat called for the creation of a “syndicate of journalists, tasked with providing health insurance to its members and compensating for work-related losses, as well as evacuating journalists from danger zones and helping their families during crises and emergencies. 

Al-Wafi agrees with Shubbat about the need for “a unified, internationally recognized and officially registered press entity to ensure the freedom of journalism and improve the reality of media work in Syria as a whole, not [only] within the liberated areas.” 

Lawyer al-Satouf said the Syrian Journalists Association he is affiliated with—established in 2012 and later joined by the Committee for Freedoms and the Syrian Center for Press Freedoms—has “played an important and prominent role in monitoring and documenting violations committed against journalists, media activists, institutions and media centers.” 

The Turkey-headquartered center issues a monthly report documenting violations against the media in Syria, and launches support and advocacy campaigns for media professionals and organizations to “bring their voice and suffering to the international community and local bodies,” al-Satouf said. These efforts are, in his view, “ a means of putting pressure one way or another on the controlling forces and perpetrators of violations on the ground, which leads to a situation that could be positive, if minimally, in terms of improving media freedoms.” 

While there is a judicial system in northwestern Syria—whether in HTS-run Idlib or SNA-controlled northern Aleppo–“the role of the judiciary is not completely integrated,” al-Satouf said. 

Facing this reality, Fadi Shubbat is looking for a way out of the country–yet another Syrian journalist forced abroad. “I tried to cling to the homeland as much as possible,” he said. “But the security, economic, education and health conditions are seriously driving us towards migration.” 

 

This report was originally published in Arabic and translated into English by Mateo Nelson. 

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