[The Amargi Exclusive] Investigating the Syrian Army’s Abuses

Half a dozen armed men stand ankle-deep in the wreckage of a neighborhood pounded by days of fighting, their boots crunching over shattered concrete and steel bars. They look up at the shattered third floor of a soot-streaked building, its facade pocked by shrapnel. A phone camera is already recording.

“Throw her off… throw her off!” the man filming shouts. Above him, another fighter steps to the ledge, gripping a limp body by the arm. Without pausing, he pitches it outward. He lets it go, and the body falls past the stories of the gray, broken-down building. It hits the ground, into collapsed rubble, and a cloud of dust flies above it.

The men below shout in harmony, “Allahu Akbar!” then flood toward the body. “It’s a pig, may the curse be on her honor,” the cameraman says, before panning to two younger men embracing. He adds, almost tenderly: “Thank God you’re safe, my friends.”

The video, filmed on January 10, 2026, in Sheikh Maqsoud, a Kurdish-majority district of Aleppo, became one of the most widely shared pieces of footage from the latest round of clashes between forces aligned with Syria’s transitional government and Kurdish-led forces. Syrian rights groups and international organizations have urged an inquiry, saying the footage raises serious concerns about degrading and inhumane treatment, among other potential human rights violations.

Residents who spoke to The Amargi said the armed men in the video were affiliated with the Syrian Arab Army. The dead woman was a member of the Kurdish internal security forces, assigned to help protect Sheikh Maqsoud under an arrangement reached in April 2025 between Damascus and the Kurdish forces. On paper, the agreement was meant to ensure the two sides avoid conflict and to keep the city’s neighborhoods safe. The implementation of that broader integration track has repeatedly stalled, even as Damascus and the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) have held intermittent talks on folding Kurdish-led forces into state structures.

In the days after the footage spread, The Amargi worked to identify where it was filmed. Through local inquiries and geolocation checks, investigators traced it to a dense grid of mid-rise apartment blocks deep inside Sheikh Maqsoud, where most buildings rise four to five stories above narrow streets (the coordinates correspond to 36.2360833 N, 37.1495278 E). Multiple residents separately identified the slain fighter as Deniz Çiya, saying her name circulated quickly through the neighborhood as families searched for missing relatives and fighters.

The January 10 video was not the only clip reviewed by The Amargi. In another, less widely circulated video, two armed men are binding a dead Kurdish fighter’s hands and feet and dragging him down a staircase, his body bumping against the steps. “These are the lions of 60^th Division,” a man filming says, apparently referring to a formation within the Syrian Arab Army, before boasting that they have eliminated “a pig,” a slur frequently used by the Syrian forces to dehumanize Kurdish fighters. The Amargi determined the footage was recent and consistent with incidents from roughly two weeks earlier in Sheikh Maqsoud, based on the video’s internal details and corroborating local accounts.

The 60th Division of the new Syrian Army has drawn particular scrutiny because of both its composition and its leadership. Formed as part of the post-reorganization effort to absorb Turkish-backed Syrian National Army factions, the division reportedly includes groups that had previously resisted domination by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), making its chain of command especially controversial. The division is led by Awad al-Jassim (also known as Abu Qutaiba al-Manbiji), a figure long linked to hardline armed factions in northern Syria. His name has become a red flag among rights monitors due to the broader record of abuses, criminality, and coercive practices attributed to forces under similar leadership structures, raising concerns that the 60th Division reflects continuity of militia power rather than a genuine step toward a professional, accountable military.

For this investigation, The Amargi reviewed and assessed dozens of videos, photographs, and firsthand accounts shared through messaging apps and social media and conducted interviews with residents who fled Sheikh Maqsoud and nearby areas. Much of the material is fragmentary, shot in panic, posted without context, and often stripped of metadata, yet patterns emerge across locations and days: heavy bombardment hitting residential blocks, civilians funneled into a hospital for shelter, and evacuees describing insults, intimidation, and alleged detentions at points of departure.

Aleppo

The Sheikh Maqsoud clashes were part of a broader escalation that, by mid-January, had stretched across north and northeast Syria. On January 7, the Syrian state news agency SANA said the army designated Sheikh Maqsoud and Ashrafiyeh a “closed military zone,” announcing restrictions on movement as fighting intensified. Days later, the Syrian army ordered evacuations in contested Aleppo neighborhoods as shelling and ground fighting expanded.

“We were shouting, ‘We are civilians, but they didn’t care.”

Syrian authorities have portrayed operations in contested areas as targeting armed threats. Several residents, however, disputed that characterization.

“The shelling was random… the targeting was directed at civilians,” said Shireen Abdo, 38, a mother of four who said she fled Sheikh Maqsoud with her children after days of bombardment and gunfire.

Adnan Ahmad, 51, said residents gathered in a convoy of civilian-owned cars after being told a corridor would open: “We were waiting in the convoy like other civilians for a corridor to open so we could leave Sheikh Maqsoud,” he said. Instead, he said, “they targeted the cars with rockets,” igniting fuel and setting vehicles on fire.

Ahmad Hassan, 43, described civilians trying to identify themselves. “We were shouting: ‘We are civilians,’” he said. “But they didn’t care.”

“We gathered in the hospital… there was no food, no water, no electricity,” Abdo said. She described children without milk and families relying on a dwindling stock of medical supplies.

The Amargi could not independently verify every detail mentioned in these accounts, including who fired at specific locations in each instance. But multiple interviews, conducted separately, describe similar sequences: shelling, attempted evacuation, then a retreat to a hospital as safe places ran out.

Inside the Hospital

As shelling intensified, residents said families moved to Khaled hospital in Sheikh Maqsoud, believing it would be safer, only to find themselves trapped in overcrowded corridors.

“We gathered in the hospital… there was no food, no water, no electricity,” Abdo said. She described children without milk and families relying on a dwindling stock of medical supplies.

Abdo and Hassan also said that tear gas was fired around the facility, causing distressing breathing issues among children. The Amargi reviewed video clips circulating online that show overcrowding, panic, and people appearing to struggle to breathe, though the publication has not independently verified the full context of every clip or who deployed which munitions.

Residents also described acts of humiliation during evacuation. Ahmad said armed men were physical with civilians and used slurs: “They spat on us and said, ‘You are pigs.’” Abdo said young men were separated from their families as buses began to move. “They took the young men in front of their mothers,” she said. We were able to verify three videos that support Abdo’s statement. In the videos, Syrian armed men are rounding up groups of men and referring to them as “pigs”. According to people trapped inside, the hospital was under siege for three days, leaving wounded patients, civilians, and fighters without food.

The following is a list of casualties based on SDF-affiliated local administrative records, which were shared with The Amargi:

The attacks between January 6 and January 10 in Aleppo led to 47 civilians killed and 133 wounded, while at least 276 remain missing, believed to have been arbitrarily detained. The Amargi obtained the names of those reported missing but has not been able to verify an updated number or determine the fate of those individuals amid ongoing clashes and restricted access.

In one instance, The Amargi verified at least one field execution of a prisoner of war. In one image, a Kurdish fighter with a distinctive tattoo visible on the right side of his chest is shown to be under the Syrian forces’ custody. Different images later circulated show the same individual dead, with signs of physical mutilation, including an apparent injury to his left eye.

Syrian authorities have released only limited casualty figures from the Aleppo clashes, primarily through local health officials and Ministry of Health-linked reporting, rather than a single comprehensive public tally that separates civilian and combatant losses.

The Interior Ministry did not respond to The Amargi’s request for comment on the death toll or the fate of those reported missing by publication time. Separately, the ministry’s public communications during the same period focused on security operations in the affected neighborhoods and did not address the missing-person reports in detail.

After Aleppo

Across Syria’s northeast, Human Rights Watch warned on Sunday that both sides – government-aligned forces and the Kurdish-led SDF – must protect civilians and respect human rights, pointing to the risks of abuses amid chaotic handovers, shifting front lines, and mass displacement.

Several of the most graphic videos reviewed by The Amargi come from areas outside Aleppo as the fighting spread east of the Euphrates. In one clip, the camera pans across a room filled with the bodies of men and women in SDF uniforms, some showing signs of severe physical mutilation. In another, a dead Kurdish female fighter can be seen with her throat slit open as Syrian army personnel mock her. A separate clip shows an armored vehicle driving over bodies while a member of the Syrian army records a selfie. The Amargi verified that the videos are new and consistent with the recent escalation, but in several cases could not independently verify the precise locations.

In one of the most serious incidents reported outside Aleppo, the Community Peacemaker Teams (CPT) – an international human-rights organization with staff on the ground documenting abuses in Syria – said a Kurdish family of 12 was attacked while fleeing Raqqa toward Hasakah. According to CPT, the family was stopped on January 18 near Abu Khashab by armed men affiliated with Syria’s new government forces. After asking whether the family was Kurdish or Arab, the gunmen opened fire, CPT said.

CPT, which has a long track record of investigating human rights violations in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, reported that six people were killed and six were wounded. Those killed included the parents, Mohammed Ismail Salih, 50, and Sara Shahin Salih, 49, as well as two children, Avin, 10, and Layla, 17. CPT claimed that some of the bodies were mutilated and that the wounded were abducted and later abandoned in the desert near Deir ez-Zor, where locals found them and transported them to Deir ez-Zor General Hospital. CPT said survivors were insulted and denied adequate care. The organization reported that the bodies were recovered two days later and remained in a provincial hospital, describing the attack as part of a broader pattern of grave abuses against civilians during recent offensives in north and east Syria. CPT published a video showing the bodies of the slain family members, which The Amargi has been able to verify.

A significant share of the evidence reviewed by The Amargi points to abuse that targets women.

As evidence of abuses mounted, Syria’s Defense Ministry acknowledged “violations” during operations in northeast Syria and said the military police had documented incidents and initiated legal measures. The ministry emphasized discipline and deterrence, suggesting that accountability was necessary to prevent further misconduct.

Targeting Women

A significant share of the evidence reviewed by The Amargi points to abuse that targets women. Several of the most widely circulated clips center on female fighters’ bodies, and the individuals in the videos show themselves asserting control over women’s bodies and humiliating them. In one video that spread rapidly online, a man holds up a severed braid and claims it was taken from the head of a Kurdish female fighter, a gesture that many Kurdish activists and residents interpreted as a deliberate attempt to degrade women who have become emblematic of Kurdish self-rule and the SDF’s image.

Online accounts later identified the man as Rami Yousef Dahsh, who also uses the name “Rami Hashemi” on social media and is described by those accounts as being from the Tel Abyad (Girê Spî) area. Claims circulating about his background – including alleged prior affiliations with extremist groups like ISIS – could not be independently verified by The Amargi and are therefore treated here as unconfirmed. After the braid video prompted a global backlash, the man posted a response saying it had been a joke and that he used a wig, not a real braid; however, he provided no additional information or clarification.

In addition to the braid clip, The Amargi reviewed another recent piece of footage that raises concerns about the treatment of Kurdish women by the Syrian Arab Army. In earlier videos that circulated widely, two female Kurdish fighters, identified by Kurdish sources as Amara Intigham and Narin Akhi, appear in captivity after being captured in northeast Syria by militants aligned with Damascus. In one clip, a fighter films himself and records what appears as a video message to another militant that he refers to as “Abu Mujahid”; the fighter in the clip says he has brought Abu Mujahid “the nicest gifts,” referring to the two captives. Another video shows an armed man seated behind a desk in what appears to be a former women’s office in a previously-SDF-administered area; he mocks Kurdish women’s rights initiatives and tears up a document on camera, declaring: “These are women’s rights in our country.”

The Syrian Defense Ministry has not responded to The Amargi’s request for comment about the specific incidents described in this report, including whether it has identified the individuals in the rooftop video, the staircase video, or the braid clip.

The government’s own public statements suggest officials recognize the political stakes. On January 22, Syrian state media reported disciplinary steps, saying the military police documented violations and began legal procedures. Furthermore, the defense ministry has now banned its personnel from posting any content on social media while in uniform.