Deir Hafer Massacre: another crime by Syria’s transitional government

Ten months have passed since the collapse of the former regime, yet violence and chaos continue to dominate the scene. The massacre carried out by transitional government forces on Saturday night in Deir Hafer highlights the persistence of policies rooted in repression and bloodshed, a direct extension of what Syrians endured for decades.

In the village of Umm al-Tina, east of Aleppo in Deir Hafer’s countryside, transitional government forces struck civilians with drone attacks, killing seven people and injuring four others.

This massacre is part of an ongoing pattern. On March 7 of this year, towns and villages across the coastal region witnessed one of the deadliest campaigns, during which transitional government forces committed dozens of massacres that left more than 1,750 people dead, while entire villages were destroyed and burned.

A United Nations fact-finding commission described those events as amounting to war crimes, painting a grim picture of the new authorities from the outset.

Soon after, on May 1, transitional government forces attacked Qudsaya and Sahnaya in the Damascus countryside, where clashes over two days left 73 people dead.

In Sweida, military operations targeted the Druze population in the city and surrounding areas. Since July 13, local and international organizations have documented at least 2,048 deaths, along with dozens of abductions, and extensive destruction of homes and property.

Meanwhile, transitional government forces and allied militias have continued sporadic attacks on North and East Syria, with Deir Hafer being the latest.

Despite the Interim government’s announcement of investigative committees for the massacres in the coastal region and Sweida, their findings remain frozen. Accountability has been reduced to media statements that have not translated into action.

The sequence of events has drawn a bleak portrait of the transitional period. Syrians who had hoped for a new era of justice and accountability instead find themselves reliving the tragedies of the past. Violence persists, massacres continue, and hope for genuine change has steadily diminished.

After ten months of promises, the facts reveal that the country has not entered a transition marked by reform but rather a new phase of violence, unfolding through massacres in the coastal region, Sweida, Damascus countryside, and now Deir Hafer.

A-H 

ANHA