New Wave of Violence Rocks Southern Syria With 10 Assassinations

Instability has reigned in Syria’s southern Daraa province with more than ten assassinations reported in the past two months, the Houran Free League said Tuesday.

Since the 2018 agreement reached between the opposition and the regime in the South, the group has registered 415 operations and assassination attempts in the province, including 277 against civilians and 133 against former leaders and members of the opposition, who struck “settlements and reconciliations” with the regime. These figures later became members of regime security services.

The group reported 48 attempts against former opposition members who refused to join the regime settlements and seven against former ISIS operatives.

The latest assassination took place Sunday when unidentified gunmen targeted two people in the city of Jassim in the Daraa countryside. The victims were Yasser al-Duneyfat (aka Abu Baker al-Hassan), a member of the Central Committee and former spokesman for the Revolution Army faction, and his cousin, Adnan.

Local sources said Duneyfat had survived an assassination attempt in 2019 when unknown gunmen tried to blow up his car while he was traveling along the Jassim-Ain al-Tineh highway in the northern Daraa countryside.

Also, unidentified gunmen opened fire on Mohammed al-Rifai, a soldier who had defected from regime forces, in the town of Um Walad in the Daraa countryside, killing him instantly.

On July 11, Rabih Faraj Abu Oreymesh, a Hezbollah member who hails from the Golan Heights, was found dead and his corpse dumped in Al-Yadoudah town in western Daraa.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said from June to date, the number of attacks and assassination attempts in various forms and methods by detonating IEDs, mines, booby-trapped vehicles and shootings has exceeded 559 attacks.