A former military intelligence officer accused of being behind one of Syria’s most notorious massacres has been arrested.
Amjad Youssef, 40, became known as the Butcher of Tadamon after a video was leaked showing him shooting dead 41 blindfolded and bound men and throwing them into a trench in the south Damascus suburb in 2013.
Youssef was arrested after a “tightly executed security operation”, according to the Syrian interior ministry.
A Syrian security agent points a gun during the arrest of Amjad Youssef – X
It said he had been under surveillance for several days across the Ghab plain area in Hama, western Syria.
A security source told Reuters that Youssef had been hiding in the region since the fall of Bashar al-Assad, Syria’s former dictator, in December 2024. Rumours had previously circulated that he had fled to Lebanon or Europe, and undergone plastic surgery to avoid detection.
Ajmad Youssef was identified as one of two named men shown in a 2013 video marching men to a trench in Tadamon, Damascus, shooting them and throwing them into a mass grave
Since insurgents ousted the former president, dozens of members of his security agencies who were blamed for atrocities during the civil war have been arrested.
Youssef’s arrest is one of the most high-profile, symbolic developments for Syria in holding former Assad era officials to account. In Tadamon, residents waved flags on the streets to celebrate after it was announced.
Videos circulating online that appear to capture the arrest show security forces storming a home in a rural area and confronting Youssef, later shown handcuffed on the floor with traces of blood on his face. Authorities also posted mugshots of him in a striped prison uniform.
The Syrian authorities released a mugshot of Amjad Youssef in a striped prison uniform – Interior Ministry Handout/EPA/Shutterstock
Youssef came to international attention in 2022, after genocide researchers published leaked videos showing Syrian security agents shooting blindfolded people one by one – rare potential evidence of the sickening war crimes committed during the country’s civil war.
Annsar Shahhoud and Uğur Ümit Üngör, the researchers, identified the gunmen as Youssef – who at the time held the military rank of warrant officer – and the late Hajib Al Halabi, a member of a pro-Assad armed militia.
Tom Barrack, the US special envoy for Syria, praised Youssef’s arrest as “a powerful step away from impunity toward accountability, exemplifying the new paradigm of justice emerging in post-Assad Syria”.
He added that the US stood with the Syrian people “in supporting real justice and a new rule of law to help heal this wounded nation”.
A Tadamon resident shows one of the many human bones found amoung the rubble in the neighbourhood – Emre Caylak
Human Rights Watch has said there is evidence that as many as 300 people died in Tadamon along a dirt trench known by locals as Execution Road.
Residents in Tadamon recalled neighbours and relatives going missing, and rape, torture and killings happening regularly. The sound of gunshots was common, as was the smell of burning corpses.
While Syrian authorities have arrested dozens of former Assad regime officials since late 2024, many remain at large. They fled the country in droves as rebel fighters closed in on Damascus from the north.
Mohammed Alrifai/EPA/Shutterstock
Others have sought to strike deals with the new Syrian government, led by Ahmed al-Sharaa, for immunity in exchange for information.
Anger erupted after the authorities reached one such agreement with Fadi Saqr, a leader of a pro-Assad militia that took part in killing civilians in Tadamon.
Steady progress toward accountability is also difficult given the many demands now facing President Sharaa’s government to rebuild the nation after 14 years of civil war.
But the government continues to promise that the authorities will keep pursuing Assad-era officials to bring them to justice.
“Amjad Youssef was not the first criminal to fall into our grasp, nor will he be the last, God willing,” said Anas Khattab, Syria’s interior minister, in a post on X.
“We will continue our work in pursuing criminals and tracking them down one by one to bring them to justice, so that they may receive the recompense for what their hands have wrought.”