The Pursuit of Justice and Reconciliation in Post-Assad Syria

Children in dusty clothing played amidst the rubble of Damascus’s Tadamon neighborhood, a site scarred by repeated massacres, sifting through human remains as though searching for treasures on a beach.

“This is a rib bone,” announced an eager young boy in sandals, holding it up triumphantly. Another child gripped what seemed to be a femur in his right hand while clutching another bone in his left.

When the Assad family’s dictatorship collapsed in 2024 after over five decades, Syrians who had suffered under the regime’s crimes—particularly during the nearly 14-year civil war—demanded swift accountability. Many anticipated that the new government would gather and utilize evidence of mass killings in areas like Tadamon to pursue prosecutions.

However, the rebels who ousted President Bashar al-Assad and assumed power have attempted to balance justice with peace, fearing that holding all perpetrators of war crimes accountable might ignite further civil conflict.

Among his initial actions, new president Ahmed al-Sharaa declared an amnesty for rank-and-file soldiers from the Assad era, while simultaneously vowing to pursue those with “blood on their hands”—specifically those directly complicit in atrocities. The measure sought to restore calm, but it infuriated many who declared they would never forgive.

Last year, the government established an independent entity, the National Commission for Transitional Justice, to supervise the transitional justice process.

“The greatest challenge is balancing law and accountability with civil peace and national reconciliation,” stated Abdul Basit Abdul Latif, head of the commission. “If you declare in Syria, ‘I will prosecute a million people,’ you are essentially saying, ‘Let us have another civil war.'”

Mr. Abdul Latif and other stakeholders noted that amnesties and reconciliation would be necessary for many crimes committed during the civil war. He emphasized that prosecutions should concentrate on the most heinous abuses, such as the former regime’s deployment of chemical weapons, the widespread torture and executions in its prisons, and massacres.

According to the United Nations, at least 580,000 people were killed during the war, though the agency warns the figure is incomplete due to the difficulties of tracking casualties during the conflict. When the Assad government fell, more than 24,000 prisoners were released—far fewer than many anticipated, suggesting that many of Syria’s 140,000 missing individuals may have perished in the regime’s prisons or elsewhere.

Mr. Abdul Latif predicted that prosecutions would provide Syrians with a sense of relief. However, he added, “Without justice and accountability, and without trying the major criminals for the massacres they committed, we will continue to swirl in a vortex of revenge.”

The approach he advocates—which includes prosecutions alongside reconciliation and reparation efforts—would require a long, complex process, and many Syrians have already begun to question the government’s commitment to justice.

In recent months, an increasing number of Syrians have sought revenge against those they accuse of collaborating with or belonging to the deposed regime. Lynchings, beatings, and vandalism have surged. The names of alleged shabiha—regime thugs and gunmen—have been scrawled on Damascus walls, and leaflets distributed nationwide have threatened regime informants and others implicated in its abuses.

The official pursuit of justice advanced last month when a Syrian court convicted Mr. al-Assad and eight others on charges of murder, torture, and crimes against humanity, sentencing them all to death. Only one of them, Atef Najib, Mr. al-Assad’s cousin, remains in Syrian custody; Mr. al-Assad himself is in exile in Russia.

The verdicts, the first in Syria pertaining to the wartime period, were celebrated in the courthouse and in streets across the nation.

Human rights experts questioned whether the proceedings were fair and transparent.

As the former head of the Political Security Branch in the southern province of Daraa, Mr. Najib was charged with overseeing the arrest and torture of schoolchildren for scrawling political graffiti, as well as the use of brutal force against protesters. When brought into the courtroom dressed in striped prison garb and confined in a large cage, the families of victims and others shouted mockingly at him. Chants erupted, warning that “Assad’s dogs” should tremble with fear.

“This is exhibitionist justice rather than transitional justice,” stated Anwar Bunni, a Syrian lawyer and founder of the Syrian Center for Legal Studies and Research, at the time.

Beyond the spectacle, human rights experts also questioned whether the government was prepared to hold its first trial. Syria is still constructing a new legal system and is in the process of establishing forensic teams, training judges, and enacting laws covering crimes committed during the war.

“They want to demonstrate that they have started, yet they lack the capacity to do so,” Mr. Bunni remarked.

The court that convicted the first nine defendants and is currently trying others has invoked international law as the basis for the proceedings, said Hiba Zayadin, a senior researcher at Human Rights Watch investigating abuses in Syria. However, properly applying international law is difficult and places a heavy burden on the judges, she noted.

“There is a genuine tension here,” Ms. Zayadin stated. “Suspects cannot remain in indefinite detention without trial, and there is a legitimate concern that without accountability, communities will seek justice outside the courts.”

“However, effective transitional justice processes take years to build properly,” she added.

Firja Tu’ma al-Ali, 70, is among those eager for the closure that justice could bring. She believes the remains of her son, Omar Ahmed Hassan, lie somewhere among the piles of bones in Tadamon or are buried underground in one of several suspected massacre pits.

Her son disappeared in 2013 when he went to pick up his daughter from school. He never arrived, she recounted. As she shared her story, she paused frequently, weeping quietly.

Although the government arrested a former regime intelligence officer named Amjad Youssef in April—a central figure accused of involvement in a notorious massacre of more than 40 people in Tadamon—Ms. al-Ali remained unsatisfied.

“What about the other criminals?” she recently asked. For many families, incomplete justice will never soothe their grievances.

One of the greatest challenges facing the country’s leaders will be convincing victims and their families to accept alternatives to criminal prosecutions, said Zahra al-Barazi, deputy chair of the National Commission for Transitional Justice and an adviser in Syria’s foreign ministry. This could involve an approach similar to South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, established after Apartheid, or providing compensation for suffering.

“We cannot imprison half a million Syrians. That does not lead to Syrians being able to live together,” she stated.

For some Syrians, the tension between justice and reconciliation is embodied in the case of Fadi Saqr, who once led the National Defense Forces, a pro-Assad paramilitary group, in Damascus. He has been accused by some Syrians of involvement in the force’s massacre of civilians in Tadamon.

Mr. Saqr has denied responsibility, stating he was appointed to lead the militia after the massacre occurred.

Mr. Saqr has worked with the Committee for Civil Peace, a governmental body aiming to ease Syria’s internal divisions and foster transitional justice. The government had hoped Mr. Saqr, a member of the Alawite minority favored by the Assad family during its decades in power, could facilitate reconciliation efforts between different minority groups. However, his participation has provoked a storm of outrage among some Syrians.

When he visited Tadamon last year accompanied by security officials from the new government, Ms. al-Ali and other residents protested, asserting he should be in prison facing trial. “I want his head. I want to see his blood,” she said at the time, according to an online video.

More than a year after his visit, a government civil defense team finally arrived in the neighborhood to collect bones and exhume one mass grave, gathering potential evidence for prosecutions. Residents believe many more bodies remain buried there.

Neighborhood children continue to unearth more remains—residents say no one from the government has returned to retrieve them.

The large hole left by the exhumation now lingers like a gaping open wound.

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