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Global Silence As HTS & Allies Take Alawite Women As Sex Slaves In Syria

Since December, when the former Al-Qaeda affiliate, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), toppled the government of Bashar al-Assad, Syria has witnessed a chilling wave of mysterious kidnappings of young women, predominantly from the Alawite community.

Evidence continues to emerge that these women, primarily from the Alawite religious sect, have been abducted and taken to live as sex slaves in Idlib governorate, the traditional HTS stronghold, by armed factions affiliated with the new Syrian government.

Shockingly, the mass kidnapping and enslavement of Alawite women now being carried out by HTS-affiliated factions mirrors the enslavement of the thousands of Yezidi women by ISIS during the 2014 genocide in Sinjar, Iraq.

In a now deleted Facebook post, Hiba Ezzedeen, a Syrian activist from Idlib, described her encounter with a woman she believes was captured and taken to the governorate as a sex slave during the wave of massacres carried out by government-affiliated factions and security forces against Alawites in the country's coastal areas on March 7.

“During my last visit to Idlib, I was at a place with my brother when I saw a man I knew with a woman I had never met before,” Hiba explained.

“This man had been married multiple times before and is believed to currently have three wives. What caught my attention was the woman’s appearance – specifically, it was clear she didn’t know how to wear a hijab properly, and her scarf was draped haphazardly.”

After inquiring further, Ezzedeen learned that the woman was from the coastal areas where the March 7 massacres, in which over 1,600 Alawite civilians were killed, took place. “This man had brought her to the village and married her, with no further details available. No one knew what had happened to her or how she got there, and naturally, the young woman was too afraid to speak,” Ezzedeen added.

Because the situation was so strange and alarming to her, she began asking everyone she knew, “rebels, factions, human rights activists,” about the abduction of Alawite women from the coast. “Unfortunately, many confirmed that this had indeed happened, and not just by one faction. Based on what friends said, accusations point to factions of the National Army and some foreign fighters, with varying motives,” she reported.

Syria's new HTS-led security forces have incorporated armed extremist groups, including Uyghurs from the Turkestan Islamic Party (TIP) and Syrian Turkmen from factions of the Turkish-intelligence-backed Syrian National Army (SNA), into their ranks since coming to power in Damascus.

Various SNA commanders and foreign extremists have been appointed to top positions in the Syrian Ministry of Defense.

While the HTS-dominated General Security units participated in the March 7 massacres in many areas, former SNA and foreign fighter factions are believed to have led the campaign. Militants went door to door in Alawite villages and neighborhoods, executing all military-aged men they could find, looting homes, and at times killing women, children, and the elderly. ...

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