On 13 July 2025, after General Security forces stormed the village of Jreen in the western countryside of Sweida, Umm Fida’s family was forcibly displaced. Accompanied by her husband, Khaled Abu Hassoun, 57, and their two sons, Fida and Ihab Abu Hassoun, both 25, they were ordered to leave with nothing but the clothes they were wearing, abandoning their home and livelihood as they fled shelling that pursued them all the way to the city of Sweida.

At first, the men remained in the village until the assault intensified, forcing them to retreat toward the city center. The family sought refuge at a relative’s home near Al-Thaala Roundabout. There, Umm Fida stayed with the women and children of her extended family, waiting for news of the men. Their fate remained unknown after communications and internet services were cut across the entire governorate, coinciding with the onset of sectarian killings carried out by forces affiliated with the Ministries of Defense and Interior, alongside tribal fighters.

Hiding from Death in a Single Room

For four days, Umm Fida and her family remained trapped inside a single room, surviving on scarce food and water. As reports of killings gradually emerged, she struggled to endure both the terror unfolding outside and the harsh reality of displacement with the few resources they had left.

“We couldn’t comprehend what was happening,” Umm Fida recalls. “When the attack reached the city, the sound of gunfire and screaming kept getting closer until they arrived at Al-Thaala Roundabout. We saw General Security vehicles alongside tribal fighters chanting, ‘We’ve come to slaughter you, infidels.'”

“The hardest part,” she continues, “was keeping the children quiet despite their fear, terrified that any noise would draw attention to us. Around that time, my husband and my son Ihab had returned from outside, but the fighters saw them and took them away to an unknown location.”

Umm Fida describes those hours as a slow death. With no phone service and no news of her husband or sons, every burst of nearby gunfire and every report of another resident being killed deepened her fear that they, too, had been lost.

Burning Bodies and a Delayed Bullet

Meanwhile, Umm Fida’s eldest son, Fida, wandered through the streets of Sweida trying to reach his family before an armed group captured him. Recounting his ordeal to Daraj, he says:

“An armed group stopped me and took me to the garage area near the Military Police headquarters. There, I saw bodies burning, and the body of an elderly sheik lying beside them.”

After confirming that he was unarmed, the fighters questioned him about his religious identity.

“When they learned I was Druze, they accused me of fighting in Jaramana against what they called ‘our revolutionary brothers.’ They claimed they had videos to pressure me, proving it. I told them, ‘If you have evidence, I accept your judgment.'”

Fida was held captive for nearly five hours, during which he endured sectarian abuse and repeated death threats.

“I told them that we are all Syrians,” he recalls. “They rejected that outright, accusing me of being a traitor and an apostate, insisting that this country belonged to them, not to us.”

He vividly remembers the moment the group’s commander, whom the fighters called “the Sheik,” arrived.

“He took my switched-off phone and tried to search it. Then he forced me to kneel among the burning bodies, pointing an 8.5 mm pistol at my head and saying, ‘Say your final prayers.'”

After Fida recited them in surrender, the men discussed his fate before deciding to postpone his execution and hand him over to General Security instead.

His testimony challenges the official narrative that General Security forces alone entered the area during the assault. According to his account, jihadist factions operated alongside them in coordination with security forces operating under the Ministry of Defense.

Speaking about how he escaped, Fida says:

“One of the fighters helped me. He told me he was an Alawite who had defected from the former regime in Idlib and later joined their ranks. He urged me to leave before General Security arrived because, he said, they would kill me.”

At that moment, an Israeli airstrike targeted the group’s positions, forcing a noticeable retreat. Their advance into the city also stalled due to resistance from local armed groups.

Recognizing Your Loved Ones by Their Clothes

Fida then made his way toward Al-Thaala Roundabout in search of his family home, navigating a landscape of devastation.

“I was running among the bodies, trying to figure out where my family was,” he recalls.

Just a few meters from the roundabout, in an area known as Al-Mazalla, he noticed three bodies whose faces had been covered with white sheets by residents.

“One of them was wearing trousers that looked like my brother Ihab’s,” Fida says. “I ran over, lifted the sheets, and found my father, my brother, and my uncle.”

“I dropped to my knees beside them and kept screaming for them to get up. A hail of bullets had severely damaged their bodies.”

Reflecting on what he saw, Fida says:

“If you want to kill someone, you shoot them once until they die. But when you empty entire magazines into a body, it means you came with hatred and the intent to kill from the very beginning.”

He believes they were executed sometime between 3:00 and 4:00 a.m. on 17 July 2025, shortly before the attackers withdrew, judging by the fact that the blood had not yet dried.

With the help of residents, the three bodies were loaded into a vehicle bound for Sweida National Hospital. Before it departed, Fida wrote their names on the vehicle and entrusted them to one of the men present, while he continued searching for his mother.

He wandered through the neighborhood like a man lost, shouting at the top of his lungs, “Umm Fida… Umm, Fida…”

Eventually, a neighbor informed his mother that someone outside was calling her name.

Picking up the story, Umm Fida recalls:

“I ran into the street and found my son, Fida. I asked him, ‘Where are your father and your brother?'”

“He answered with deep sorrow, ‘They met the same fate as everyone else, Mother.’ At that moment, I knew they had been killed.”

“I Searched for My Family Among the Bodies”

Fida moved his mother, along with the women and children who were with her, to a safer location before heading to Sweida National Hospital as a second wave of attacks by tribal fighters began.

When he arrived, the hospital courtyard had become a collection point for bodies recovered from the streets, homes, and surrounding villages.

“I had to search for my father, my brother, and my uncle among 53 bodies,” Fida recalls. “I turned over each one, staring at their swollen faces. During my search, I saw the bodies of elderly men, women bearing signs of physical abuse, and children who had been beheaded.”

After a lengthy search, Fida finally found the bodies of his father, brother, and uncle.

At around the same time, his cousin was killed alongside two other relatives on Al-Mahwari Road during the assault. According to the family, they were later buried in the mass grave at Al-Raha.

Buried Under Fire

With fuel in short supply, communications cut, mass displacement underway, and cemeteries already full, finding a burial site became an ordeal in itself. Fida refused to leave his relatives’ bodies exposed and rejected suggestions to bury them temporarily by the roadside, as some families had done until conditions improved. Instead, despite the dangers, he decided to take them to a private cemetery in the village of Masad after obtaining permission from the village’s mukhtar.

He managed to secure a vehicle and drove to Masad under the cover of darkness. As the burial was taking place, nearby Bedouin groups opened fire on the area. Despite the gunfire, the burial was completed at around 10:30 p.m. on 17 July 2025.

Bargaining with Blood

Like many mothers in Sweida, Umm Fida survived with only half her family. Others lost their families entirely. All that remains are the death certificates issued by Sweida National Hospital for her husband and son—a stark reminder of the day that changed their lives forever.

The family has since faced another ordeal. To process her late husband’s pension, government offices require that the cause of death be amended from “gunshot wound” to “natural causes,” effectively forcing families to deny the killings in exchange for receiving their pension benefits.

As tears interrupt her account of those days, Umm Fida wipes her eyes and concludes:

“Your children are beyond precious. We lived through unimaginable days, but the dignity of their blood is worth more than anything.”