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US journalist Austin Tice’s household is livid over a CNN report strongly suggesting her son — who was taken captive in Syria by the Assad regime 13 years in the past — is lifeless.
The CNN documentary and accompanying article by Clarissa Ward, aired and revealed Tuesday, relied on the testimony of Bassam Al-Hassan, the ex-right-hand man to ousted Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad.
Hassan, who has been charged with battle crimes, claimed he was ordered by Assad to execute Tice in 2013 and that the order was carried out by a subordinate.
“In fact, Austin is lifeless. Austin is lifeless,” Hassan instructed CNN.
Nonetheless, Hassan was beforehand interrogated by the FBI over these claims and failed a polygraph check, a element that the household feels CNN buried.
“CNN ran this text with out regard for Austin and the torment that this has rained on our household,” Tice’s mom, Deborah, instructed The Publish.
Tice, an ex-Marine, coated the Syrian civil battle in its early days as a contract journalist in 2012. His bylines appeared within the Washington Publish, McClatchy and CBS Information.
He embedded himself with rebels on the entrance line. He was kidnapped by the Assad regime on Aug. 13, 2012, whereas reporting in Daraya, a suburb of Damascus.
In September 2012, a video was launched of a blindfolded Tice being led up a mountain by males who gave the impression to be Jihadis. Tice may be heard reciting the Islamic declaration of religion and crying “Oh Jesus,” as his captors shout “Allahu Akbar.”
US officers decided the video was staged, and CNN reported that the “terrorists” have been the truth is Syrian troopers in disguise.
He’s believed to have been held in a number of prisons throughout Syria.
Deborah, 64, mentioned that Hassan is a “pathological liar” who will say something he must within the second, and accused CNN and Ward of going “off the rails” by giving his statements validity.
She believes Hassan is merely making an attempt to current himself as a reformed particular person who’s prepared to assist the US shut Austin’s case — however doesn’t really know what occurred to her son.
The anguished mother, who has by no means given up her conviction that her son is alive, known as CNN’s report “one other knife to our stomach.”
Although the FBI has searched inside Syria, neither Austin nor DNA proof confirming his demise has turned up.
“The U.S. authorities is dedicated to bringing Austin Tice and different People unjustly detained residence,” a State Division consultant instructed The Publish.
“Austin has not been seen in lots of, a few years,” President Trump mentioned in Could.
Deborah has spent the final decade doggedly advocating for her son’s rescue.
Her efforts have taken the Houston homemaker to DC to fulfill with a number of administrations and even to Damascus, the place she sat down with newly put in Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa.
She mentioned she noticed a few of her personal son in al-Sharaa — who was held prisoner in Abu Grahib from 2006-2011 whereas he fought with Al Qaeda in Iraq towards the US.
“In some ways, he jogged my memory of Austin, he’s from an enormous household, they usually’re actually essential to him. His mom and I’ve issues in widespread; she was by no means prepared to just accept that her son was lifeless when he was in jail, that’s loads like me,” she defined.
Deborah mentioned she met with US Nationwide Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard in April, and was proven intelligence as current as October 2024 that led her to consider her son remains to be alive.
She nostalgically recalled how Austin, a former Eagle Scout, was the “chief of the household” who took on a parental function towards his six youthful siblings.
“He was the massive brother everybody needs to have. Our household is de facto, actually shut. They have been the happiest days of my life, when all of my kids have been at residence,” she mentioned.
Deborah lamented that Austin’s seize threw her right into a world that the stay-at-home mother — who had Austin when she was simply 20 years previous — was by no means ready for.
“There have been issues I simply didn’t know concerning the world, about the best way adults deal with one another and deceive one another,” she mentioned.
Although it’s now not believed that Austin is held in a Syrian jail, and all leads to date have turned up chilly, Deborah says her “mother radar” tells her he’s alive and she or he appears ahead to the day they lastly reunite.
“He’s an unbelievable hugger, he’s an incredible hugger, I’ve missed these hugs a lot.”
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