CNN Report Raises Questions
Well, buckle up, because this story just got way more complicated than anyone could have imagined. What started as a dramatic, headline-grabbing moment—CNN freeing a “prisoner” from a Syrian cell—has now unraveled into a tangled web of alleged war crimes, misidentities, and some seriously questionable optics.
Let’s rewind. Last week, CNN’s Clarissa Ward described her dramatic rescue of a man she thought was a victim of Bashar al-Assad’s brutal regime.
The video went viral, as Ward and her team helped the man out of a dingy, windowless cell. He claimed his name was Adel Ghurbal, that he’d been locked up for three months, and that he didn’t even know Assad’s regime had fallen. Sounds compelling, right?
Except now, the narrative has taken a hard left turn. Syrian fact-checking group Verify-Sy dug into the story and dropped a bombshell: that prisoner wasn’t some innocent civilian wrongfully detained. Nope, they say he’s actually Salama Mohammad Salama, a first lieutenant in Syrian air force intelligence. And if that name doesn’t ring a bell, his reputation certainly should.
Locals know him as “Abu Hamza,” and not for any good reason. This guy allegedly spent years shaking people down, torturing anyone who wouldn’t pay up, and even killing civilians during Syria’s devastating civil war.
Oh, but it gets worse. Verify-Sy’s report notes some big red flags in the CNN footage. Salama looked way too healthy for someone supposedly stuck in solitary confinement for 90 days.
No injuries, no signs of malnutrition. And the kicker? The man didn’t even squint at sunlight after months in a pitch-black cell. Not exactly convincing.
When the fact-checkers couldn’t find any trace of “Adel Ghurbal,” they uncovered what they say is his real identity. Locals told them Salama ended up in that prison after falling out with a higher-up over—you guessed it—how to split extorted money. So, instead of being a victim of the regime, it seems like he was on the losing end of a power struggle.
And what about CNN? Well, they’re standing by their reporting for now but admit they’re looking into the allegations. “We have subsequently been investigating his background,” they said, though they’re adamant the rescue wasn’t staged.