Original subtitles

What do you think, Hansa?

Strange.

>> I feel strange.

>> It's difficult to feel like your life is

staged again. you know

feel like I'm here myself and now exists

there and just like I felt my my heart

is like

I I can't I can't find words

[music]

[music] in

Mark

>> I have never told Anna a story even to

to my family. Um my brother or uncle or

anyone else. Nobody knows.

[music]

[music]

>> Turn over

>> and action. Anna had to be created

because President Assad spies his

commanders, his officers.

[music] He will only talk to Anna.

There's no other way to do it.

This girl has ice in her veins.

Where does she get the the nerve to sit

down, to slip through the cracks of that

wall of silence and to to get backstage

in the machine?

Once I click call, I switch to Anna.

The question is, would they talk to us?

[music]

Heat. Heat.

[music]

the revolution in Syria. It started all

in 2011. mass protests in the streets

and those protests were repressed with

uh the Assad regime shooting live

bullets into demonstrations and then

arresting repressing demonstrations uh

locking people up and in many cases

disappearing them. Now the apparatus

that was responsible for that was

Assad's intelligence agencies. they have

covered their tracks by raising mass

graves or expuning archival records or

limiting access to eyewitnesses.

Um, so the question here is what how do

we write the truth when the evidence is

being made to disappear?

So I'm in [music] this conference and I

get a text from a friend of mine and he

says he has to see me immediately.

[music]

[music]

>> [music]

>> So, I text them back. I say, "Look, I

meet you in a nearby cafe.

[music]

We have to sit all the way in the back

of the cafe." And he took out his phone

and he said, "You need to watch this."

[music]

And then I watched the video.

[music]

When I watched [music] the video, I

stopped breathing.

And I never thought I could be shocked

after so many years of doing research on

on [music] genocide,

but it shocked me.

>> [music]

>> Back up.

When the video is done, then I breathe

out. And then I immediately realized

that this is a watershed. this is

something different from all those other

videos that we've seen. And I asked him,

who is the source? He said, it's

somebody I trust from Damascus. And he

didn't want to give any details.

[panting]

There's no way you can watch these

videos

and then shrug your shoulders and go on

with your life. At least not me. Do you

think I need to do something about this?

There was only one person I needed to

call and that was Onsar.

>> Hey.

[laughter] Hey.

So at the beginning when I saw the video

I was amazed.

We were like wow

finally we see the victims

[clears throat] we see the perpetrators

and we see the the process.

So, Ansar is a researcher studying a

master's program in genocide studies

[music] in Amsterdam.

She is an intelligent and sensitive

woman and her most fundamental

characteristic I think is that she can't

stand [music] injustice

work in a very small team [music]

working in secrets.

It was me and a few other people.

You see the actual killing live on video

and this is a unique chance to actually

prove that the regime is behind it.

>> We realized that there was a daunting

task ahead of us. And we have to watch

the videos not once but hundreds of

times.

The killing is done methodically.

The victims are hands are tied. They're

blindfolded, taken out of the car.

None of them tried to to fight.

>> The victims look well fed. They look

well dressed.

>> They look like they've been just

snatched off the street. It looks

[music] like they just went out for work

that day and then never came back.

>> They put the tires and down then the

bodies and then they put more tires

above. They need to to make sure that

the body is actually burned well. before

they remove the remainance.

>> Most of the victims are unidentifiable.

So I watch video and count them over and

over.

Victim number one, male an old guy.

Victim number two,

male. Victim number 13, female, mid age.

Victim 28, male.

Victim 51, female,

young, young. [music] Victim 52,

male

and clear. Victim 71, male. Traces of

torture. Victim 87. in the clear.

[music]

>> 288 people across 27 different videos,

almost all civilians.

>> I didn't allow myself to have even

feelings about what's going on.

It's not easy watching the videos over

and over.

Watching is easier than listening.

>> The sound, not the the the image itself,

the sound of the victims, the sound of

uh shooting,

man.

The perpetrators are fully visible.

There seems to be one main executioner

[music]

in green fatigues. He's clearly in

charge of this operation. [music]

>> Has the scar above his eyebrow.

[music]

>> He's just a professional killer. He's a

torturer.

There are moments where he seems [music]

almost charming, where he's uh horsing

around with his friends. You develop a

sense of empathy with him when he looks

into the camera and he grins.

I caught myself grinning back once, but

then also to the victims, he [music] has

this unforgiving, cold and piercing

uh look.

That is the moment where you see [music]

the face of the killer.

Call him the shadow man.

[music]

Literally also steps into the shadows of

the building.

When I watch this, I [music] I want to

know who he is.

I want to find him.

Who is this guy that executes these

people in cold blood?

>> Where do you even start?

>> The perpetrator's faces. We cut them

out, enlarge them almost like a

detective show.

I opened the Facebook. [music]

>> Facebook is a type of telephone

directory for the Assad regime.

>> I start searching [music] profile by

profile by profile.

Look for names looking and looking and

looking.

>> We thought [music] what are these people

do doing on Facebook? You are involved

in a conflict. Uh you have enemies. Why

are you [music] making yourself findable

on on social media and on Facebook? Of

course, they would take selfies with

their buddies hanging [music] out in

some neighborhood. These are my friends.

Person A, B, C, D.

And then she would click on that person,

add that person also to our friend

[music] friend group. And then of course

we would go one by one. Is it this guy?

No. Is it [music] this guy? No. Is it

this guy? Looks like him. But let's zoom

in. No. Is it this guy? No.

And you would scroll [music] through the

photos 10, 20, 30, 40, 60, 100, 200,

300, 400. You go all the way back to

2011.

[music] This is looking for a needle in

a hay stack. And it was a kind of

mission impossible.

Are we ever going to find this person?

And it starts to invade your psyche in

ways [music] that you can't really

control anymore.

Maybe your body is triggered by

something, by a smell or like a movement

or a word or a face.

You're walking the street somewhere

>> and all of a sudden I would just see him

and suddenly there was a guy really

looks like him

[music] and it's like my life is about

searching for him.

This is taking over my life, but I can't

stop.

And one day

Ansar sent me [music] picture of

[snorts] two men standing together

somewhere in Damascus.

There is a guy who has like looks

similar to to the guy in the video. I

sent to saying is it our man?

>> No, that's not him. That's definitely

not him. And she said you might want to

take a closer look. So, I zoomed in on

the photo

[music]

and I zoomed in on his face especially

and I zoomed in on [music] his eyes.

The scar is there.

[music] There's a scar on the exact same

eyebrow above the exact same eyebrow.

[music] This is him.

We found him.

Bingo.

was like very

enthusiastic that finally we found him.

[music]

[music]

We have his name. We have his

background. Then we found [music] this

Facebook page of Amjad Yousef.

>> Now we caught the perpetrator [music]

through Facebook. We have to at some

point go public with this material and

so [music] we contact different outlets

in various countries

but Syria is yesterday's war

people have moved on to a new wars

only the Guardian they showed a profound

interest and they realized the

unprecedented nature of the of the

investigation.

Doors open.

[music]

I'm Michael Safi and I'm an

international correspondent with The

Guardian.

The Guardian is first approached about

this story in March 2021.

What I'm told is astonishing. [music]

Nothing like this had ever come out of

Syria before.

Everything we had seen from the Syrian

war up to this point had been from the

perspective of the [music] opposition.

Citizen journalists in places like

Hummer, like Aleppo, like Homs were

filming protests.

They were taking us inside makeshift

morgs and hospitals.

But that was the war that we could see.

And we knew that the entire time there

was another war happening inside areas

that were regime controlled.

In those areas, there was a mystery. We

had no idea what was really going on.

We'd only hear rumors of the killings.

We've had years of testimony. We've had

satellite imagery. We've had fragments

of video.

What we don't have is proof in black and

white. We've never seen them doing it

before. And then [music] this video

lands

and this is a horror movie.

I mean it's sickening.

>> All these things that have been [music]

long suspected but never proved. Now we

can prove them.

>> Who is this guy?

>> [music]

>> These Facebook pictures show him sitting

on a motorbike looking pretty [music]

impressed with himself.

standing [music] in a street,

in a car,

at [music] the gym.

What struck me looking at the pictures

[music] was that

he could have been any of the people

that you pass on the street in a city

like Damascus.

We find these images on [music] his

profile page that was kind of like the

Barbie house in that movie. I just got

this impression of him coming home from

a day doing terrible [music] things and

just being bathed in pink light for the

rest of the evening.

Then we found this poetry

and Amjad is one of those perpetrators

who try to write

>> [music]

[music]

>> So he's mourning his brother. I mean

he's a brother who lost his brother.

[music] I mean he's a professional

killer. So not doesn't mean that he

doesn't have emotions. He seems to be

caring son for his mother and father.

It become harder to believe that [music]

the same person we we see in the tape is

the person we see now in the photos.

Okay. What should we do now? Do we try

the something rather devilish and we try

to contact Bamjet and see maybe if he's

dumb enough to make a Facebook account,

he's also dumb enough to talk to us. We

realize this is a job for Anna. It's

nothing and nobody else could do it.

>> Okay. I mean actually

>> in 2018

was

complaining that it's impossible to

interview Syrian perpetrators unless we

have like someone that's regime

we [music] can't create a story of a

person never exist

someone called

>> these militia men they generally only

trusted individual iduals who had a pro-

regime Facebook page.

So we set up a young woman. We gave her

a name, a character, [music] a

backstory.

I changed my name, changed my my

identity.

Anna is proad [music] girl from homes

from a middle-class family.

>> [music]

>> doing studying outside uh Syria.

>> This is the father and this is the son

and they ruled Syria for like 50 [music]

years, 60 years. Yes. Both are

dictators.

He just had criminal hoods to [music]

the Syrians, him and his father.

>> [music]

>> You need to have these

symbols.

If you had this room without [music]

these two posters,

Assad's militias, Assad's [music]

intelligence agents, they wouldn't talk

to her.

[music]

Like we tend to have the same culture,

the same values.

>> So it's not really you, right?

>> It's not really me. No. No.

We put a [music] souvenir. It's a famous

sword in the Shia culture drawn on it. A

Syrian the regime flag. I'm saying I'm a

pro Assad. with the help of the

photograph a friend. [music]

We did a photo session.

So I will not have my face fully on the

on the picture

but just like part of me.

[music]

They would like to know who is she. It

will encourage them to talk. Yeah.

The question is, would [music] they talk

to us? Can we get them? I said, yes, we

will get them.

[music]

[music]

>> [music]

>> So in the very beginning, Dans was

sitting at the computer and she has zero

friends. She started contacting people,

sending them friend requests.

>> My father

So then folks kept growing [music]

from zero to 20 then 50 then 150

>> and gradually not only did [music] the

network expand but also Anna's

confidence grew

>> the more I was Anna the more I learned

how to use it for research purpose

>> for for them they should see that you

are like powerless before them don't

forget they are like powerful masculine

man and you are like just a [music]

small uh woman powerless woman.

>> It's about some taboo and if [music] you

speak to anyone about violence you will

be hunted down like your victims.

They thought I am a therapist.

So they felt the [music] confidence to

talk to me about their violence.

[music]

>> [music]

>> We are catfishing the ranks of [music]

society in the military and in the state

bureaucracy. But now is the time for

something that has never been done

before

to contact Amjet, a sitting military

intelligence officer, a member of the

Muhammabat.

>> Muhabarat is basically Syrian

intelligence.

They received training in the 70s and

80s from agencies like the East German

Stars.

They spy on the public. They spy on each

other. They arrest people. They police

dissent. [music]

But maybe their most penicious impact is

psychological. They create this feeling

among Syrians that the walls have ears.

That [music] you can't trust your

neighbor, your aunt, even your children.

Amjud is trained to spot liars. He's

trained to [music] see people under

pressure.

So when Anna meets him, she needs to be

ready.

[music]

>> I sent him a Facebook friend request.

Then I wrote to him [music]

[music] and he replied, "Do I know you

sh I'm [music] interested and this This

is my project.

>> We were laying a trap to catch a killer.

What if he was immediately very

suspicious? What if he saw through us?

The make orb breakak [music] moment in

the investigation.

[music]

Then after 4 days, I'm [music] just call

I'm shocked.

Yeah, I switch like immediately to Anna.

Once I I receive a call immediately I

start recording

Keep

back.

Yeah. Go up.

Mhm.

Wow.

>> [laughter]

[laughter]

[music]

>> him accepting to the call was was huge.

[music]

I was so happy that uh

we going to have an interview with him

and he will talk.

[music] I mean um I was like I can look

at my eyes like it's like wow we get

[laughter] him

we get him.

>> [snorts]

>> I can

[clears throat]

connect Yeah,

[music]

>> he's suspicious.

I think he he wanted to make sure if I'm

lying or not.

[music]

[laughter]

Sure.

[music]

[music] So he is asking question asking

question asking question to make sure

that I am not lying. So he was looking

for the information.

See, so he called me not because he he

accepted the call, not because he wanted

to share information in the country. He

wants to know who am I.

[music]

>> [laughter]

>> but I was very calm [music] because I

was very happy you know and uh I wanted

not to make any mistake.

Sec.

[clears throat and cough]

[music]

When I'm in a call with them, I'm in

control. [music]

I'm trying to control everything single

word that I speak to them [music] about.

Give them some sense of normal normaly

that what I'm telling them it's the

truthful [music]

the truth.

So I live the moment with them.

[music]

Foreign

[laughter]

speech. Foreign speech. Foreign speech.

[music]

>> [music]

>> Hello. Hello.

>> And he promised to call back and then he

disappeared. [music]

I was stressed that he will not call

back.

So I text him in Friday. Next Friday he

didn't reply. The Friday after he didn't

reply and I stopped texting him him. I

thought he would not call back. It will

be like the end of of the thing. We hope

it works.

>> We found the perpetrator on Facebook and

we interviewed him. But there's so much

we don't know. Who are the victims? Uh

what is the timing? And also why are

these people massacred? So to answer

these questions, we need to know the

location of the video and the location

is almost all of the puzzle basically.

>> So I text and I told him like we need to

work with someone inside the Moscow.

>> We needed some boots on the ground so to

speak.

>> But it is 2021 in Syria. Assad is in

full control of Damascus.

>> Shattered ghost towns. Tens of thousands

dead. Hundreds of thousands more trapped

in the purgatory of not knowing a loved

one's fate. The legacy of the Syrian war

so far. 10 years and counting.

>> So the city is like a prison and the

intelligence is everywhere. You can't

get in or out without one of many

checkpoints. People can disappear.

>> Who would be crazy enough to help two

foreign researchers with an

investigation on a massacre committed by

Assad?

>> To ask someone in Damascus to work on

that, it's a death sentence.

>> [music]

>> How

famous?

Cash

video.

Hey

God.

Adam.

Ladam. You know, you

[music]

They are among an estimated 150,000

Syrians who were detained or went

missing during hundreds of thousands

[music] of imprisoned or disappeared by

the rejo. The torture it continues for

those holding on to the hope of

connecting to those they love.

Fore!

Foreign! Foreign!

Skype. I mean,

[music]

Sword

for

[music]

>> [music]

>> Okay.

How are you?

>> [music]

>> forever

by the Irish mother. [music]

[music]

off

that

>> that's terrible. I'm really sorry

in the area before in 201

With the help of field researcher on the

ground in the Basos. We learn the videos

are just a snapshot.

>> We can see in this map that there is not

only one mass graves, not only one site

of killing, we have at least four to six

sides of killing

>> from November 2012 [music]

until 2015 at least.

>> So we are talking about thousands of

people went missing. They killed them.

They burned the bodies. They [music]

removed the ashes and they brought a new

group. It was very systematic,

methodological.

So we [music] began asking who is

controlling the area back then?

Is it the opposition or the regime?

Mass violence had been carried out by

both sides. [music]

Our field researcher found out that the

location actually is in in an area under

the regime control and never was under

the the opposition control. We can't say

it's Amjad but the Syrian regime will

say this video doesn't tell who is Amjad

and interview with Amjad is not enough.

So it confirmed our result 100% that the

only one who is responsible for this is

the regime.

>> [music]

>> They address [music] the the camera and

said this killing it's for you as if

they are saying we done the job we

killed [music] for you indicating that

it's it's organized

they know exactly what they have done

[music] they kept footages and evidence

about them so They reported their their

deeds to the to the to his superior.

Amjad has a direct connection with that

branch 227 [music] in the military

intelligence

and this connection goes to the [music]

president

dedication to the boss. We think that

means directly or indirectly bash

[music] ass.

>> So, President Assad himself is fully

cognizant [music] of the events that are

happening under his rule. Assad is a

lanky, uncarismatic, chinless,

awkwardl looking man with a lisp who

doesn't strike anyone as a genocidal

maniac,

but looks can deceive.

said he's the only leader who can give

orders and ultimate orders and everyone

should listen to him. [music]

People being killed in this video,

[music]

they were ordinary people, people who in

many cases weren't even political. And

it raises this question of why? Why were

they killed? [music]

At some point in 2012, the regime in its

kind of paranoid madness was arresting

more people than it could afford to

imprison. [music]

The regime started avenging civilians,

kind of collectively punishing them,

accusing them of sympathizing with the

opposition.

If we look at [music] someone like

Mjett, there are many MJets walking

around in Syria

[music]

who did not videotape their massacres

and who do not have a Facebook account

and yet were at least equally [music]

brutal in their violence.

>> You need a political cover and

institutional backing to [music] do such

a scale of killing. Mjad is part of a

killing machine.

>> Mjaded has the apparatus of the Assad

regime behind them.

deep in their hearts they know that

their practices are violent,

undemocratic, and that it's unfair and

unjust. And that if it was up to the

majority of the Syrians, there would be

a very different regime in power. That

realization makes them cling on to power

even more.

>> The crucial thing is us and them. They

assume that everyone is against them.

that you are the other and they have the

right to kill you.

mean

>> there's Assad and then there are the

enemies who need to be dispatched.

This is the making of a killer.

This is how you make these perpetrators.

Perpetrators are not born. They're made.

>> I had two months of the regime since

childhood.

In a very early age, five, six,

you see people dying, killed, [music]

tortured.

A person with a childhood trauma can't

really defend themselves.

I have a psychological condition [music]

called dissociation disorder.

So I start dissociating to forget about

that trauma.

You become numb to to the outside world.

[music]

So I guess to see it into an

I weaponize myself. [music]

So it's kind of revenge for myself, for

the others, [music] for many Syrians.

The world need to know what the regime

have done.

Yeah. Out of the blue, amateur calls.

The sound of the call. I I immediately

switch become Anna.

I prepared a program to start the

[music] coding.

>> Mhm.

>> He's drinking. It's clear from his eyes

and from his words. He was there.

Like usually [music] you tell tell

someone you you consider close to you

like I miss you. Someone you dear to

you. Yeah. So [music] he's like

flarious. He wants to to have something

something like romance and other things.

Yeah.

>> [music]

>> [ __ ] you.

>> Of course, as I'm sorry, I hated a lot.

Always inside me, I would [music] say

like, "Fuck you." But I I smile and I

complete the call.

[laughter]

money.

>> No, no, no, no.

>> But as I dealt [music] with it, it's

something don't want to think about it.

My aim is clear. [music]

But the way you deal with it is to lead

them to where you want.

Um

>> [laughter]

>> I was raised in a in a house where I

with my father and two brothers. So I

know how how people think things, man

things.

>> [music]

[music]

[music]

>> I think male population in Syria are

really broken by this male ego.

>> [music]

>> which is hiding a lots of destruction

and shutter by society by the regime

[music]

uh and later by violence itself. I mean

you are under huge pressure but if you

are not part of that you will not

realize what is [music] behind this ego

which is really a damage.

[music]

>> [music]

[music]

>> might even come to

[music]

I led him to talk about his family, his

brother because it was key um key

[music] incident in amid life and I felt

Like if we open up talking about his

brother, he will talk more about the

violence.

[music]

>> [music]

>> He will have more like

trust to to speak more because he will

talk about his suffering. When people

talk about something very close to them

and a very traumatic event on their

about in their past, they will talk more

about something they they feel ashamed

about. And that's what happened.

[music]

[clears throat]

[ __ ]

[music]

We caught him.

So, it's like just like you piece

evidence together. You piece all the

puzzle together and himself saying,

"Yes, I [music] did."

All the walls in his mind collapsed and

he he spoke the words he shouldn't

speak.

It's an extraordinary [music] admission

that Ansar has been able to secure from

Amjud. He's somebody who keeps secrets

professionally. He operates in the

shadows. Here he is telling a woman he's

never really met. He's a murderer.

It was amazing that he confessed. We

were very very happy but it cost me a

lot

[music]

[music]

>> for 4 years.

>> I was I don't know 24/7.

It is difficult for her to inhabit the

character of Anna

who has all types of characteristics

[music] and opinions and ideas and

adheres to an ideology and to a regime

that's that Ansar finds despicable.

So it starts getting under your skin.

>> I suppress my emotions over and over and

over.

I'm sorry. Has an addiction for Anna,

too.

Can't do this for too long. This has to

be

purely instrumental. We're getting

material and then we're ending the

operation.

cuz I start losing control over my my

body when I'm dissociated and I have

this pain in my spine. So, it's a kind

of like tingling and burning sensation

in the in the spine.

They call my memories as if you are

reliving that somehow.

>> [music]

>> I felt like

that's getting inside

knowledge was my way of revenge against

a

we have what we need but there was one

last thing we have to do. Let's let him

know that we have seen the video the the

massacre.

>> [music]

>> When we do that, he he flip-flops a bit

with his responses.

Then he said, "It's my [music] job." And

in the end, he says, "I'm proud of what

I did.

Now we caught the perpetrator [music]

through Facebook and confesses to the to

to his crime. It's time to inform the

world about this horrific massacre.

I barely slept the night before the

story [music] came out. I had the sense

that we were going to be in the middle

of a storm.

>> [music]

>> It's put on the Guardian website first.

5:00 a.m. or 6:00 a.m.

I woke up and my phone was buzzing. 37

[music] messages, that many missed

calls.

Oh my god, this is the moment. This is

happening. This news going into the

world.

>> [music]

[music]

>> I looked at regional news in the Middle

East and this video that had been a

secret on my [music] computer

was being broadcast across the world.

>> [music]

>> Within a day [music] after the

investigation, MJ closes his Facebook

page because it was inundated with

messages from people

because he was exposed.

He knew that this story [music] was out

there and he was trying to cover his

tracks to hide himself.

[music]

The Syrian government were trying to

ignore it. Just don't talk about it and

hope it'll all go away.

In the case of this story, it was too

big.

>> It had a major impact around the world.

French government and the German

government, they began investigating

[music]

into the crime.

The state department tweeted about it.

>> The regime struggled [music] to to deny.

He said that uh didn't happen or [music]

sometimes even Bashad read the Guardian

article and he was furious.

>> So, President Assad's foreign minister

said, "This is French colonial

propaganda. This is all a ploy by the

US.

>> This video shows beyond doubt that all

of the things that Syrians were telling

the world for years about what was

really happening in regime held areas

were true.

[music]

When the investigation is published,

Amjad is not even symbolically punished

for what he has done. [music]

The Assad regime is still there. So what

value does our investigation have?

[music]

I've asked myself this question [music]

many times and I'm thinking maybe the

regime is still there. Maybe most likely

there will be impunity for Assad,

[music]

for Amjad and all those others.

Let's be honest, people were really

depressed,

lost hope.

[music]

>> [music]

>> So I was at home watching news. It's

time to [music] go.

>> A momentous day in the Middle East. The

family dynasty that controlled Syria for

more than half a century is no longer in

power with President Bashar al-Assad

[music] having fled the country.

>> We were like living a dream.

It's really a dream.

While many Syrians celebrate, others

continue their desperate search for

loved ones disappeared by Assad's brutal

regime. My cousin, my son, my family,

all all.

[music]

foreign.

[music]

You can for

speech.

Foreign

[music]

[music]

[music] speech. Foreign speech. Foreign

speech.

>> [music]

[music]

>> Stories of atrocities, brutal

detentions, and mass killings are still

coming to light after the fall of

dictator Bashar al-Assad.

>> [music]

>> More and more bodies like this are

discovered across the country. Locals

are reporting [music] on mass graves.

>> As journalists rushed into Damascus for

the first [music] time in decades,

trying to tell the story of this moment

and of the brutality [music] of Bashar

al-Assad.

They went to Tadaman and I realized

watching from afar it had become this

symbol. One of the names [music] that

became most prominent among Arab and

Syrian journalists, one of the people

who they were all asking about where is

he? It was Amjad Ysef.

[music] And according to civilians, this

was the place that the massacre of was

committed by the Assad regime militias

here in this area.

A recruit from the Assad regime named as

Ajad als

men in Syria.

So people are telling me that Amjudad

might be in Sweden, in Cyprus. Some are

saying he's escaped to Beirut. Others

are even telling me that he hasn't left

Syria at all. He might have had

extensive plastic surgeries. You

wouldn't recognize him.

It's really difficult to sort fact from

[music] fiction, but by this point, it

feels like he's already becoming a

ghost.

I had the sense [music] he could be on

the street near me and I wouldn't know

it.

>> I received many threats during the

project. I had dreams that Amjad is

killing me. [music]

>> We will come after you.

We will kill you.

Come back to Syria and you will never

see the sun.

My therapist, [music]

he told me, "You need to choose between

Alsar and Anna."

And it's and deserve to live.

I decided to kill Anna.

I told her we need to bury Anna.

And so we decide to stage a ritual

[music]

to close off this period. We have to

kill off Anna.

>> We printed [music] the first page of

like profile page of Anna.

I think that moment I felt like I'm free

[music]

now for the first time.

[music]

[music]

>> [music]

[music]

>> He spoke some words about goodbye Anna

and that's it.

It was as [music] if killing part of

himself.

The more you heal psychologically,

[music]

the more you you figure out how we were

raised to accept [music] violence.

I'm and everybody will say without this

research he's just a man killing people.

But we wanted to prove

[music]

and tell the truth that this man is

ordered by a state by the regime.

This is the truth for me.

I hope for Syrians at least

it helped.

Anna set out with this goal to

understand the people who had done these

terrible things.

Not just to expose them, [music] but to

understand

where they come from. And that's not

just a service to Syrians. [music] It's

a service to all of us. It's an insight

into how ordinary people can be turned

into monsters.

[music] I know it was a huge sacrifice

but but I know like um must now [music]

stronger than before

and that was one of the ways I tried to

deal with my trauma [music] and sense of

injustice.

The population of Syria is 28 million

and we always joke that the 28 millions

are suffering trauma.

We [music] need to have lots of

discussion how to to deal with this by

all sides

[music] otherwise this will lead us to

more violence.

That last

[music]

>> [music]

>> How

shuna?

>> [music]

[music]

>> Who is

Limited? [music]

[music]

foreign

[music]

[music]

speech.

Fore!

Foreign! Foreign!

[music]

>> [music]

>> Foreign

[music]

speech. Foreign speech. Foreign speech.

[music]

foreign

[music]

speech.

[music]

>> [music]

>> I did it. [music]

[music]

>> [music]

[music]

[music]

>> Heat.

Heat.

Heat.

[music]

[music]

Heat.

[music]

>> [music]

[music]

>> Heat. Heat.

[music]

It's nat.

[music]

>> [music]