Talk:Massacre of the Sheitat Tribe

I thought we had a talk page for this. Where did CE put the defected ISIS leader's bodyguard's story? --Caustic Logic (talk) 12:39, 13 December 2014 (UTC)


 * I did put it over there. Don't think I was aware that we have a special page for it, and well, it isn't very informative (yet). --CE (talk) 14:32, 13 December 2014 (UTC)


 * Thanks. Yeah, it's been slow. Some new stuff now, worth getting back to. Below, what we have there: --Caustic Logic (talk) 09:43, 23 May 2015 (UTC)

Moved Introductory Material

 * ''from Talk:Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham

IS Executes "700" of al-Sheitaat tribe in Deir ez-Zor province. Huff Post, August 16, 2014

Baldur (talk) 01:33, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks. See also (Huffy, bah) Massacre of the Sheitat Tribe page which is woefully behind considering the gravity of this act os mass terror (with SOHR numbers, however, hopefully inflated...) --Caustic Logic (talk) 09:34, 20 August 2014 (UTC)


 * Bodyguard of Syrian rebel who defected to Isil reveals secrets of the jihadist leadership, The Telegraph, November 10, 2014


 * Syria in a nutshell: Meet Saddam Jamal, Drug dealer, turned FSA commander with claimed CIA connections, turned ISIS big wig and child mass murderer. The kids had the misfortune of being born into the Sheitat tribe. Witnessed and reported to the Telegraph by his fled bodyguard. Surprise, surprise: He cares more about Power than about Islam (or bringing democracy to Syria, for that matter). --CE (talk) 09:44, 11 November 2014 (UTC)


 * What a story ... as for "in a nutshell," they're not all this ambitious and destructive as this sick opportunist, but a crowd of lesser versions has been the bread and butter of the uprising, at least its getting things done (and getting Assad blamed) end. Didn't even take ISIS to do the Houla Massacre - but it take ISIS to openly slaughter dozens of enemy children at a time without letting anyone else take the glory. --Caustic Logic (talk) 12:58, 11 November 2014 (UTC)


 * An extreme case for sure - one less familiar with the scene than us could even suspect propaganda, given the source -, but it indeed fits the picture. Got the link from an Edward Dark tweet who expressed - and had to defend - a similar characterization. --CE (talk) 13:08, 11 November 2014 (UTC)
 * It's clearly being used as propaganda. And it could well be untrue, but not from implausibility, just maybe by coincidence. :) --Caustic Logic (talk) 13:49, 11 November 2014 (UTC)
 * You're right. I hate it that I always have to explain that propaganda doesn't have to be untrue. And now that. Sloppy. ;o) --CE (talk) 14:20, 11 November 2014 (UTC)


 * Abu Hammam on Wikimapia
 * Syria tribal revolt against Islamic State ignored, fueling resentment By Liz Sly, Washington Post, October 20, 2014. This explains, from escaped tribal members, that a fight over a Sheitat man smoking on the street started the conflict, with both sides escalating it.
 * EA Worldview Includes early tweets from a man talking to a tribe member who says a rape sparked it.
 * [Syria direct] In November some exiled members allowed to return after promising to behave and pbey ISIS, aacording to an ISIS news agency (sorry, direct link was considered "spam" - can be found with shaitat-return-to-deir-e-zor-after-pledging-fealty-to-is/)

Mass Graves

 * Thomas van Linge on Twitter, December 13 #Syria: people in #Deir_ezzor have discovered a mass grave of members of the Sheitat tribe who were massacred by #IS (includes photo) --Caustic Logic (talk) 12:39, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Mass Grave Found in Eastern Syria Suspected to Hold Bodies of 230 Tribesmen Killed by Islamic State Vice News, Dec. 18. embedded Youtube video Also Deir Ezzour, maybe the same grave mentioned above. Says the dead here were all fighting-age males. --Caustic Logic (talk) 00:27, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

Opposition Records
I checked the database of the Center for Documentation of Violations in Syria finally to see if they ever recorded this massacre. The name does appear, barely. I found three relevant (English, transliterated) spellings in the "Martyrs" database by checking Arabic (2+ spellings) - combined, 8 Sheitats killed in the whole war, all civilian.
 * VDC
 * Recall, this is a sizeable Sunni clan, we hear, at least in Raqqah and Deir Ezzour. It didn't yield many non-civilian ("FSA"/other) martyrs, yet it had 'til then seemingly suffered very few losses per capita (even knowing the list is likely incomplete even before this recent and massive blank spot). Maybe everyone but Daesh knows that tribe is hands off? Eh, that's all pretty speculative.  --Caustic Logic (talk) 11:19, 23 May 2015 (UTC)


 * one Shetat - an 8 year-old killed by sniper, Dec. 2011, Homs
 * one Shtata - a man, killed by shelling, Homs, July 2012
 * 6 named Shatat(most common Arabic then is شطط )- 5 men and one woman, killed by shelling and shooting from 2012 on. Note that three were killed around this massacre span, if a bit early - June 16, 2014, while SOHR has the massacre by ISIS in the first half of August - and the wrong area - the massacre is in Raqqa and wherever Daesh can reach - can they shell Aleppo? Because these three were over in Aleppo, Sukkari district, killed by "warplane shelling." Notes: Several people martyred in a massacre due to the regime air forces' shelling with explosive barrels, Documented through the forensic office. They're only part of a mass of 60 people killed in an attack on Sukkari neighnorhood that day, at least by this record. The VDC listed the Daeshbags'Al-Mabouja Massacre in 2015 but with the victims listed under "regime forces" deaths, not martyrs. So I checked there and the Sheitats didn't even get that honor. At one point thousands were considered missing. VDC's missing list doesn't have any. --Caustic Logic (talk) 09:43, 23 May 2015 (UTC)
 * A Wikipedia article gives the family name spelling الشعيطات but this does not appear in the VDC database at all.

Continued Slaughter of the Sheitats
There may wind up being several parts to this, but to start two alleged parts from recent days and from a bit earlier, unclear. These come from the same interesting report from the Telegraph: Islamic State begins beheading regime fighters in Palmyra] --Caustic Logic (talk) 11:11, 23 May 2015 (UTC)

Palmyra Sheitats Beheaded?
Telegraph:
 * A picture sent by activists to a Western journalist showed a row of men in a street in Palmyra - known locally by its Arabic name Tadmur - lying in a pool of blood.


 * At least four of the men had been decapitated.

We have this image saved here. It's pretty accurate. Those saying these were popular committee fighters ("Shabiha) may be right, and just guessing it seems fair enough. All fit, younger fighting age men, in civilian clothes but mostly sporty, is totally consistent with civilian-dress fighters. In the context, I would be out there fuckin' fighting, I like to think. Either Shabiha types, or just someone who felt slated to die anyway, met it head on in a team with sneakers and rifles, and took a few Daeshbags out before they went down, horribly.


 * Other activists in the town told contacts elsewhere that the dead men were members of the Shaitat tribe, an anti-Isil Sunni clan from eastern Syria. The Shaitat suffered one of the worst Isil massacres yet when they rose up against Isil’s conquest of eastern Syria. When Isil managed to reassert its authority last August it carried out a swathe of punishment killings, shooting, beheading and crucifying 700 people.

And now, some say, their relatives in Palmyra, maybe some who escaped the earlier slaughter but more likely its own local branch who never even had a Deash to rise up against until now ... hell, they're probably sworn to hunt down any unborn children who survived, and all their offspring. --Caustic Logic (talk) 11:11, 23 May 2015 (UTC)

Shraideh Sheitats Targeted?
Telegraph:
 * In a separate report, the anti-Isil activist group Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently said that the group had executed another member of the Shaitat tribe from Abu Hamam town in Deir Ez-zour province with a rocket-propelled grenade.


 * The jihadists were shown laughing and cheering as one of the men lectures the young man, tied to a pole, then retreats and fires the bazooka. They then kick the body of the man, named as Ibrahim Shraideh.

The time frame of this incident isn't clear - presumably, it's relatively recent. Those reporting it suggest the area is Raqqah, but that's not sure. I checked into this at the VDC ... in case it's just a mangling of Sheitat, there's the overview of those above under, no apparent match. Presumably this is a branch of the same clan, as defined by those with the grudge, but with a different family name. They seem to list no man of that name being killed anywhere (under "regime forces" or "martyrs") --Caustic Logic (talk) 13:01, 23 May 2015 (UTC)


 * Arabic list, whole war for name شريتح, twenty-six entries with 3 being non-civilian (usually means "FSA") --Caustic Logic (talk) 10:12, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

But they have five children featuring his name, or the name of another man with the same name. These were killed pretty recently, but not in Deir Ezour, it says. All 5 were killed March 23 in Tafas, Daraa province, by "Warplane shelling" - time and space fudging is entirely possible, but the Barrel bomb everyone knows is real is blamed, and there is video attached. Listed are 4 boys (Moaz, Abdul Rahman, Obada, and Mohammed) and a girl (Tuqa) all with the rest of the name Ibrahem Shraiteh. That usually means their father is someone named Ibrahim Shreida. As established, it doesn't seem to be a common name. Notes: "Several people martyred in a massacre due to the regime air forces' shelling with explosive barrels." All with that note = the same five and no one else. All Daraa shelling deaths that day = 5. The children have photos attached: 4 boys and the girl, who had a sort of boss thing going on, perhaps. And videos, likely the same ones (not reviewed yet) shared here:
 * https://in.screen.yahoo.com/activists-report-children-killed-strikes-113831091.html - activists report "at least 5 children" were among the dead after a barrel bomb strike in Tafas --Caustic Logic (talk) 13:01, 23 May 2015 (UTC)


 * Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently (Raqqa-SL.com) original post in English
 * ISIS executes Ibrahim Shraideh from Alshaitat clan of Abu Hamam town in Alsnor neighborhood in Deir ez-Zor province, using Bazooka (RBG) to kill him on charges of fighting ISIS, the video shows fighters from Tunisia and Morocco. Cited video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VaemXb1LrEI uploaded by them May 21, 2015

The victim, tied to a post, seems to give his name Brahim, then Shraideh, and affirms that's part of Sheitat, which seems to be relevant to his death sentence. He's described as a teenager, might be a young adult about 20, and does look far too young to have the five kids the VDC shows (some nearing teenage themselves). But the name seems unlikely to be pure coincidence. Is he an older brother giving his family but not his personal name?

As for the killing, The video isn't totally clear to me - it's said (in comments) they miss the target and kill him with gunshots instead. His body after is intact but torn up in the belly. He could be listed as a victim of "shelling<" by "regime," maybe by barrel bomb, what the hell. But at the VDC, no. Comments say he was accused of killing two ISIS guys with an RPG. Maybe that's made clear by the dialogue, but it also seems possible this was more revenger for the other Sheitat guy who allegedly killed one Daeshbag with hand grenade at the start of the troubles (Liz Sly report mentions that). --Caustic Logic (talk) 08:25, 24 May 2015 (UTC)

A bit more on this incident, specifically the Daesh leader overseeing it: a Raqqa-SL page in Spanish shares the above but adds this (Yandex translated) "It (his execution?) is about threatening his executioner: Lavdrim Muhaxheri, one of the terrorists most wanted by the Interpol." Photo shown, when he was clean-shaven and Russian-looking blue-eyed guy. Apparently Albanian, from Kosovo, carrying on the KLA tradition - in late July 2014 he released a video of himself beheading a Syrian man. Soon after, Aug. 15, Interpol got the request from Kosovar authorities and put him on their list. 4 days later, Kurdish TV was claiming they'd killed him, no arrest was needed (from a few articles collected at InSerbia that stop at the death report). The Economist reported on Aug. 21 a friend was denying Muhaxheri was actually dead. If this is a recent video, it seemingly confirms that - looks like the same guy to me, or consistent anyway. The State Department designated him as a foreign terrorist fighter by Sept. 24. --Caustic Logic (talk) 09:21, 24 May 2015 (UTC)