DAMASCUS, SYRIA - CNN suffered a journalistic setback on Sunday after a prisoner that reporter Clarissa Ward helped release from a secret government facility in the aftermath of the Assad regime’s collapse was revealed by several sources to allegedly be First Lieutenant Salama Mohammad Salama of the Syrian Air Force Intelligence Directorate, who is reputed to have committed multiple war crimes.
According to reporting from Syrian fact checkers Verify-Sy, locals identified Salama as the prisoner, who was recently imprisoned following an alleged dispute around “profit-sharing from extorted funds with a higher-ranking officer.” CNN reported that Ward encountered the man with Syrian rebel troops while following leads to find missing American journalist Austin Tice.
Ward shared the now viral interview with Salama who identified himself as “Adel Ghurbal” and claimed to be from the city of Homs on Wednesday with the comment, “In nearly twenty years as a journalist, this was one of the most extraordinary moments I have witnessed.”
An image obtained by CNN over the weekend seems to support the identification of the man as Lt. Salama, cross-checked against a photo of Salama on duty the outlet stated that facial recognition found they matched with over 99% probability.
Commenting to the Post, a CNN spokesman said, “We have subsequently been investigating his background and are aware that he may have given a false identity,” acknowledging, “We are continuing our reporting into this and the wider story.”
Verify-Sy along with many skeptical commentators including Louder with Crowder’s Steven Crowder expressed doubts last week after the initial report noting, “well-groomed, and physically healthy, with no visible injuries or signs of torture — an incongruous portrayal of someone allegedly held in solitary confinement in the dark for 90 days.”
Crowder wrote in a post to X Friday, “CNN Syrian prisoner rescue is totally, definitely, absolutely, irrefutably, emphatically, infallibly and categorically not fake not even a tiny little bit. And if you're speculating otherwise, you're a bigot fake news Nazi who belongs in a gulag.”
During his Friday morning show, Crowder made several observations suggesting initially that the ‘prisoner’ was a fake. “The guy just walked out of an LL Bean catalog. And what do they have ‘Just for men?’ That is a perfectly trimmed beard right there.” Crowder added, “I don’t think this passes the sniff test.”
According to reporting from Syrian fact checkers Verify-Sy, locals identified Salama as the prisoner, who was recently imprisoned following an alleged dispute around “profit-sharing from extorted funds with a higher-ranking officer.” CNN reported that Ward encountered the man with Syrian rebel troops while following leads to find missing American journalist Austin Tice.
Ward shared the now viral interview with Salama who identified himself as “Adel Ghurbal” and claimed to be from the city of Homs on Wednesday with the comment, “In nearly twenty years as a journalist, this was one of the most extraordinary moments I have witnessed.”
In nearly twenty years as a journalist, this was one of the most extraordinary moments I have witnessed. https://t.co/rG3WmhKh7X
— Clarissa Ward (@clarissaward) December 11, 2024
An image obtained by CNN over the weekend seems to support the identification of the man as Lt. Salama, cross-checked against a photo of Salama on duty the outlet stated that facial recognition found they matched with over 99% probability.
Commenting to the Post, a CNN spokesman said, “We have subsequently been investigating his background and are aware that he may have given a false identity,” acknowledging, “We are continuing our reporting into this and the wider story.”
Verify-Sy along with many skeptical commentators including Louder with Crowder’s Steven Crowder expressed doubts last week after the initial report noting, “well-groomed, and physically healthy, with no visible injuries or signs of torture — an incongruous portrayal of someone allegedly held in solitary confinement in the dark for 90 days.”
.@CNN Syrian prisoner rescue is totally, definitely, absolutely, irrefutably, emphatically, infallibly and categorically not fake not even a tiny little bit.
— Steven Crowder (@scrowder) December 13, 2024
And if you're speculating otherwise, you're a bigot fake news Nazi who belongs in a gulag. pic.twitter.com/5YUQtbT9Y3
Crowder wrote in a post to X Friday, “CNN Syrian prisoner rescue is totally, definitely, absolutely, irrefutably, emphatically, infallibly and categorically not fake not even a tiny little bit. And if you're speculating otherwise, you're a bigot fake news Nazi who belongs in a gulag.”
During his Friday morning show, Crowder made several observations suggesting initially that the ‘prisoner’ was a fake. “The guy just walked out of an LL Bean catalog. And what do they have ‘Just for men?’ That is a perfectly trimmed beard right there.” Crowder added, “I don’t think this passes the sniff test.”
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