Family says Betül Aluş has been held by ex-Nusra commander for five months, tells The Cradle
The parents of Betül Aluş, an Alawite student who vanished outside Latakia University, told The Cradle magazine their daughter was abducted by Jableh's most senior security official. The family said death threats have forced them from their home.
RastinewsRua and Süleyman Aluş, who live in the countryside outside the Syrian coastal city of Jableh, gave their most detailed account yet of their daughter's disappearance in an interview with The Cradle magazine. According to the family, Betül vanished on April 29 and was abducted by Heysem Ahmed Abbas, known as "Sheikh Selahaddin," a former Nusra Front commander who now holds the top security post in Jableh.
"Everything that has happened amounts to abduction, enforced disappearance and the distortion of facts," Rua said.
Three hours later, a message: "She wasn't abducted"
Rua said Betül messaged her on WhatsApp on the afternoon of April 29, writing that she had left the university and was heading home by bus. Her phone went dark shortly after.
The family reached Yasir Halife, who oversees the university's women's dormitory. Within just three hours of the disappearance, Halife told them he had already gotten word from security officials: Betül had not been abducted and was in Jableh. He described the matter as a "security issue."
University administrators showed the family camera footage of Betül entering the campus but withheld footage of her leaving, citing legal restrictions. The family said the university president, Sheikh Abu Sumer, told them plainly that her file was in the hands of Sheikh Selahaddin.
Armed guards outside the villa
When the family went to a villa on the Jableh coast, they found armed guards and dogs. Two sheikhs came to their home the next day, promising to help but warning them not to take the matter to social media.
On May 6, a video of Betül circulated online. It showed her in Afghan-style religious dress on a beach near Selahaddin's villa. In the video, Betül said she had left her family of her own will and converted to Sunni Islam.
"My master and commander"
The family was summoned to the Jableh courthouse on May 7. According to their account, Betül was brought before Judge Sara Subh veiled and flanked by two security officers gripping her arms. The family said she contradicted herself on basic questions and appeared to be wearing an earpiece through which she was receiving instructions.
The family said Selahaddin entered the room twice during questioning. When the judge asked who he was, the court clerk described him as "my master and commander." The family said the judge ended the questioning after Selahaddin's second entrance.
Outside the courthouse, three security officials threatened to kill Süleyman. They pressed him to record a video saying his daughter had not been abducted, promising Betül would be released within three days — a promise that was never kept. "I had no choice but to film it, to protect my daughter," Süleyman told The Cradle.
A 3 a.m. "press conference"
At 3 a.m. on May 11, officials convened a meeting at a government building in Jableh, attended by security officials, pro-government journalists and the local mayor, and broadcast live on Facebook. George Hamwi, a human rights activist present at the meeting, said most of the talking was done not by Betül but by someone else in the room.
The next day, another video surfaced, filmed on the beach with a social media influencer, purporting to show Betül returning from a shopping trip. The family said they reviewed security footage from the store in question and found no veiled woman had entered it at that hour.
The family is in hiding
Süleyman said the family received death threats after going public again with their account, forcing them to leave their home and go into hiding.
The family said that two months later, Betül managed to reach them only through voice messages, in which she spoke of Selahaddin in strongly defensive terms. The family said they believe she was subjected to sexual violence and, traumatized, has bonded with the man holding her. That claim has not been independently verified.
The Cradle's report, based on the interview, did not include a response from the Damascus government or the officials named in it.
Massacres on the coast, and other missing women
In March 2025, security forces and allied armed groups carried out attacks on Alawites along the Syrian coast, killing at least 1,600 civilians over three days. In the Kasur neighborhood of Baniyas alone, 179 people were killed.
After the massacres, Reuters, The New York Times, Amnesty International and the UN Commission of Inquiry on Syria documented dozens of cases of abducted Alawite women. The Damascus government denied the abduction allegations.
Mira Celal Sabit, who disappeared in Homs, likewise announced in similar videos that she had converted. Her father, who insisted his daughter had been abducted, saw his shop hit by a bomb and gun attack in October; two young men were killed, and the father and his son were wounded.