Syria Captures ‘Butcher of Baniyas’ Ali Kayali at Border, Intelligence Says

Syria’s General Intelligence Directorate has arrested Ali Kayali, widely known by the pseudonym Mihraç Ural, as he attempted to cross the border illegally, security sources said.

Kayali, branded the “Butcher of Baniyas,” is accused of leading the 2013 massacre in the town of Al-Bayda in the Baniyas countryside, an attack that killed hundreds of civilians.

Background of a Militia Leader

According to Turkish media, Kayali was a founding member in the 1970s of Acilciler, a left-wing Turkish organization locally called “The Urgents,” which carried out terrorist operations during that period. After the group dissolved following 1980, Kayali fled to Syria and established ties with the family of Jamil al-Assad. He formed a militia named the Popular Front for the Liberation of the Sanjak of Alexandretta. In the years before the 2011 Syrian uprising, Kayali moved between France and Syria, spending time in Paris before returning to the Syrian coast to build and arm militias involved in violence and sectarian cleansing against civilians.

Atrocities in Al-Bayda and Beyond

In early May 2013, Kayali commanded the assault on Al-Bayda, where hundreds were killed or wounded through summary executions, stabbings, burnings and gunfire. His militia was later implicated in the May 2012 Houla massacre in the Homs countryside, as well as armed campaigns across rural Aleppo, Hama, Homs and Latakia.

Human Rights Defender Demands Justice

Fadel Abdul Ghany, director of the Syrian Network for Human Rights (SNHR), said the arrest marks a crucial step toward accountability for the May 2013 massacres in Al-Bayda and Ras al-Nabaa, offering some justice to the victims’ families. Speaking to SANA on Thursday, Abdul Ghany said the detention restores hope for justice more than thirteen years after the crimes. He noted that SNHR documented the events as they happened and identified Kayali in a report published on 10 May 2013, based on eyewitness testimony that named him as a key commander of the massacre.

Abdul Ghany explained that the allegations against Kayali are based on contemporaneous documentation rather than recent developments, and stressed the importance of subjecting all evidence to judicial scrutiny. He said SNHR recorded the deaths of 459 civilians, including 92 children and 71 women, in addition to dozens of missing and detained individuals. The violations included summary executions, the destruction of entire families, the burning of bodies and homes, and widespread looting carried out by forces of the deposed regime and allied loyalist militias.

The SNHR director affirmed that the organization possesses testimonies, data, photographs and video recordings collected since 2013 that could serve as the basis for a criminal prosecution. However, he noted that using these materials as judicial evidence requires verifying their sources, authenticity and chain of custody, and cross-referencing them with military and security records.

He underscored the legal requirement to establish a direct link between the alleged crimes and any suspect, whether through direct participation, issuing orders, facilitating execution or bearing command responsibility under international law. He also emphasized the right of victims’ families to know the truth, participate in judicial proceedings and obtain full redress and reparations.

Abdul Ghany reiterated SNHR’s readiness to cooperate with competent judicial authorities, as it has in previous cases, to ensure that the arrest leads to fair judicial rulings based on verifiable evidence that reveals the truth and honors the victims.

The General Intelligence Directorate’s announcement confirms Kayali’s arrest as one of the main figures responsible for the Baniyas atrocities, which resulted in the killing of hundreds of civilians, most of them women and children.