Arabic → English transcript

I am Amjad Yousef, first assistant.

I used to work in the Intelligence Division at Branch of the Area, Branch 227.

I joined the military corps in 2004.

For a full one- year course. I graduated in 2005— 2006, sorry, 2006.

With the rank of sergeant,

staff sergeant.

And I completed the rank of staff sergeant until I was promoted to assistant.

And then the regime fell while I held the rank of assistant.

The video that spread on social media, the one showing Amjad Yousef, that is me.

And the one in which it appeared that before,

around the beginning of the crisis, the start of the revolution.

What happened is that Najeeb and I, this is Najeeb al- Halabi,

he was in the National Defense.

And one of his men was a cameraman, I do not

remember what the cameraman’s name was. We had brought, earlier,

around forty people.

At that time,

supposedly they were all terrorists or financiers,

providing material support to terrorism. As for soldiers,

there was no one there except me. We drove them to the pit that had been dug,

dug by a backhoe.

And I opened fire on— like you saw in the video clip.

One time I wait for him to go down into the pit,

another time I shoot him before he goes down into the pit.

Another time I bring Najeeb so he is the one who shoots,

until we were done with them. And after we finish shooting,

we had put tires

on the ground under them.

We put more tires on top of them, and we set fire on top of them. So that, you know,

no smell would spread in the area. We lit a fire on top of them

and we buried the pit. He buried it, I mean, after a day or two,

I did not think of it anymore. Deep down inside yourself? Deep down inside myself,

without— I do not have any military rank that gave me

an order, or an officer, or a general.

If I had one, I would tell you the opposite,

I would take responsibility for myself.

By God, I did not choose the victims. It was not my choice,

the agreed- upon number was not forty people, I mean. That is how it happened,

that is how the circumstances came together and that number came about.

We did not choose them.

I would go out with him,“ Bring so- and- so,” for example,

someone about whom there was information. Or someone came

He wrote a report about him,

or passed on information about him,

that he had been with the gunmen in some area and then left, for example.

And a student in hiding, so- and- so was supporting the militants with…

Material or anything, that is how the info came. And based on that,

we would go get them.