Updated February 03, 2025 at 05:00 AM ET
Editor's note: This story contains images and descriptions of victims' remains.
DAMASCUS, Syria — The residents of one Damascus suburb say that all one needs to do to find dead bodies there is dig.
They say the bones belong to people executed by forces associated with Syria's former dictator, Bashar al-Assad.
A Tadamon resident named Abu Ayman waves his hands around at the alleys between shattered concrete buildings.
"Where you see freshly dug earth, you sometimes find bones," he says.
Tadamon was one of the Damascus areas most viciously besieged by forces aligned with Assad. His military pounded most of it into dust with tanks and artillery because it was one of the earliest, staunchest holdouts for the rebel resistance against the regime.
Today, Syria's future is uncertain after rebels toppled the country's longtime ruler in December. There is hope and momentum to repair large areas of the country destroyed in its 14-year-long civil war. Rebuilding, however, is also unearthing painful memories.
On a recent visit to the southern Damascus suburb of Tadamon, you could see and hear new construction happening. Residents who had fled violence and economic hardship are moving back — some after more than a decade away — now that the old regime is gone.
Mohammad Sahli, 25, an electrician born and raised in Tadamon, spent the last two months helping rewire and renovate one of the many destroyed homes.
"I want the idea of renovation to be contagious, to inspire the neighbors to rebuild too," he told NPR.
Malik Moustafa, another resident, says when Assad's forces breached Tadamon, they ruled it with impunity.
He points to what he says are human bones still left behind from the executions during that time. On the ground there is a jawbone, an adult femur, and ribs.
Then he points to the frail, concrete ruins looming overhead. He says forces aligned with the Assad regime used to throw people blindfolded off the buildings.
"There used to be more bones, but over the years, the dogs got to them," Moustafa says.
Executions were documented
The residents' accounts echo the findings of international human rights groups and researchers of mass executions of civilians by Syrian government forces and allied militia in the area. Unarmed civilians were shot, burned and buried on a dirt street in Tadamon, killings that were documented by a military conscript and shared with researchers in Turkey.
Two years ago, then-Secretary of State Antony Blinken levied sanctions against a Syrian military official and his family over one incident in 2013 that Blinken called the "Tadamon Massacre," citing video evidence of the killing of more than 40 unarmed civilians.
Human Rights Watch said the organization's representatives visited a mass gravesite in Tadamon on Dec. 11 and 12, 2024, and found "scores of human remains both at the location of an April 2013 massacre and strewn throughout the surrounding neighborhood."
The organization also cites reports of videos showing that 288 people, including women and children, were killed in the suburb.
Hiba Zayadin, a senior Middle East and North Africa researcher at Human Rights Watch, called on Syria's new transitional authorities to secure evidence of Assad's atrocities across the country, saying, "The loved ones of people so brutally killed here deserve to know what happened to them. The victims deserve accountability."
Life is slowly returning
Meanwhile, the area is slowly coming back to life as more former residents return. One only has to seek out areas of color that stand out among the gray rubble to find examples of renewal — and optimism for the future.
There are a freshly painted mural, carefully potted plants, and bright laundry hanging up to dry in houses still missing walls.
Tadamon has no electricity or running water. Most structures are completely shot through. Walls gape with holes. Towering piles of garbage and rubble block streets that once bustled with cars and bicycles. Children and scrap pickers rummage through the detritus.
Still, Abir Rahim, 17, decided to come back with her family after the regime fell. They're now living in the burned-out remains of her uncle's house. The sooty walls still reek of smoke.
She says she has no memories of Tadamon. Her family fled when she was just a child, and since then, she floated from one site to another. Her last home was a tent camp in Aleppo, in northern Syria.
Asked how long she is planning on staying in Tadamon, she replies: "Forever."
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