Asma’s deal | We call her Emma Ep4

Summary

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We Call Her Emma | Tortoise Investigates

Episode 4: “Asma’s deal”

Date: July 28, 2026
Host/Reporter: Chloe Hadjimatheou
Producer: Gary Marshall

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Chloe Hadjimatheou investigates a critical turning point in Asma al-Assad’s life during the early years of the Syrian civil war. The focus is on the revelations following the 2012 email leak, Asma’s attempt to leave Syria, and the alleged “deal” she reached with her husband, Bashar al-Assad, that secured her enhanced power and influence within the regime. The episode contrasts Asma’s role and choices with those of Syrians risking their lives to document regime atrocities, querying whether she was victim, complicit, or a driving force in Syria’s suffering.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

The 2012 Email Leak & Asma’s Public Image

• [02:00] The episode opens with revelations from hacked emails exposing Asma shopping for luxury goods—jewelry, furniture, and even a fondue set—while Syria was engulfed in civil war.
• [03:36] Chloe Hadjimatheou draws a comparison to Marie Antoinette:

  "It felt like a Marie Antoinette moment. At this point in the war, Syrians were becoming citizen journalists and telling the world what was happening in their neighborhoods."

Life in the Regime’s Bubble

• [04:00] While most of Syria burned, the elite in Damascus maintained normal lives—dinners, salons, and shopping—largely shielded from the violence nearby.
• [04:55] Bashar would send Asma lighthearted YouTube videos, reflecting a troubling disconnect from the country’s reality.

Asma’s Attempt to Escape

• [10:44] Former advisor Ayman Abdelnur reveals an attempt by Asma to flee Syria with her children after the email leak:

  “She tried to leave with her son and daughter. And she was sent back from the airport. She wasn’t allowed to board.”
  (10:44)

• The regime prevented her from leaving (“orders came: no”), likely because her departure would have signaled weakness.

The Assad Marriage: Infidelity & Power

• [12:02] Initially, Chloe speculates Asma’s escape attempt was due to moral objections about violence. It’s revealed instead that it was triggered by Bashar’s serial infidelity.

• [13:40] Journalist Ibrahim Hamidi:

  “Even in terms of Bashar’s relation with ladies, I think he was sick, and I think it was proven... He was sex-obsessed, really. A sex addict with zero morale about it.” (13:40)

• The couple reached an unorthodox arrangement:

  “[Asma] accepted the new reality that they had this kind of marriage relations... there was a sort of trade off I guess.” (15:23)

• [16:09] Ayman says Asma went months without marital or physical contact with Bashar after her failed escape.

The "Deal": Power and Influence for Silence

• [16:53] Asma’s father, Dr. Fawaz Akraz, reputedly brokered a deal:

  “The deal was great for her. She got the influence, the money.” (17:46)

• Chloe challenges the idea Asma had no choice:

  “What choice did she have?… can we really hold her responsible?” (17:51)

  • Ayman is adamant:

    “Yes, for sure. Because you can go to silence, don’t help his image, raise your kids and don’t steal the money of the people.” (18:05)

• Dr. Akraz denies these claims, insisting they are “pure fantasy” and unsubstantiated.

• Before parting, Ayman delivers a damning summary:

  “She knows and she sold her soul to the devil in exchange of the money. That’s 100%.” (19:27)

Contrasting Narratives: Choices in War

• [20:18 – 24:41] Parallel to Asma’s story, the episode follows Osama (an activist) and Farid (a military photographer), who risked their lives to document torture and murder by smuggling out tens of thousands of photographs—later known as the “Caesar photos.”

  • Osama describes the terror of hiding and moving evidence, and the trauma of the images on his own family:

    “‘Dad, why are all these people sleeping on the ground without any clothes?’ It was very upsetting…” (23:26)

• Their actions eventually led to the 2014 release of the images, galvanizing international outrage and sanctions.

Asma’s Emergence as a “Power Player”

• [31:18] Jihad Yazid, editor of the Syria Report, confirms Asma’s growing influence:

  “We began sensing that she was having more influence... Don’t be fooled by this woman.” (31:50)

• [32:37] Asma is alleged to have orchestrated the downfall of Rami Makhlouf, the regime’s billionaire banker cousin, taking control of his vast economic network:

  “It was clear at the time that Rami had lost the battle and Asma had won.” (34:37)

• Stories spread that business in Syria could not happen without Asma’s men’s (Rijal e Sit) approval. Noncompliance led to factory closures and arrests:

  “Asma was a thug... She would have men arrested and even tortured, where she would physically... pressure businessmen to hand over the businesses.” (36:33)

• Yazid is unequivocal that Asma knew and gave direct orders (37:03).

Humanitarian Aid & War Profiteering Allegations

• [37:41] - [39:00] UN and charities funneled aid via Asma’s Syria Trust for Development, effectively making her gatekeeper of international assistance—raising accusations of siphoning off cash for the regime.

• Dr. Akraz rejects these claims as unsubstantiated and says audit evidence is lacking.

The "Caesar" Photos and International Response

• [40:49] The “Caesar” photos—over 27,000 images of starved and tortured corpses—are published, dramatically changing world opinion and policy.

• US sanctions (the “Caesar Act”) specifically target Asma and her family as “war profiteers.”

• Osama sums up the role of Asma’s image:

  “Asma Al Assad has been utilized as the gentle, soft spoken face which carefully polished the regime’s tarnished image for the international community…” (43:27)

Reflection on Moral Choices and Atrocity

• The episode ends with Osama’s reflections on how ordinary people became complicit in regime brutality, and his conviction that Asma was “an active part” of the system.

  “...the businessmen who stood by the Syrian regime are murderers... Asma Al-Assad is an active part of this.” (47:35)

• The closing narrative is chilling:

  “Asma and those working for her had taken over large parts of the economy, and they were siphoning off international aid and using the money to prop up the regime financially. But she was helping the regime in other, darker ways, too.” (48:01)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “It felt like a Marie Antoinette moment.” — Chloe Hadjimatheou (03:36)
• “She tried to leave with her son and daughter. And she was sent back from the airport.” — Ayman Abdelnur (11:14)
• “Even in terms of Bashar’s relation with ladies, I think he was sick... sex-obsessed.” — Ibrahim Hamidi (13:40)
• “She knows and she sold her soul to the devil in exchange of the money.” — Ayman Abdelnur (19:27)
• “Don’t be fooled by this woman.” — Jihad Yazid (31:50)
• “Asma was a thug.” — Jihad Yazid (36:33)
• “Asma Al Assad has been utilized as the gentle, soft spoken face which carefully polished the regime’s tarnished image for the international community.” — Osama (Activist) (43:27)
• “[She] would have men arrested and even tortured... she gives the orders.” — Jihad Yazid (37:03)
• “Are people born evil? I don’t think so... This is torture for the sake of torture.” — Osama (Activist) (46:09)

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Key Timestamps

• 02:00 – Introduction of the 2012 email leaks
• 10:44 – Ayman Abdelnur on Asma’s failed escape
• 13:40 – Bashar’s infidelities and their effect on the marriage
• 16:53 – The alleged “deal” and Asma’s enhanced power
• 20:18 – Osama and Farid’s covert documentation of atrocities
• 31:18 – Asma’s emergence as regime figure and economic power
• 34:37 – Asma’s clash with and victory over Rami Makhlouf
• 37:41 – Humanitarian aid and Asma’s Syria Trust
• 40:49 – Caesar photos and impact
• 43:27 – Osama on Asma as the regime’s “soft spoken face”
• 46:09 – Reflection on the psychology of brutality
• 47:35 – Responsibility for war crimes; Asma’s complicity

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Episode Tone & Language

The episode’s tone is investigative, personal, and at times indignant. Chloe Hadjimatheou probes not just facts but motives and moral choices, bringing in voices that challenge assumptions—about Asma as victim, complicit, or villain—amid references to ordinary Syrians’ suffering and resilience.

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Conclusion

“Asma’s deal” peels back the myths and murky realities behind Asma al-Assad’s role in the Syrian tragedy. The episode invites listeners to reconsider narratives around power, complicity, and choice under dictatorship, highlighting the suffering inflicted on ordinary Syrians while exposing the transactions and allegiances that sustained the regime—and perhaps asking: who is the real Emma?

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Next Episode Teaser:
A devastated mother searching for her children amid regime roundups—“She definitely knows. Definitely.” (48:53)

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Transcript

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[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

Tortoise Investigates.

[Optum Advertiser]

For those wondering what President Bashar al Assad and his wife are doing as the world watches in shock the brutal suppression of the Syrian people, there appears to be an answer.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

Since the start of the war in 2011, Asma had largely been silent and hadn't been seen much in public. But in March 2012, information began leaking about what she'd been up to.

[Narrator/Reporter]

The cache of emails. The private communications of the dictator of Syria and his wife. Hacked emails leaked to cnn. Emails that appeared.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

According to the Syrian opposition, a mole in the president's inner circle had handed the personal passwords for Bashar and Asma's emails to a cell of opposition. And for months they'd been monitoring their messages. The emails revealed a lot. While bombs were killing civilians across the country, Asmaa had been indulging in one of her favorite pastimes.

[Narrator/Reporter]

In an email on August 4, Assad's wife, Asmaa ordered jewelry from a cousin's boutique in Paris, writing one turquoise with yellow gold diamonds and small pave on side I don't know what a father

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

more than 50 emails she sent and received were about shopping. The sanctions placed on Syria meant she couldn't make international purchases herself. So she was asking her friends abroad to help her buy, among other things, a fondue set, thousands of pounds worth of furniture, including a chandelier and a Ming vase, and handmade jewelry from a

[Narrator/Reporter]

Paris workshop, one Cornelline with yellow gold diamonds, one full black onyx with yellow gold diamonds, and one amethyst with white gold diamonds.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

I remember reading those emails at the time, and it felt like a Marie Antoinette moment. At this point in the war, Syrians were becoming citizen journalists and telling the world what was happening in their neighborhoods.

[Interviewer/Journalist]

We can already hear the shelling. How regular is that bombing?

[Ibrahim Hamidi (Journalist)]

It's constantly in one hour, in one

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

minute we can count more than 10 hours. But the thing is, for most of the war, central Damascus, where Asma lived, would have seemed a world away from the rest of the country. Apart from a few bombings of government offices and the odd mortar shell in the first couple of years, life in the heart of the capital, at least for many of Syria's regime elites, went on pretty much as normal. People still went to dinner parties and concerts. Ladies had their hair and nails done. You could hear the war going on in the suburbs nearby. Occasionally you could even smell the explosions. But actually, most of the time you could kind of shut it out. So maybe it didn't feel that weird to be shopping while the country burnt. And it seems likely that since becoming first lady, Asma had kind of got used to shutting things out.

[Ayman Abdelnur (Former Advisor)]

Next, it's Kevin James.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

Meanwhile, Bashar was sending his wife video clips of a magic show on America's Got Talent and other funny YouTube content. There's something tawdry in catching these stolen glimpses of the daily lives of a dictator and his wife, a peek inside their gilded bubble. Those emails also provide a snapshot of how Asma's friends were reacting to all the violence in Syria. One person with whom Asma regularly corresponded was the daughter of the then leader of Qatar, Al Mayassa Al Thani. Like Asma, she was glamorous and was involved in philanthropic work, and she was trying to warn Asma about the violence. December 7, 2011 18:43 GMT hello. I can't imagine you agree with what's going on. You've done such great work. It can't all be lost on the basis of Weeks of bad policy. Honestly, how can we be of help? Those leaked messages also show that Asma's friend was telling Asma to get out of Syria and offering her a safe place to go. Subject. Hey, every day I think about the thoughts running through your head and the safety of your children. I only pray that you will convince the President to take this as an opportunity to exit without having to face charges. It's not much of a spoiler alert at this point if I tell you that Asma didn't take up this offer. What I have discovered is that Asma did actually try and leave around this time, but she didn't make it out. I'm chloe hadjimothe and from tortoise investigates and the observer. This is. We call her emma. Episode 4 asma's deal. Okay, so we're. I think we're about half an hour from the border. For years, I've been reporting on Syria from a distance. It just felt too dangerous for me to go there myself. Then, a year and a half ago, the regime collapsed. Almost overnight, Syria became accessible in a way that it hadn't been for more than a decade. For the first time in years, I could get a visa. More importantly, for the first time in years, people inside the country were free to talk openly. So in April, my producer Gary and I flew to Lebanon and set off for Damascus by road. Interesting to see if we see any Hezbollah flags anyway. Although if you're Hezbollah putting a flag out right now, probably not a good idea.

[Jihad Yazid (Editor, Syria Report)]

Is

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

was a strange moment to be heading into the region. It felt like the whole of the Middle east was on edge. President Trump and Iran were locked in a dangerous standoff, and there was a sense that the whole thing could just tip into a wider conflict at any moment. And yet, oddly enough, Syria felt like the one place that wasn't on fire. It's been 16 years since I was last there. After years of war, isolation, and fear, it was incredibly exciting to be able to travel there again. I hope that I'll be able to persuade people to talk to me that I can't. Long distance.

[Currency Exchanger]

Here's your bag of cash.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

Soon after Gary and I landed, we met up with Sarah Dardush, a Syrian producer we've been working with. And our first job before heading to the border was to change money. Sarah, it feels like you've just robbed a bank or something. This is ridiculous. Syria's completely cut off from the global banking system, so absolutely every payment is in cash and there are no cash points. And each note is 5,000. So how much is here?

[Currency Exchanger]

The total is $500. Oh, how much in Syrian pounds? Yeah, it's 6 million 350.

[Interviewer/Journalist]

So there's million.

[Currency Exchanger]

You have 1270 pieces of paper over there. Should. Yeah, let me just do that math again, just in case.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

This recording, the drive to the Syrian border entry point takes around an hour and a half from Beirut. Welcome to Syria. We're finally passing in across the border and after a quick passport and visa check, we headed straight for the capital.

[Currency Exchanger]

We're now officially in Damascus. This is the Mezze Highway. These Soviet looking buildings are just the classic Damascus look. Basically they're all very drab and brown.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

Almost as soon as we arrive, we're out in the old city in a restaurant with journalist Ayman Abdelnur.

[Ayman Abdelnur (Former Advisor)]

Diet Coke or something? Just give caffeine without the coffee.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

He's fitting us in around lots of other meetings he has with officials from the new government and foreign delegations who want to know about the new government. Ayman is Bashar's former advisor. They fell out years ago, but he's still very well connected. And it's Ayman who told me about Asma's attempt to leave Syria.

[Ayman Abdelnur (Former Advisor)]

Yes, this is. It was very big rumors and I think it's a fact.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

Do you know where she was trying to go?

[Ayman Abdelnur (Former Advisor)]

To London, to her home.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

The recording of Ayman you heard at the end of the last episode came from our conversation in this restaurant where he told me that around the time of that spectacular email hack, when Asma was caught shopping, he. She tried to flee.

[Ayman Abdelnur (Former Advisor)]

She tried to leave with her son and daughter. And she was sent back from the airport. She wasn't allowed to board.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

And she got as far as the airport with her kids?

[Ayman Abdelnur (Former Advisor)]

Yes.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

And then what happened?

[Ayman Abdelnur (Former Advisor)]

They sent her back because they needed the approval to take off. And the orders came? No.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

So how would they have stopped her?

[Ayman Abdelnur (Former Advisor)]

They will tell her, the captain, that we are not allowed to leave, to take off. And then she will see the cars from the presidential palace there with the protocol team, with her team waiting for her under the plane. So she will go. She understood it and she went back to the house.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

In some ways, you could interpret this as a humanizing moment. It gives credence to what people like Brooks and Maria have told me, that Asma was trapped by the regime with no way out. If Bashar had let Asma go, it would have risked making the regime look weak, a very public fracture. So when Ayman first told me this, I made an assumption that she'd tried to escape because she couldn't accept the violence being perpetrated in the regime's name. But it turns out her issue was less about her husband's politics and more to do with their relationship. They were married women.

[Ayman Abdelnur (Former Advisor)]

Yes, for sure. Yes, yes, yes, for sure. All of them.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

We'll get to the married women for now. Those hacked emails also contained several flirty exchanges between Bashar and young, Western, educated, ambitious Syrian women. Younger versions of asthma, if you like. Back at the start of the war, they were working as aides to the president, and they'd sent emails in which the tone isn't. Well, it isn't what you'd normally expect between a boss and his junior advisors. They called him the dude and went on about how loved he was by his people and told him they missed him. One woman even sent a photograph of herself posing. She had her back against the wall wearing sexy linger. It all reminds me of what someone else told me when I first started looking into the relationship between Bashar and Asma.

[Ibrahim Hamidi (Journalist)]

Look, I mean, even in terms of Bashar's relation with ladies, I think he was sick, and I think that it was proven.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

What do you mean, sick?

[Ibrahim Hamidi (Journalist)]

Like he was sick. I think he was sex obsessed, really. He has this sex obsession, like a sex addict. Sex addict with zero morale about it. One of the most.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

This is journalist Ibrahim Hamidi. These days, he's the editor of Al Majala, a political magazine. But for many years, he was one of the most respected reporters inside Syria, and he followed the antics of the country's ruling family very closely.

[Ibrahim Hamidi (Journalist)]

The level of immoral behavior of Bashar is, like. Goes beyond any imagination.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

What have you heard?

[Ibrahim Hamidi (Journalist)]

You know, he's. He has this obsession, like, just to make sex with us. With. I'll say. Because, you know, some of them. I know.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

Can't you just say without explaining who they are?

[Ibrahim Hamidi (Journalist)]

No, it will.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

Ibrahim's being cagey here. He won't say more on Mike because some of these women were his friends. So he doesn't want to go into any detail. But he tells me Bashar was sleeping with the wives of top regime officials, some of whom were friends with Asma.

[Ibrahim Hamidi (Journalist)]

Asma knew about it, about how addicted he was, and about his relations with the girls.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

If what I'm being told is true, it wasn't the suffering of civilians that got under Asma's skin. It was what her husband was getting up to when he wasn't ordering the shelling of cities. That was her tipping point.

[Ibrahim Hamidi (Journalist)]

She knew about it, and I think at Certain point she consoled with it, but she accepted the new reality that they had this kind of marriage relations between her and Bashar. And she accepted that this is how it is and she had her own life and she had his own life. There was a sort of trade off. I guess

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

it was a trade off that took some time to reach. Ayman says that that day on the Runway when she was trying to get out, Asma was told the plane didn't have the authority to take off. And she allowed herself to then be escorted back to the palace. But she remained angry for some time

[Ayman Abdelnur (Former Advisor)]

and she stayed six months with no marriage or physical contact for a few months after those emails leaked. And then I think her parents came and they reached that deal. Since then they start being more in public and start developing her own business network.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

And you think her father was the one that made the deal?

[Ayman Abdelnur (Former Advisor)]

I think it should be someone knows both and away from this politics in order to be able as an independent talk about these matters. And I think so.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

Asma's father, the London based cardiologist Fawaz Akraz, father and daughter are very close. I've spoken to people who know him and they say Asma still talks to her dad most days. We know he also had a direct line to the President because he crops up in that batch of hacked emails. He writes to Bashar offering moral support and public relations guidance, advising him on how to respond to his critics in the West. But in 2012, Fawaz Akraz apparently acted as a marriage counsellor. Maybe he couldn't stop his son in law being unfaithful, but he could make sure his daughter had something to take the sting out of the betrayal. According to Ayman, the deal he brokered was that Bashar would continue behaving as he liked, but that Asma would be given more power, more freedom, especially when it came to business.

[Ayman Abdelnur (Former Advisor)]

The deal was great for her. She got the influence, the money.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

What choice did she have? In a way, I'm just trying to sort of play devil's advocate, but she tried to leave and she couldn't. So what choice did she have? Can we really hold her responsible?

[Ayman Abdelnur (Former Advisor)]

Yes, for sure. Because you can go to silence, don't help his image, raise your kids and don't steal the money of the people.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

This feels a long way from Emma, the young woman who left London full of hope. Nothing back then could have prepared her for the life she's now living in a war zone, the wife of a tyrant and an unfaithful one at that. This Asma, who brokered a deal to gain more power and influence in her husband's regime, doesn't look like a hopeful progressive fighting for change. She looks more like someone making a savvy move, keen to exploit the moment to their advantage. Asmaa's father, Dr. Fawaz Akraz, didn't want to talk to me, but he did reply to an email I sent him to say that at no time did his daughter discover serious infidelities by her husband. He said the claim that Bashar had affairs is based on spurious articles which have absolutely no foundation. He also said the idea that he brokered a rapprochement between the couple is pure fantasy.

[Ayman Abdelnur (Former Advisor)]

Thank you. Thank you.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

As he gets up to leave, Ayman has one more thing to say.

[Ayman Abdelnur (Former Advisor)]

She knows and she sold her soul to the devil in exchange of the money. That's 100%. She could have done so much better. That's it. Thank you a lot.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

I've spoken to another source, a regime insider who confirmed this story. They said they remembered it being before the war, but they were sure that Asma did get as far as the Runway before being forced to turn back. Someone else who used to be close to her told me Asma discussed leaving Syria lots of times during the conflict. While all that was playing out at the palace down below on the streets of Damascus. And Osama and Farid, the rebel activist and the military photographer, were being forced to make very different choices.

[Osama (Activist)]

For months, I spent a lot of time gathering all these photographs together on my personal computer. Then, in the quiet hours late at night, I would meticulously organize them into files and folders so I knew where to find them.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

For months now, Osama's brother in law, Farid, had been collecting photographs of of dead bodies, often emaciated, with obvious signs of torture. Fared's job was to gather the photos for possible use in military forensic cases. But after he'd done that, he'd slip a tiny memory card full of photos into his belt or his shoe and leave government controlled Damascus where he worked, heading back to the neighbourhood where he lived, which was in rebel held territory. It was a 20 minute drive during which he had to pass through both regime and rebel checkpoints. If either side had caught him with a memory card full of photos of murdered people, it would have cost him his life.

[Osama (Activist)]

It meant that every day he was forced to make the long commute back and forth between his home and his work. It was a journey filled with absolute unrelenting terror. But he had no Other choice.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

The two men had decided they had a duty to keep a record of what had happened to those men so that their families could one day have closure. They also believed that they were documenting evidence of war crimes. Most days after work, Farid would go round to a Sammers flat and they'd download the images. But even at home, they didn't feel safe.

[Osama (Activist)]

We knew that the regime was always conducting raids and arbitrarily detaining innocent people.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

There was always the fear that their homes would be searched randomly. And then one day it happened.

[Osama (Activist)]

The political security forces raided my family's home.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

The regime had come on a fishing expedition to see what they could find. They seized a laptop, but by some miracle, it wasn't the one that held all the photos. It was such a close call. And the incident sent a jolt of panic through both of them. Osama had a new nightly ritual. Looking through those terrible photographs. It was traumatizing, but he couldn't help himself. He felt he owed it to the dead.

[Osama (Activist)]

Quite often I would lose track of everything around me. I wouldn't even notice who was around me. This one time I was staring at the screen, lost, and I was quite surprised to discover my younger son standing right there beside me. He was only about 4 or 5 years of age. I at that time.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

He'd been there a while before. Osama noticed him, and the boy had got a good look at what was on the computer screen.

[Osama (Activist)]

He looked up at me and asked, dad, why are all these people sleeping on the ground without any clothes? It was very upsetting. I was quite taken aback and I was upset that he had seen such terrible images. I told him, these people are exhausted. They're laying down like that because they're just so tired.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

How could Osama begin to explain to a child how his fellow countrymen were causing each other such unimaginable suffering? It was hard enough for an adult to comprehend. Meanwhile, the photos were racking up. Osama and Farid had assumed the regime would fall within months. But then two years had passed and they were still gathering photographs, sometimes 60 or 70 a day. A summer in Fared might have gone on like this had it not been for a summer's wife. At some point she asked him how long he planned to carry on.

[Osama (Activist)]

She said, the photos are piling up every single day. Bashar al Assad is killing people and you're just collecting photos. The world needs to see these images so we can help put an end to this tragedy. It was Khaula, my wife Farit's sister who first got us seriously thinking about leaving this country.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

It wasn't a straightforward decision. What they were doing was already dangerous enough. If Osama and Fared were going to smuggle the photos out, they'd also have to take everyone with them, because if the regime realized what they'd done, they'd go after their families.

[Osama (Activist)]

There was a risk, and it was a very serious one. I had to aim my family's safety against all those who had met their fate at the hands of this killing machine. By this point, Farid was bringing home around 70 photos of bodies each day. The slaughter was unbearable. How long could we just keep archiving their crimes?

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[Interviewer/Journalist]

I think it's important

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

to highlight that is worldwide exclusive.

[Interviewer/Journalist]

It's your first interview for the last eight years.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

I remember this moment. It was late 2016 and Asma suddenly appeared in an interview with Russia 24, a state controlled TV channel. It was no coincidence. By this point Russia, along with Iran, had stepped in to help Bashar after he lost control of almost 80% of his country. And President Putin's military might helped tip the scales back in Bashar's favor. Now it looked like the regime might actually win. And all this time, Asma had remained silent. My first question why did you decide to disappear? Why did you decide to stand by your husband and to keep silence all these years?

[Interviewer/Journalist]

Well, from my perspective, it was never a question of preference. I stood by him because my conviction didn't tell me otherwise. As for the publicity, I've never been one to chase it, so I couldn't really answer your question.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

Here she was, looking as immaculate as ever. Very slender in a dark, conservative dress with perfectly styled shoulder length hair and just a hint of lip gloss. It was an image that had been very carefully curated and she was steadfast in her support for her husband. But there were hints, too, of how she saw her legacy through her NGO work with the Syria Trust. This was her playing Princess Diana again.

[Interviewer/Journalist]

But of course, my priorities today are helping martyrs, families, helping injured soldiers and people that have been displaced or affected by this war.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

Asma talks for more than half an hour, but actually she says nothing of substance. The questions are fawning and staged. None of it's very interesting, really, until the presenter asks the last question. During all the war times, you didn't flee the country.

[Interviewer/Journalist]

Did someone recommend you to flee to save your life? And what was your response? First of all, I've been here since the beginning and I never thought of being anywhere else at all. And secondly, yes, I was offered the opportunity to leave Syria, or rather, to run from Syria. These offers included guarantees of of safety and protection for my children, and even financial security. It doesn't take a genius to know what these people were really after. It was never about my well being or my children. It was a deliberate attempt to shatter people's confidence in their president. And suffice to say, these offers were foolish.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

The truth was, several years into the war, as Osama and Farid were gathering evidence of the crimes of the regime, Asma was becoming more embroiled in them. It seems she was busy with much more than war widows and NGO work. I had a long list of people I wanted to meet in Damascus. And right at the top of the list was Jihad Yazid. He's the editor of the Syria Report, which for years had journalists on the ground inside Syria tracking the regime's business and economic activities.

[Jihad Yazid (Editor, Syria Report)]

And then we began sensing that she was having more influence you would see her attending, for example, some business conferences.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

It's such a strange feeling being in Damascus, surrounded by opposition activists and journalists. For so many years, Syria was a place we could only report on from afar. And now here we were on a bright sunny day, sitting at tables in the street, sipping coffee and winding back the clock to a few years into the war, when Asma began to emerge as a driving force behind the Syrian regime.

[Jihad Yazid (Editor, Syria Report)]

And it's only actually gradually, I can't remember exactly when, when people realize that actually, no, she's actually completely behind her husband. Don't be fooled by this woman.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

Jihad remembers Asma coming out publicly in favor of the war. And then over the next few years, he started noticing her name begin popping up more and more connected to various businesses and schemes in Syria, cultural events, economic events.

[Jihad Yazid (Editor, Syria Report)]

So you would see her presence gradually gain size, if you want, without us understanding exactly what role she had. But clearly we sense that she had influence speaking to Bashar and speaking to other decision makers in the country.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

Then, around the end of 2020, she made a really bold move.

[Jihad Yazid (Editor, Syria Report)]

If you want to keep your wealth, you had to get rid of people who had a big share of the pie, if you want. And so Rami had a big share, very big share of the pie. He had the biggest share of the p.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

Rami Makhlouf was Bashar's cousin and a man many people thought of as the regime's banker.

[Interviewer/Journalist]

The 50 year old billionaire is considered the wealthiest and one of the most powerful men in Syria. Before the war began in early 2011, he controlled 60% of the economy. This allowed him to build an independent power base apart from Syria Town. His business empire ranges from real estate to consumer construction and oil trading.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

He even encroached into areas of Asma's interest.

[Jihad Yazid (Editor, Syria Report)]

He had opened, for example, a microfinance bank which was in competition with Asmaa Assad's own microfinance bank, run by the State Trust for Development.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

For years, Asma must have felt frustrated. As long as Rami was around, there was no way she could expand her NGO and economic and business interests. So he was taken down.

[Acast Advertiser]

Maluf has long been considered untouchable, but now he is accused of owing millions

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

of dollars in back taxes to the state, an indication the tycoon is being isolated from the base of power. It made news around the world, and several regime insiders I've spoken to say they believe that Asma was behind Rami's demise.

[Jihad Yazid (Editor, Syria Report)]

So Rami's companies were either closed down or in the cases where they had an established presence in a specific market, they were taken over.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

People connected to Asma's NGO network took over. His power transferred to her. It seemed to happen overnight. And for Syrians who'd seen Rami as one of the most powerful untouchables of the regime, someone who'd really benefited from the war, his takedown was stunning.

[Jihad Yazid (Editor, Syria Report)]

It was clear at the time that Ramy had lost the battle and Asma had won.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

Rami may have been Asma's biggest victory to date, but it soon became clear there were plenty of others in her sights. Jihad started meeting businessmen who'd crossed the border from Syria into Lebanon, who told him there was a new top dog in the corporate sector.

[Jihad Yazid (Editor, Syria Report)]

Gradually, you hear more and more stories of people directly affiliated with Asmaa getting orders from Asmaa. So, for example, no major real estate deal could happen in any city without her being aware, so that she has a say she can buy or sell or pressure the sellers to sell to her at reduced price.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

And stories began emerging that for businessmen who didn't comply with Asma's wishes, there were consequences.

[Jihad Yazid (Editor, Syria Report)]

Factories closed, accounts blocked. And gradually the man who runs Asma's office became what Syrians would call a rijal, a set. Rijal means the men. Aset means the lady. So the men's of the lady, the

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

lady being the first lady Assad, the

[Jihad Yazid (Editor, Syria Report)]

lady being the first lady being Asmail Assad. And so in every city, she had someone or more than one person where big transactions could not take place without her men knowing of them. And so she became gradually increasing increasingly influential in many sectors of activity.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

I've spoken to people who were inside the regime at this point, and they told me that Asma was power hungry, that she promoted corrupt men who were loyal to her. And they told me she did what she did for personal gain.

[Jihad Yazid (Editor, Syria Report)]

Asma was a thug, you know, when she went on arresting, threatening, this is thuggish behavior. Asma became that symbol. And the violent, relatively violent symbol of that is in the sense that she would have men arrested and even tortured, where she would physically, actually pressure businessmen to hand over the businesses her directly. I mean, her men, the men working for her, her office. Yes, of course, of course.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

So she would have been aware that was happening?

[Jihad Yazid (Editor, Syria Report)]

Of course, of course. She's not only aware of it. She gave the orders for this to happen.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

How do you know that she was the one giving those orders?

[Jihad Yazid (Editor, Syria Report)]

I mean, I know this from a lot of, you know, testimonies of businessmen. When you hear in Every Syrian town and every Syrian city, about Rijal e Sit, about the men of the lady, even in small towns, then you realize that actually she is really the one who has, who gives the orders. So over the course of the conflict, the economy deteriorated and the population got impoverished. And it coincided also with the rising influence of Asma. What happened between the end of 20.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

By this point, the country's economy and infrastructure lay in ruins. More than half the population was struggling just to put food on the table each day. But one significant source of money coming into the country was international aid and development money from charities and United nations agencies. And if you wanted to get aid into Syria, chances are you had to go through asma's organisation, the Syria Trust for Development. I spoke to somebody who worked in that sector. It was an off the record chat and they told me that ASMA created a network to capture as much of the humanitarian and development assistance coming into the country as possible. They told me that UN food was being sold for cash in local markets by people working for the regime. This was a moral dilemma discussed with within UN agencies. But ultimately it was decided that it was worth it if a few needy people might still be helped. Meanwhile, UN agencies had ongoing partnerships with the Syria Trust to, among other things, provide legal aid as well as psychological and social support for people displaced by the war. In other words, asma's organisation was providing support, support for people whose homes her husband was bombing. And while most people were going hungry, lots and lots of money was rolling into Asma's organisations. Jihad painted a chilling picture of Asma, a ruthless, cutthroat woman who had made a deliberate, calculated choice. A thug, as he says, and very much one of the Assad clan. A big player in her own right. But Asma's father, Dr. Akraz, told me that this picture, which presents his daughter through a narrow lens of power, ambition and wrongdoing, doesn't reflect the person that he knows, nor the humanitarian and development work that she's undertaken in over two decades. And that these accusations about Asma's business and economic interests in Syria have never been substantiated with evidence. He also said that the allegation that ASMA created a network to capture humanitarian or development assistance entering Syria isn't true, and that no financial record, audit finding or similar verifiable material exists to prove otherwise. In 2013, Osama and Farid and eventually their whole families escaped from Syria.

[Osama (Activist)]

I felt a great deal of guilt towards my father and my mother and the people I forced to leave their country. But I tried to justify it to myself by saying I was protecting them and that I made the right decision not only for them, but for all Syrians.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

More than 27,000 images made it out of Syria. Among those, around 6,700 individuals were identifiable as people who had been murdered, most of whom had been starved, beaten or strangled to death. And in January 2014, Osama and fared released the images to the world. But the latest horror story has shown shocked even those who didn't think they could still be shocked. Experts say this evidence is more detailed and on a far larger scale than anything else that's emerged during the 34 month conflict. Starved and tortured to death, Bashar of course, denied the photos were real.

[Acast Advertiser]

Showing emaciated, tortured bodies in your.

[Jihad Yazid (Editor, Syria Report)]

Who verified the pictures? Who?

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

They verified that they're not edited and photoshopped and so on.

[Jihad Yazid (Editor, Syria Report)]

Just propaganda. It's just fake news. They want to demonize the Syrian government.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

But he wasn't convincing the rest of the world. For the first time, the international community could finally appreciate the full horror of what was going on in Syria. Even in the relative safety of the West. Fared and Osama were still so scared of the long arm of the regime reaching them that they were known to everyone but a handful of lawyers and opposition activists. By pseudonyms, Osama became Sami and Fared became Caesar. Their photos were known as the Caesar photos. And when Farid was invited to speak about them in front of the US Congress in 2014 and again in 2020, both times he appeared in in disguise, wearing a blue hooded raincoat with the hood pulled tight around his face. And he spoke only in whispers to an interpreter so his own voice wouldn't be heard publicly. Eventually, Congress passed a new law inspired by those photos, the Caesar act, which massively extended sanctions on Syria. The country was turning into the North Korea of the Middle East. Those sanctions were also specifically targeted at the Syrian first lady and her family. Her father Fawaz, mother Sacha and her two brothers, all British nationals. The US State Department said Asma's family had accumulated their ill gotten riches at the expense of the Syrian people. And the Secretary of State specifically called out Asma as a notorious war profiteer.

[Osama (Activist)]

The truth is, Asma Al Assad has been utilized as the gentle, soft spoken face which carefully polished the regime's tarnished image for the international community. Well, she couldn't do that any longer because of the horrific nature of the crimes that we were able to document and show the world.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

Osama and Fared had stopped gathering photos, but the bodies hadn't stopped accumulating. There's evidence that the dead continued to arrive in the yard of that hospital beneath the palace. And I keep coming back to one specific image from that hospital. Not a photo of the bodies. This one was of Asma.

[Osama (Activist)]

The Syrian government says the wife of President Bashar al Assad has been diagnosed with breast cancer. Photos posted on social media show British

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

born Asma al Assad sitting alongside the

[Osama (Activist)]

President with an IV line in her arm while apparently undergoing treatment.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

Asma eventually recovered from her cancer. But what stuck with me was in One of those PR photos from August 2018, Asmaa is shown sitting in a chair at Meze Hospital. It's one of the few times I've seen her so casually dressed in a T shirt and joggers.

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She.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

She's smiling at Bashar who's sitting next to her. And they look like a couple still very much in love, supporting each other through a health crisis. I remember wondering at the audacity of it. Just a few hundred meters away in that same hospital, were the bodies of people who'd been tortured to death by her husband's intelligence services. It's hard to fathom how far this woman had traveled from her comfortable home in London. Final thing really is Asma Al Assad had really been the sort of. I want to know whether everything Osama's seen has given him deeper insight into human nature and how these atrocities are possible.

[Osama (Activist)]

Bashar al Assad didn't kill the detainees in the prisons with his own hands. There was an entire system, chains of command, that led us to these heinous crimes. Those individuals who detained people, dragged them to security prisons, tortured them, knowing full well that the detainee will in all likelihood never emerge from those walls again.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

How do you compute the fact that so many Syrians were involved in. In something so evil?

[Osama (Activist)]

Are people born evil? I don't think so. The surprising thing was the extent of the torture. I kept asking myself, if the regime wanted to kill these people, why did they need to torture them in such a horrific way? This was more than just carrying out an order or an execution. This is torture for the sake of torture.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

I've wondered about this too. Torturing someone is very different from shooting them. It's far more personal and intimate. How did the Assad regime create the kinds of people capable of carrying out this brutality? I've spoken to experts who've interviewed lots of people who worked in Syrian detention centers and prisons, and they say that inside those dungeons, prisoners and guards were stripped of their humanity, moral rules no longer applied. And for the jailers, the detainee's body became nothing more than an object to be acted upon. And there was another important but really quite banal aspect to it all. The regime paid the jailers salaries. That's why for Osama, a lot of the blame lies with those who helped prop up the regime's coffers.

[Osama (Activist)]

There were the entities that supported it financially. And that's why we believe that the businessmen who stood by the Syrian regime are murderers. Even if they didn't issue the kill order, they are murderers because they provided financial support to the regime. Asma Al Assad is an active part of this.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

Asma and those working for her had taken over large parts of the economy and they were siphoning off international aid and using the money to prop up the regime financially. But she was helping the regime regime in other, darker ways, too. There was a directive there to the orphanage not to release the children to any family or anyone coming asking for them. She said, those are the children of terrorists and that's none of your business. So don't go looking for trouble.

[Interviewer/Journalist]

The sound of the scream he let out when they yanked him away like that, he was screaming, mommy.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

And do you think Asma knew? She definitely knows. Definitely.

[Interviewer/Journalist]

I was just crying and saying, for God's sake, just find out where my children are. Just look for my children for me.

[Chloe Hadjimatheu (Narrator)]

That's coming up on episode five of We Call Her Emma. This series is reported by me, Chloe Hadjimatheu. It's written by me and the producer Garry Marshall, with additional production by Hannah Varrell. The field producer and translator in Lebanon and Syria is Sarah Dadoosh. Our interpreter was Ayesha Aldris. Development program producer was Jess Swinburn. Sound design was by Carla Patela and Hannah Varrell. Our theme music is Yamo from the Syrian band Schoon. The voice actor was Majed Atamimi. Podcast artwork is by Lola Williams and Eliza Borner. The executive producers are Jasper Corbett and Basha Cummins. This podcast was supported by a grant from the Pulitzer Center. Thanks for listening to we call her Emma. If you'd like to listen to the rest of the series today without any adverts, just subscribe wherever you're listening now. You can also access exclusive reporting, including photos and videos from our time in Syria on our website observer.co.uk. Tortoise Investigate.

[Optum Advertiser]

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[Boost Mobile Advertiser]

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