afrinpost – exclusive
According to our correspondent, Osama Rahal, also known as Abu Hassan Obama, has been extorting Kurdish residents in the towns of Ba’dina and the village of Dumliya in Rajo for road repairs.
Rahal, from Maalili in Jabal al-Zawiya, Idlib, and deputy to Abdul Karim Jamal Qassoum, the leader of the controlling “112th Brigade” militia, has been collecting fees exclusively from Kurdish families.
Kurdish residents were forced to pay $50 per family owning a vehicle (car or tractor) and $500 from each olive oil mill owner, despite IDPs owning more vehicles and running various businesses like fuel stations, bakeries, and exchange offices, were exempt from these taxes.
The roads were repaired, particularly the section leading to an olive oil mill established by Rahal in an old building in Dumliya belonging to forcibly displaced resident Habash Habash Batal. The total amount extorted from the residents of Ba’dina was approximately $16,000 and from Dumliya about $8,000.
When Arif Dehdo from Badina refused to pay the $50 fee for recently acquiring a vehicle, Rahal summoned him to the brigade’s headquarters, detained him for hours, and imposed a six-fold fee. His brothers had to pay $300 for his release.
Rahal rules with an iron fist. Since 2018, he has personally seized the house and shops of the late Mustafa Nashat Mustafa in Ba’dina to house his family, entirely blocking the western road in front of the house. He also took over Rashid Dehdo’s fuel station, despite Dehdo living in the town, Ghassan Omar Fawzi Dehdo’s olive mill, despite him residing there, and the late Mustafa Abdul Jafar’s poultry farm, despite two of Jafar’s sons living in the town. Additionally, Rahal seized around 6,000 olive trees in the villages of Khazaniya, Shitka, and Habo in Mabatli, owned by forcibly displaced Kurdish residents. He employs villagers under brigade control to work in these fields with their equipment without paying them any wages.
Osama Rahal
