This is the incredible moment an American ‘pilgrim’ was found in Syria after spending seven months as a prisoner under murderous dictator Bashar al-Assad’s regime.
The man, identified as Missouri native Travis Timmerman, revealed he had been trying to travel through the country on a pilgrimage when he was seized by Assad’s forces after entering Syria on foot without permission, following a month spent in Lebanon.
Though he was initially believed to have been American journalist Austin Tice, who has been held in Syria for the last 12 years after being kidnapped while reporting on the Syrian Civil War, these reports were quickly dismissed after he gave an interview.
In a video interview with Al Arabiya, Timmerman, wearing a dark gray hoodie with no shoes, said he heard torture on a ‘daily’ basis in Assad’s detention centres.
He told CBS News that he was released from prison after seven months by two armed men who broke down his prison door with a hammer on Monday.
‘My door was busted down, it woke me up,’ Timmerman said. ‘I thought the guards were still there, so I thought the warfare could have been more active than it ended up being… Once we got out, there was no resistance, there was no real fighting.’
He said he had been making his way out of the prison he was being kept in following Assad’s fall last week.
Timmerman said he left the prison with a large group, and was heading towards Jordan before he ended up in the Syrian town of Al-Dhiyabiya.
He said he ‘had a few moments of fear’, and still hadn’t processed the fact that he was now a free man.
He told CBS: ‘I still haven’t really thought about that. I’ve been more worried about finding a place to sleep each night since then. So I’ve been working, really.’
He said in his interview with Al Arabiya that ‘it was mostly young men’ who he heard being tortured while imprisoned, adding that he ‘never heard a woman scream’ while he was incarcerated.
He said that despite this, he was personally treated well.
‘I was fed, I was watered. The one difficulty was that I couldn’t go to the bathroom when I wanted. I was only let out three times a day to go to the bathroom. Other than that, I was not beaten. The guards treated me decently.’
A video released by Syrian rebels showed Timmerman sleeping in a house in the town.
An unidentified rebel appeared to confuse him with American journalist Austin Tice, who has been missing for the last 12 years after Assad’s forces kidnapped him while he was reporting on the Syrian Civil War.
He also claimed that Timmerman had been tortured by Assad’s henchmen, which the American later denied.
The rebel said: ‘In the name of God, the most gracious, the most merciful, [here is the] American journalist, We don’t even know what his name is.
‘A brother found him [in] Al-Dhiyabiya in the early hours of this morning, they found this American person.
‘After the Americans lost him for seven months in the prison system, [Assad’s] ungodly [guards] were torturing him in Sednaya – This journalist is now safe and among his family. We have been treating him well Good. We brought the doctor and he is cured, praise be to God, Lord of the world.
‘[The doctor] checked his health completely.
‘They found him in the orchards. He was naked and barefoot. [Here is a] message to all the world – This man was at the criminal at the hands of the gangs of Assad, who do not recognise neither humanity nor human rights, will be delivered safely, God willing to the people of America.’
DailyMail.com has contacted the US State Department for comment.
More to follow.
