INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
A mother and her daughter hunch down by the windows of their attic as armed men gather outside the gate
They try not to make a sound
that day, on March 7, the patriarch of the Khalil family had assured them that they were not in danger
The attacks on the village, where swathes of farmland surround small clusters of buildings, reveal fresh details about the intensity of some
the ground, CNN was able to shed light on the scale of the carnage in the town, where government-aligned forces subjected largely unarmed
villagers to summary executions, looting, arson and sectarian slurs, and bodies were piled up in two mass graves.CNN tallied at least 84
bodies in videos geolocated to the Pine village, which has a population of a few thousand
that the new government described as an effort to contain remnants of the former autocratic regime.The state blamed the mass killings on
Al-Sharaa set up a fact-finding committee to investigate the killings and has vowed to hold the culprits to account.The attacks targeted the
Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shia Islam that the Assad family are members of, and which dominated their regime for over half a century until
Network for Human Rights (SNHR), said more than 800 people were killed in attacks following the ambush
Other rights groups say the number is even higher.Assad loyalists have staged several smaller attacks on government forces since then,
according to authorities.Survivors said the attacks in Pine village began in the early hours of Friday, March 7, a day after the initial
ambush by Assadist loyalists was reported.CNN identified the armed man who filmed himself at the home of the Khalil family by matching his
facial details, clothing and build with other photographs and video on his Facebook profile
A cached version of his account shows the video was later deleted
Two survivors, who viewed the footage of him shared on social media, also said he was the same man who was rampaging through their town.CNN
reached out to the man on Facebook but has not received a reply.In the days that followed, another video surfaced on social media showing
him singing, with bodies littered behind him
pine trees, utility poles and a curving road, which corresponded to satellite imagery
control from the old regime and became the de-facto government
embroidered with what appears to be HTS insignia
Three military experts said the patch on his shoulder was consistent with several HTS units, but the photograph was too blurry to determine
the specific brigade.Another fighter is identifiable in two videos that CNN geolocated to Pine village and are believed to have been filmed
over the course of the attack
The bearded man with red hair is seen in the footage taken in the Khalil home and at the entrance of Pine village.Another clip verified by
other unidentified fighters.Eyewitnesses who spoke to CNN detailed the hours leading up to the executions
Tuesday, three days after she said her father and two brothers were executed
Then they returned and ransacked our home
who was injured by a bullet to the right side of his body, pretended to be dead while he bled out
As night fell, he attempted to escape
According to the woman, the fighters shot him six times as he limped through the fields.Her mother was sitting in shock and grief between
also told CNN that fighters had entered her home several times before they dragged her husband outside and shot him and several other men in
a ditch.Locals said only a handful of men survived
One man told CNN that he tried to reason with the fighters, ultimately saving his own life, but was unable to stop them from killing his
village, after villagers said fighters forbade them from collecting their dead, according to three of the locals CNN spoke to
On March 10, armed men oversaw the retrieval of bodies that took place over two days, according to residents.Locals said the bodies were
Some of this was captured in videos and imagery that CNN geolocated to the area, matching it against satellite imagery to verify the date.A
photograph, which CNN determined was taken at the cemetery of the village shrine, captured at least 10 bodies wrapped in shrouds, laid in
two narrow graves.In one video, CNN counted at least 42 shrouded bodies dumped along a roadside, with three more in a shallow grave
Nearby mounds of earth suggested additional burials.Another verified video showed at least 29 bodies in two shallow graves, where an
excavator appeared to be refilling one of them with soil.CNN could not confirm whether the bodies in the two videos and photograph depict
different individuals or the same.The bodies and graves can also be seen in satellite imagery reviewed and verified by CNN.Aerial images
provided by Airbus from March 11 show ground disturbances near the shrine, where CNN identified graves
The imagery also appears to capture bodies covered in shrouds and the excavator seen in one of the videos geolocated to the same site.Maxar
imagery from March 14 also shows evidence of the soil being displaced
Maxar told CNN the approximate dimensions of the excavated and then smoothed-over grave site were 26 meters by 16 meters (about 85 feet by
