Airstrike kills major drug dealer, family in Syria: Monitor

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - An airstrike killed a prominent drug dealer and his family in southern Syria on Monday, a war monitor reported, suggesting that the strike was carried out by Jordan though Amman has still not provided a comment. 

UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) said that a drug dealer identified as Marai al-Rathman was “killed in a Jordanian air force strike” together with his wife and six children in Suwayda province near the Syrian-Jordanian border.

The monitor added that Rathman is “the most prominent drug dealer who is responsible for smuggling it [narcotics] to Jordan from the area,” adding that he was affiliated to Lebanon’s Hezbollah. 

Jordan has not yet commented on the reports of the airstrike being attributed to it. Jordanian airstrikes targeting drug smugglers in Syria have taken place before, dating back to 2014, according to AFP. 

On Thursday, Jordan’s foreign minister told CNN that the country is determined to battle the threat of narcotics taking place along its border with Syria. 

“We are not taking the threat of drug smuggling lightly. If we do not see effective measures to curb that threat, we will do what it takes to counter that threat, including taking military action inside Syria,” Ayman Safadi said.

The airstrike comes as the Arab foreign ministers agreed to allow Syria back into the Arab League, 12 years since its expulsion. Following a meeting on May 1, Syria had pledged to cooperate with Iraq and Jordan to curb the wave of drug smuggling along the borders.

“So we will do what it takes to contribute to ending the crisis, meanwhile we will do what it takes to protect Jordanian national interest as well,” Safadi added. 

Jordan has become a transit point of drugs, particularly captagon, being smuggled out of Syria. Captagon is an amphetamine-type stimulant which has been spreading across the drug market in the Middle East, with Syria as the main supplier, and Saudi Arabia the primary consumer of the substance.

Numerous US sanctions have also been slammed on Syrians involved in the drug trafficking, including two cousins of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad as well as Lebanese affiliates. 

A report by the New Lines Institute last year on captagon trade in the region said that Syrian state figures, members of allied militias including Lebanon’s Hezbollah benefit from the process.