CNN has some epic egg on their face right now. The Syrian prisoner that Clarissa Ward breathlessly reported on is, in fact, one really BAD DUDE.

Here’s the video of the event.

I have to say, it all looked a little too staged for my tastes. As others started pointing out, if he’d been in a completely dark prison cell for over 90 days, we’d see something entire different. 

A. He would’ve been disheveled and very dirty.

B. He would’ve been very weak. 

C. The sunlight would’ve been EXTREMELY painful!

Yet, as you see from the video, none of that is evident. And folks started digging. 

"Syria is free."

Extraordinary moment as @clarissaward and her team witness a Syrian prisoner freed from a secret prison in Damascus.

Left alone for days without food, water or light, the man was unaware Bashar al-Assad's regime had fallen. pic.twitter.com/ZAnGiBlLON

— CNN International PR (@cnnipr) December 11, 2024

And what has been uncovered shows that CNN got played. BIGLY. 

The freed prisoner identified himself as Adel Gharbal, a civilian from Homs who had been confined for three months.

But Verify-Sy, a Syrian fact-checking group, identified the man as Salama Mohammad Salama, a first lieutenant in the Syrian Air Force Intelligence, an agency that served the Assad regime. Residents of Homs identified him as an agent frequently stationed at a checkpoint in the area, according to Verify-Sy.

Salama “participated in military operations on several fronts in Homs in 2014, killed civilians, and was responsible for detaining and torturing numerous young men in the city without cause or on fabricated charges,” according to Verify-Sy. “Many were targeted simply for refusing to pay bribes, rejecting cooperation, or even for arbitrary reasons like their appearance.”

That’s not a minor mistake. It’s HUGE. This thug targeted and tortured Syrians because he could. And CNN didn’t even bother to do even the most minimal of research into this dude before parading him on camera to the world. 

Then again, Clarissa Ward, who was on the ground in Kabul during the Afghanistan debacle, took a hard turn and has been accused of staging reports during missile attacks in Gaza. 

The fact is, Salama was one of Assad’s henchmen whose track record is that of a war criminal. CNN’s response to this new information?

“We have subsequently been investigating his background and are aware that he may have given a false identity,” CNN acknowledged to The Post. “We are continuing our reporting into this and the wider story.”

~Snip

CNN denies allegations that the piece was fabricated.

“No one other than the CNN team was aware of our plans to visit the prison building featured in our report that day. The events transpired as they appear in our film,” CNN said.

NO ONE else was aware that a CNN crew was going to tour and film the prison in Damascus? Someone’s nose is getting longer and longer with each spin. 

Jake Tapper added to the clown show.

CNN's Jake Tapper after the first time the now-debunked Syria story from Clarissa Ward aired: "Another just absolutely remarkable report. CNN's Clarissa Ward in Damascus doing vital, vital journalism Thank you so much!" pic.twitter.com/tOQFY1xiXA

— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) December 16, 2024

There you have it. “Vital journalism” means creating fake news in real time and then digging all the holes with the subsequent spin. 

CNN has had a credibility issue for a very long time. They’ve already forked over an undisclosed amount of money to Nicholas Sandmann, looked like clowns during the George Floyd riots, and are facing a major defamation case involving CNN and Jake Tapper.

Earlier this year, judges with the First District Court of Appeal for the State of Florida ruled that Young offered evidence “of actual malice, express malice, and a level of conduct outrageous enough” to warrant a trial.

The judges wrote, “Young proffered CNN messages and emails that showed internal concern about the completeness and veracity of the reporting — the story is ‘a mess,’ ‘incomplete,’ not ‘fleshed out for digital,’ ‘the story is 80% emotion, 20% obscured fact,’ and ‘full of holes like Swiss cheese,’” but the network aired it anyway.

Needless to say, this new report by CNN puts major egg on the network’s faces. Keep in mind, as Beege points out here, Clarissa Ward has been more activist than journalist for quite some time. 

In 2021, CNN's @clarissaward boasted that she stopped looking at US policy in Syria as a journalist: only as an activist.

She said she was so enraged by Obama's refusal to do more to remove Assad (beyond his $1b CIA dirty war) that she sent deranged voice mails to @brhodes: https://t.co/WOpXI6NIrE pic.twitter.com/T5z0z5u4HO

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) December 11, 2024

And CNN wonders why Food Network is beating them at the ratings game on a massive level. Propping up and promoting an agent of torture as a humble prisoner is a key reason. 

Will CNN amend their “story?” Probably not. There will either be a note buried at the end of the news item or they’ll make the story disappear altogether rather than admit they had their journalistic asses handed to them once again.

Feature Photo Credit: Original artwork by Victory Girls Darleen Click