The mother of American journalist Austin Tice, who was kidnapped during a press trip to Syria in August 2012, expressed her hope on Sunday that the unrest in Syria would lead to her son's release.
Debra Tice told the news that a Missouri resident Travis Timmerman He had been released from a Syrian prison by rebels, and felt “like a dress rehearsal.” Her children woke her up when photos of Timmerman began circulating on social media and she misidentified him as Tice.
When asked if Timmerman's misidentification was a moment of false hope, Debra Tice instead described it as a moment of joy to be shared. Timmerman said he traveled to Syria on a spiritual mission earlier this year and was arrested for entering the country illegally.
An American was released from Syrian prison after the overthrow of Assad by the US military
Austin Tice, who worked as a freelance reporter for The Washington Post and McClatchy, was captured during a reporting trip to Syria in 2012. His mother (pictured) expressed hope on Sunday that the unrest in Syria would lead to her son's release. (Evelyn Hochstein)
“It was like a dress rehearsal…an idea of what it would really feel like to have Austin free,” she told NBC's “Meet the Press.”
Tice is the focus of a large-scale search operation after the ouster of the Syrian president Bashar al-Assad Last week after 13 years of civil war. Opposition fighters led by the hardline Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham have released thousands of people from prisons in Damascus where Assad is holding political opponents, ordinary civilians and foreigners.
A week after Assad's ouster, some US officials fear that Tice may have been killed during the latest round of Israeli air strikes. Officials are also concerned that if Tice had been held underground in a cell, he might have run out of air to breathe, as Assad's forces cut off electricity to several prisons in Damascus before the president fled.
Debra Tice said news of Travis Timmerman's recent release from prison in Syria gave her new hope that her son, Austin Tice, would be released. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call)
In response to a question about whether the US government should search for Tice on the ground In SyriaDebra Tice was circumspect, expressing gratitude for the efforts of journalists and other civilians on the ground looking for him, including Hostage Aid Worldwide.
“The United States government has made the decision not to go to Damascus. So, my feeling is, if they don’t want to be there, they shouldn’t be there. And the people who are there are the people who are there,” she said.
Tice, who worked as a freelance correspondent for The Washington Post and McClatchy, was one of the first American journalists to arrive in Syria after the outbreak of the civil war.
Debra Tice gives a press conference at the National Press Club in Washington on May 2, 2023. (Evelyn Hochstein)
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In August 2012, during the fighting in Aleppo, he was captured.
Weeks later, a video was posted on YouTube showing Tice blindfolded and with his hands tied behind his back. Armed men apparently dressed in Afghan uniforms took him up the hill chanting “Allahu Akbar” in an apparent attempt to blame Islamist insurgents for his capture, although the video only attracted attention when it was posted on the Facebook page associated with it. With Assad's supporters.
Reuters was the first to report on Friday that in 2013, Tice, a former Marine, managed to escape from his cell and was seen moving between houses in the streets of the upscale Mezzeh neighborhood in Damascus.
