Exclusive: How Syria's hard-line rebels turned against a human rights activist The disappearance of Razan Zaitouneh and her colleagues has been one of the greatest mysteries of the Syrian war — until today. DW's investigative unit hunted clues across six countries to track down the perpetrators. Syrian human rights lawyer Razan Zaitouneh was forcefully disappeared By the summer of 2013, documenting human rights abuses had become taboo even in rebel-held territories in Syria. But Razan Zaitouneh was steadfast. The prominent human rights lawyer had just fled the capital, Damascus, due to the immense pressure placed on her work by the regime — and she wasn't prepared to stop it at the behest of armed men in rebel-held Douma, a small town on the outskirts of the capital.