Security forces loyal to Syria's new transitional government took Khalil from his home in Sadad on February 8, 2025, roughly three months after the fall of the Assad regime. He has not been granted a lawyer, has not been allowed regular visits from his family, and reports from human rights monitors say his health has declined sharply in custody, with credible indications that he has been tortured.
The letter was organized by In Defense of Christians and signed by Christian Solidarity International, the International Religious Freedom Summit, the Institute for Global Engagement, the Shai Fund, the American Syriac Union, and the Alawite Association of the United States. The groups argue that Khalil's imprisonment sends a chilling signal to Syria's dwindling Christian minority about their place in the country's future, particularly since the very government holding him has formally joined the U.S.-led coalition against the Islamic State that Khalil himself fought to keep out of Sadad in 2015.
Khalil was first elected mayor of Sadad in 2012, as Syria's civil war spread unrest across the country. Three years later, when ISIS fighters overran the town and killed dozens of residents before Syrian forces retook it, Khalil organized the civilian defense that many credit with preventing a far larger massacre. Advocates for his release say that record should mark him as an ally of any government serious about defeating jihadist violence, not a man to be locked away without a hearing.
A Cell Without a Charge
There is a particular cruelty in being held with no accusation ever spoken against you. A man can prepare a defense against a charge. He can face a judge. But when the door simply locks and no reason is given, the soul is left to wrestle in the dark, not knowing whether tomorrow brings release or the grave. That is Suleiman Khalil's seventeen months, and it is the daily portion of untold thousands of believers scattered across nations that have never learned to fear God enough to deal justly with man.
The world likes to imagine that suffering for righteousness is a relic of some ancient age, a thing that happened to men in robes long before electricity and diplomacy. It is not so. Right now, this week, a Christian who defended his town from butchers sits in a cell because the men now in power over him have not reckoned with the God who sees what is done in secret. The Lord has never lost sight of Sadad, and He has not lost sight of that cell.
"Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." (Matthew 5:10)
That word was not spoken to comfortable men. It was spoken to a crowd who would watch friends dragged off, who would themselves stand before governors and kings for the name of Christ. The promise is not that persecution will be pleasant, nor that it will end quickly by any calendar we keep. The promise is that the kingdom of heaven belongs, even now, to the one who suffers for doing right. Suleiman Khalil's family does not need a theologian to tell them that; they need the church to remember him.
"Remember them that are in bonds, as bound with them; and them which suffer adversity, as being yourselves also in the body." (Hebrews 13:3)
That is a command, not a suggestion. To remember the prisoner as though his chains were your own is the plain instruction of scripture, and it is not satisfied by a moment's pity before scrolling on to the next headline. It is satisfied by prayer that does not quit and by pressure on rulers who claim to value justice while practicing none. Governments rise and fall, coalitions are signed and broken, but the God who numbers the hairs of Suleiman Khalil's head has not forgotten the door of that cell, and He will not forget the man behind it.