Texas

Family of Houston journalist Austin Tice presses White House to intervene for his release from Syria

Houston Public Media News 88.7 | By Andrew Schneider

Published December 9, 2024 at 11:11 AM CST

In 2012, Houston native Austin Tice went missing while covering the Syrian civil war as a freelance journalist.

The family of Austin Tice, a Houston journalist and U.S. Marine Corps veteran kidnapped in Syria more than a dozen years ago, is making a fresh push with the Biden Administration to secure his freedom. The Tices planned to go to the White House on Friday to meet with the National Security Council.

Tice, whose work had been featured in The Washington Post and McClatchy newspapers, among other publications, disappeared from a checkpoint west of Damascus on August 14, 2012. A video released shortly afterward showed him being held by armed men.

Naomi Tice, Austin's sister, said the family has fresh information for the administration of President Joe Biden, who in January will be succeeded by President-elect Donald Trump.

"We are so happy to be able to be able to say that we can independently confirm what President Biden has been consistently saying, which is that Austin is alive and well," Naomi Tice said.

The Tice family has worked with the Obama and Biden Administrations as well as the first Trump Administration to try to secure Austin Tice's release. Currently, the U.S. and Syrian governments have no direct contacts. The U.S. closed its embassy in Damascus six months before Tice’s disappearance. It ordered the Syrian embassy in Washington, D.C. closed in 2014.

"We realize that this is an incredibly crucial moment, an incredibly pivotal moment, and so our goal now is for President Biden to take that moment, to pick up the phone, to call (Syrian President Bashar al-)Assad, and to work and do what needs to be done to bring my brother home," said Jonathan Tice-Zelaya. "There are a couple of months left in this administration, and so our push is to encourage him to do whatever it takes, whatever is necessary to do this now and bring him home now."

The Syrian government has denied it is holding any American citizens. Majd Kamalmaz, a Texas psychologist who went missing in Syria in 2017, was confirmed dead earlier this year.

The long-running Syrian Civil War has flared back to life in recent weeks. Rebel forces have seized Aleppo, the country's second-largest city, and stormed into Hama, putting them within reach of Damascus.

"What's happening in Syria is especially concerning," Naomi Tice said. "Right now, most of the activity is in a different region than where we believe Austin is held."