A Syrian refugee family, once hailed as a model of successful integration in the Netherlands, has been convicted for the brutal honour killing of their own 18-year-old daughter and sister. The shocking case has laid bare the dark undercurrents of honour-based violence and raised serious questions about the protection of vulnerable young women.
A Promising Start Shattered by Brutal Murder
Khaled Al Najjar was determined to flee the Syrian civil war. In a complex family reunification process, he first paid for his eldest son, then 15, to be smuggled to Holland. After the son was granted asylum, the rest of the family – Khaled, his wife, and their eight children – successfully joined him in the northern Dutch town of Joure.
The welcome was warm. The local council provided a specially converted seven-room unit for the large family, furnished it, and arranged school places, language classes, and benefits. Khaled was later helped to open a pizza shop and a courier firm. In 2017, their story was featured in a local newspaper as a positive example of integration.
This image was shattered in May 2024. Days after her 18th birthday, the body of Khaled's daughter, Ryan, was discovered face down in a remote stream in a nature park near Lelystad. She had been gagged, her hands tied behind her back with 18 metres of tape. Prosecutors stated that while the cause of death was drowning, there was evidence she had been suffocated or strangled first – thrown into the water alive.
A Family's War on 'Westernisation'
In a packed courtroom in Lelystad, Judge Miranda Loots delivered the verdicts. Khaled, 53, was sentenced to 30 years in prison. His sons, Muhanad, 25, and Mohamed, 23, each received 20-year sentences. Khaled was tried and sentenced in absentia, having fled to Syria after the murder.
Ryan's 'crime', in the eyes of her family, was becoming too westernised. As a teenager, she stopped wearing a headscarf, began socialising with boys and girls from different backgrounds, and embraced social media. Photos show a happy young woman in jeans and hoodies, making peace signs to the camera.
Her desire for freedom created unbearable tension. "She is a slut and should be killed," read one message from her mother's phone on a family WhatsApp group. Her father, Khaled, called her a "burden" and a "pig" that needed to be "slaughtered". In a fit of rage, he declared, "A snake would be a better daughter."
After turning 18 and making clear she wanted to cut ties with her family, the decision to kill her was made. Khaled instructed his sons to find her and "throw her in a lake and let the fish eat her." They lured Ryan from a friend's house in Rotterdam under the pretence of returning home to apologise.
Systemic Failures and a National Problem
The case has exposed critical failings in the Dutch protection system. Ryan was known to authorities for years. In 2021, aged 15, she was found carrying a knife to school, threatening suicide. In February 2023, she fled barefoot to a neighbour, screaming, "You have to help me. My father wants to kill me."
From 2021 until her death, she was in and out of care homes and under a government-backed security scheme. Yet, for unexplained reasons, she left this protection around the time of her murder. A spokesperson for the protection services admitted staff faced a "dilemma" as Ryan would often return to her family.
Tragically, Ryan's case is not isolated. Dutch police handle up to 3,000 honour-based violence offences annually, with between 7 and 17 ending in fatalities each year. Prosecutor Bart Niks told the court, "There is no place for this form of violence in the Netherlands... Ryan came to the Netherlands for safety, but she was never safe."
While Khaled remains at large in Syria – reportedly remarried and starting a new family – the Dutch authorities state an extradition is currently impossible due to a lack of treaty and diplomatic ties. Ryan's sister, Iman, 27, demands action: "Is this the justice the Netherlands is talking about? We demand that the Dutch authorities... arrest him, because he is a murderer."
The verdict brings legal closure, but the case stands as a harrowing testament to a young woman's lost future and the persistent, deadly clash between archaic patriarchal codes and modern liberal values.
