On February 7, 2019, Omair Gharaibeh and two friends entered Syria from Jordan to visit Damascus. As a professional photographer, Gharaibeh brought his camera with him and, during the trip, captured panoramas of the city of Damascus.

On February 10, Gharaibeh and his friends were travelling back to Jordan on a bus, when they were stopped at a checkpoint in Minkt Al Hatab, near the city of Al Kiswah in the countryside south of Damascus. The checkpoint was under the control of the Syrian Air Force Intelligence Directorate. After looking at the pictures saved on his camera, officers of the Air Force Intelligence arrested Gharaibeh and took him to an unknown location.

On the same day, his friends informed the Jordanian Embassy in Damascus of the arrest. On February 12, they returned back to Jordan and reported the arrest to the Jordanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and several members of the Jordanian parliament. His family has also contacted the Syrian Consulate in Jordan. The Jordanian Embassy in Damascus has not been given access to visit nor to contact Gharaibeh.

On March 10, the Jordanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced that the Jordanian Embassy in Damascus had sent a memorandum to the Syrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs enquiring about Gharaibeh’s fate and whereabouts as well as the reason for his arrest. The Syrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs confidentially informed the Embassy that Gharaibeh was being held in good conditions and he was not being subjected to ill-treatment. However, they did not provide any information about his current whereabouts. Additionally, on March 11, the Syrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs responded to an official inquiry from the Jordanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs regarding the details of the arrest by publicly denying “the circumstances of the arrest of Gharaibeh”.