Rare footage has emerged of British women who have moved to Syria with their husbands for fight for the rebel insurgency against President Bashar al Assad.
The footage, shown on Britain’s Channel 4 News, was shot by Bilal Abdul Kareem, an American convert who is documenting the lives of Western jihadi fighters in the war-torn country, and shows the fighters and their families going about their daily lives. It focuses on a woman known only as “Maryam”, who talks of converting to Islam before marrying her husband and moving to Syria to help the rebel fighters.
“You have to always attack. You have to liberate the country,” says the UK-educated media and film studies graduate.
Another woman told Channel 4: “Before I used to wear the face veil [in the UK] it was fine, but when I started to cover my face people used to say ‘go back to your country’.”
Maryam’s husband said, “My wife is pregnant now… inshallah I get to see the baby before I get shahada [martyred] – that’s what I really want to see… Inshallah it will be a boy”.
As it is almost impossible for Western journalists to get such access to Syrian Islamists, this footage is extremely rare and gives a unique insight into the lives of the jihadists and their families:
]
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.