The Islamic State came as colonists, but not everybody was unhappy with the new rulers. This was not because of the popularity of their ideology but because the new state did not feel like the worst of evils. Justice was harsh, but it was predictable. The Islamists, for the most part, left ordinary people in peace, as long as they obeyed, dressed correctly, and prayed. Ordinary Syrians continued to persevere.
The IS-run administration was at times more efficient than people were used to. It was quicker to repair broken water pipes or fallen electricity cables, it cleaned up the parks, planted flowers, and swept the streets. Photographs of the tidying up were posted on Twitter. The caliphate was to gleam.
The eastern part of Aleppo province was a backwater. Most of its inhabitants made their living from agriculture and the only sign of industry was a single cement factory. Lawlessness had accompanied the civil war. Criminal gangs mixed with the rebel forces, plundering, kidnapping, raping, and killing. Crime fell when IS took control—the severity of punishments scared people: public flogging, the loss of your hand or your head, crucifixion.
Sadiq read online that the ruins of aqueducts and walls from ancient Hierapolis were to be found in Manbij. In another article he learned that there were as many refugees in the town at present as inhabitants. What if the girls could hide among the refugees, make an escape that way?
This is how he spent his days and nights, in front of the screen, reading and reflecting on everything that was happening where the girls were.
In mid-November, more Syrians and another American were ritually murdered. The IS video of the event, which they titled Although the Disbelievers Dislike It, showed the beheading of twenty-two Syrian soldiers and the decapitated head of Peter Kassig. The young aid worker was the fourth Western hostage that IS had killed. He had managed, some months previously, to get a letter to his parents in Indiana smuggled out: “Don’t worry Dad, if I do go down, I won’t go thinking anything but what I know to be true. That you and mom love me more than the moon & the stars.”
The jihadi girls in the caliphate functioned as a fan club for the executioners. One of them described Kassig’s beheading as “gut-wrenchingly awesome, shariah = justice.”
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Young men from both sides were falling at the front. Two days after Kassig was beheaded, two Norwegian IS terrorists were reported killed on Norwegian TV2.
The report began with a photograph of a smiling boy in a winter jacket, his skin dark against the snow.
“This is Hisham Hussain Ahmed,” the reporter said. The next picture showed the same boy holding a pike. “He came to Norway as an unaccompanied minor in 2003 at age thirteen. In December 2012 he traveled to Syria,” the reporter went on. “The Norwegian of Eritrean descent was said to have a leadership role in the Islamic State, IS.”
Hisham?
Sadiq felt relief coursing through him.
Hisham was dead!
Ayan was free!
A warm sensation of revenge surged through him. Hisham had humiliated him deeply, first by stealing Ayan away from her family and then by marrying her without asking permission. Finally Sadiq could put thoughts of him from his mind.
He rang Osman to break the good news.
“Great!” Osman said. “She’s sure to want to go home now.”
Hisham was out of the way. Ayan was a widow. All they had to do was await her call.
Osman had earned a tidy sum bringing foreign fighters in, now he could make money getting them out.
Ayan would probably reach out soon. Once the period of mourning had ended.
“I have the solution,” Osman announced one day when he called to see if Ayan had been in touch. “There’s a relative of mine. He has two faces, if you know what I mean. He’s working for IS but is actually one of us.” The smuggler outlined the plan. “Part of the road to Aleppo goes through a tunnel. At one end IS is in control, at the other al-Nusra. When he comes from Atmeh, he drives into the tunnel as a Nusra man and out the other end as an IS man. On his next trip to the caliphate he can stop off in Raqqa and Manbij on the way back, pick up the girls, hide them aboard, and drive through the tunnel and out. Very simple … also very dangerous.”
Osman would ring when “the Double,” as they called him, was ready to carry out the job. In the meantime Sadiq was to wait.
“You’ll soon get them back! But it’s going to cost money.”
Later on that month Osman made contact again. “The Double is ready. You just need to put him in touch with the girls.”
Sadiq called him. The Double answered in classical Arabic, struggling slightly with suffixes and some words. Nevertheless, his message was clear: It was a risky operation, both for him and the daughters, but it was possible.
“You have to get them to call me,” the Double told him. “I have to be in direct contact with them.”
The deal had to be crystal clear. The girls needed to know exactly when and where to wait for their rescuer, and it all had to happen fast.
“Then I can drive them anywhere, to Turkey, wherever you want.”
“Yes, I’ll have
