ISIS arrested whomever they pleased.
Whenever.
Wherever.
Charges were manifold.
Jeans were forbidden. Ornaments on women’s clothing likewise. Smoking meant running the risk of losing the fingers you held the cigarette between. Long hair on men was prohibited, growth of beards was compulsory. Most of those harboring aspirations for freedom had either been killed or had fled.
The three youngsters from Bærum had taken possession of such a family’s house. It was empty, insofar as it was without occupants, but was filled with everything one could need: bedclothes, towels, pots and pans, appliances, and electronics.
Those who did not support ISIS lay low and kept quiet, except one small group calling itself Raqqa Is Being Slaughtered Silently, which posted photographs online and reported what ISIS did not want the wider world to know. The leaders of Raqqa’s most prominent tribes saw which way the wind was blowing and swore allegiance to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. The new force occupying the city replaced Assad’s reign of terror with its own.
Everything had gone according to Haji Bakr’s plan.
Hisham was one of the pawns. The pike angler had risen through the ranks and now commanded a squad of soldiers. He had arrived early in Syria, in autumn 2012, and was thus regarded as having seniority. Initially, he had joined al-Nusra but later defected to ISIS when the opportunity arose. Serving ISIS, on sacred soil, your thoughts required adjustment if you were to become a proper Muslim. If you hailed from a land of infidels, you were regarded as an infidel, no matter how well-read you were. Everyone began at the same level, as though hearing about Islam for the first time. For some it was familiar material; for others there was a lot that was new. Hisham did not understand much, as the lessons were held in Arabic and English. Prior to the religious instruction, the aspiring fighters had been subjected to a series of trials of patience, like being placed in a room with other newcomers to sit and stew. They could be left to themselves for days without any knowledge of what might happen or when. Some freaked out. It was an important grounding in life as a soldier, which in addition to going on the offensive involved staying calm, lying in wait, keeping your head down, and awaiting orders. A good fighter had ice water in his veins.
Only after weeks of patience training and religion classes did the new recruits begin weapons instruction.
* * *
The highest positions in ISIS were assigned to carefully chosen men. Like Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, most of the top military leaders were Iraqi—ISIS was above all an Iraqi organization. Saudi Arabians held the uppermost positions in the courts, with Tunisians below them, and Arabians from the Gulf often worked in the intelligence services. Many Chechens, with their valuable guerrilla war experience, held midlevel ranks in the military.
There were opportunities for advancement, however, despite this consciously imposed hierarchy. Young men who had no experience of having people answer to them and had never so much as held jobs in the West could find themselves in command positions. Men like Hisham.
Young Muslim males had enlisted in holy war before. In Afghanistan. Iraq. Bosnia. Somalia. In that respect Hisham was part of a tradition. What was new was the speed at which it was happening and the flow of females, many in their teens. By autumn 2013, the number of Western migrants in Syria numbered around three thousand, several hundred of whom were women.
What made young women renounce their families, friends, and studies to travel to a war zone?
A group of researchers at the London-based Institute for Strategic Dialogue attempted to find an answer to this online, on Twitter, on blogs. These were the places the girls themselves chose to explain why they went. Three main reasons were offered.
The first was that the ummah was under attack. The West wanted to eliminate Islam and drive out Muslims.
The conflict was presented as a part of a larger war against Islam. The girls shared images of dead or wounded children from Palestine, Syria, and Afghanistan. A black-and-white perspective was typical. “Either you are in the camp of iman—belief—or you are in the camp of kufr—unbelief, no in between,” declared Umm Khattab, one of the most active on Twitter in 2014. She, in common with the others, wrote under a nom de guerre, and many of the women used the prefix umm, “mother” in Arabic. She held the view that Muslims could not live in the West.
The second reason was the desire to establish the caliphate. Few women traveled with the purpose of fighting themselves. Those who did were disappointed. ISIS did not allow women near the front line, the privilege of the men. Only those charged with control of their sisters’ morals in the female police brigade—al-Khansa—were given weapons training. They patrolled the streets of Raqqa with Kalashnikovs over their shoulders.
Female migrants traveled with the idea of building a new society based on the laws of Allah. An ideologically pure state. A paradise for fundamentalists. Some mentioned a call to help others, some wanted to be mothers and wives. Many of those who went there to marry had never had a boyfriend before.
The third main reason was individual duty and identity. Carrying out your religious duty while on earth secured you a place, perhaps even a good place, in paradise. Some wrote that they had no wish to live in this world at all and yearned for the hereafter. Umm Khattab, like Ayan, quoted the mantra of Jihadists the world over: We love death more than you love life.
The search for a sense of belonging went like a red thread through the Twitter messages. Many wrote about the sisterhood they felt in Syria, as opposed to the false, superficial friendships they had in the West.
Umm Irhab—Mother of Terror—wrote that seeking a better life had not been her intention. Her journey was rather a lesson in patience and hardship. The meaning of
