Threat from Daesh women, kids to UK ‘underestimated’
THOSE COMING BACK FROM SYRIA, IRAQ POSE SECURITY THREAT
Experts have warned of the growing threat of women and minors linked to Daesh, suggesting that the number returning to Britain from Syria and Iraq has been significantly underestimated.
According to a new report from King’s College London, a combination of an absence of government data and a changing view within Daesh of when women should take up arms means that the danger they pose is likely to be much greater than official figures suggest.
The report, from the university’s International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation, found that women had recently been actively involved in plots across the world. It said that 4,761 (13 per cent) of 41,490 foreign citizens who became affiliated with Daesh in Iraq and Syria between April 2013 and June 2018 were women. A further 4,640 (12 per cent) were minors.
The ICSR researchers Joana Cook and Gina Vale said 850 British citizens became affiliated with Daesh in Iraq and Syria, including 145 women and 50 minors. Of the 425 who returned to the UK, only two women and four minors were confirmed. The figures are believed to be vast underestimates due to an absence of official government data, they added.
“The British citizens that have now been confirmed as returning to the UK have not been differentiated by gender, or age delineation, though women and minors accounted for 23 per cent of British ... [Daesh] affiliates in Syria and Iraq,” said Cook. “We believe some women may now pose a particular security threat based on several factors. These include the physical security roles and related training that some women have undertaken in [Daesh]-held territory, and the potential to transfer or apply these skills in other locations, or to their children.”
Perpetrators
The report, From Daesh to Diaspora: Tracing the Women and Minors of Daesh, said the threat posed by women’s “evolving and seemingly increasing roles as perpetrators of terrorist attacks” has appeared to take three general forms: womenonly cells, family cells, or individual women perpetrating attacks.
In October 2016 in Morocco, 10 women were arrested for plotting a suicide attack during parliamentary elections, four of which had seemingly married Daesh members in Iraq and Syria over the internet.
Last year, British security services foiled a terror attack on the British Museum in London, and the country’s first all-female terror cell linked to Daesh was arrested and convicted this year. Safaa Boular, a British teenager who went on to marry a Daesh fighter online, was part-radicalised by a female Australian national in Syria.
Women played a variety of roles. They were active in recruiting other women, disseminating propaganda and fund-raising for the ‘caliphate’. In Canada, a female recruiter based in Edmonton who offered an online Quran course reportedly radicalised at least one young woman, and facilitated travel for her to Syria. In Ceuta, Spain, two friends led a ring that recruited other women for Daesh in Iraq and Syria before travelling themselves.
The report cited push-andpull factors for women who travel to Daesh, including feelings of discrimination, persecution or those of not belonging to their society, as well as ideological motivations and efforts by Daesh to portray women’s empowerment. This narrative has played itself out in many countries around the world, including the UK, where in 2015 four schoolgirls from Bethnal Green travelled to Syria to marry Daesh fighters. The loss of the Bethnal Green girls was a severe blow to the Muslim community in East London and a powerful indication of how strong the lure of Daesh could be.
Changing position
After the fall of the so-called caliphate in 2017, the status of many women remains unknown. While Daesh originally restricted roles for women in combat operations, since 2015 there have been increasing indications that their position is changing.
In February this year, for example, Daesh produced and released a video of a woman appearing in combat on the battlefield for the first time alongside male soldiers.
Europol has noted that 96 women were arrested for terrorism-related charges in 2014, 171 in 2015 and 180 in 2016 (though this fell to 123 in 2017).
The report also found that at least 730 infants have been born inside the Daesh’s socalled caliphate to international parents. It drew on figures reported between April 2013 and June 2018 in line with the formal announcement of Daesh by Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi, official government sources and figures, and academic or institutional publications and media reports deemed credible.
The researchers have encouraged governments to work with local regional authorities to identify the location and status of their citizens and ensure they are dealt with in accordance with international law.
They said minors in particular required nuanced consideration, including clear rehabilitative, rather than punitive, policies for those returning.