I’d give my life for this
Defiance of the former maths student, 27, who is the first UK woman to take up arms against IS killers in Syria
A FORMER maths student is believed to be the first British woman to join the fight against Islamic State in Syria.
Kimberley Taylor travelled to the warzone after becoming shocked by the plight of refugees and now says: ‘I’m willing to give my life for this.’
The self-styled revolutionary, 27, left without telling her family in Merseyside she was going to war and has spent nearly a year with an all-female Kurdish militia.
Yesterday she revealed she is now at the frontline of the terror group’s fight against IS as it pushes towards the bloodthirsty extremists’ de facto capital of Raqqa.
Astonishingly, relatives are said to support her decision to risk her life in one of the world’s deadliest conflicts, which has already claimed the lives of three British volunteers.
Her father yesterday spoke of his fears for her safety but also of his pride. Former teacher Phil Taylor, 57, said: ‘I was upset in the first instance upon learning of Kimmie’s intentions... and worry about her safety.
‘But to ask her not to follow her beliefs would be like asking her to cut her arm off. She just wants to change the world.
‘But where most of us think and talk about it, she acts. She is truly one in a million and we are very proud of who she is and what she stands for.’ Miss Taylor grew up in Darwen, near Blackburn, and spent years backpacking solo around the world after pulling out of her maths degree at the University of Liverpool.
She was drawn into feminist activism, and gained experience with weapons when she joined the university’s Officer Training Corps. Her decision to go to Syria came after an initial visit to the region 18 months ago to write about the anniversary of the Sinjar massacre – during which IS fighters butchered thousands of the Yazidi ethnic minority.
‘I was torn apart at the conditions refugees from Syria and southern Iraq were living under,’ she told The Guardian. ‘In that moment, I made a promise to myself that I would commit my life to helping these people.’ Miss Taylor returned to Britain before taking up a university place to study political science in Sweden. But in March last year she travelled to Rojava, the autonomous centre of Syria’s Kurd population to join the allfemale militia known as the YPJ.
In a disarmingly cheery Facebook post last month she wrote: ‘Heading to the frontline of Raqqa. Ciao!’ Officially she describes her role as filming and photographing the militia’s operations, but admits she will also have to take part in the fighting. Images show her dressed in combat fatigues and being trained in handling a large, truckmounted machine gun by comrades who now know her by the Kurdish name Zilan Dilmar.
Speaking just 19 miles from Raqqa, she said: ‘I’m willing to give my life for this. It’s for the whole world, for humanity and all oppressed people, everywhere.’
When she first announced on Facebook she was with the Kurdish militia, one friend said she was ‘absolutely crazy’. But others praised her decision to go to the warzone as ‘amazing’. Posting about her exploits online, Miss Taylor has described how she was lucky to avoid being killed by a bomb. Her pictures include smiling women and children liberated from the barbaric terror group.
However, she said taking photographs is taking second place to fighting ‘as I’m in the middle of a war’. She said combat so far amounted to a few skirmishes, but she was well aware that IS wouldn’t give up Raqqa ‘without a fight’.
She insisted: ‘I want to get in there because this is something in my heart. I need to do it.’ Meanwhile, her family back in the UK can only sit and wait to hear news from the frontline. Speaking at his detached home in Prescot, Merseyside, Mr Taylor said last night: ‘Of course I am worried. Deep down you cannot help it and it is always on your mind, wondering if you are going to hear anything.
‘But I am not shocked over what she has done. Kimmie is resourceful and streetwise and she has a cause she deeply believes in and that makes me very proud.
‘I believe you are what you have experienced – though that is not to say I would have encouraged her to go to Syria. That was her decision.’
Miss Taylor, who has an older sister and younger brother, has travelled solo through South America and Africa. Her father said she was ‘not particularly gregarious’ but extremely organised. ‘When we visited Disneyworld in Florida when Kimmie was 15 we allowed her to plan the whole thing and she did it meticulously,’ he added.
‘She wants to change the world’