Fear and frustration as Isil fighters cling on to their last square mile
Amid a de facto ceasefire and hostage negotiations, civilians are streaming out of jihadists’ final territory
The landscape of the eastern Syrian Desert is so flat that from a vantage point 300 yards away you can almost see the entirety of the minuscule last pocket of territory ruled over by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.
Women in black abayas walk the street that runs through the village of Baghuz in Deir Ezzor province – a hamlet so small it does not even feature on the map – while white Toyota pickup trucks speed past.
A once-vast, cross-border territory that had covered an area the size of Britain has been reduced to just a square-mile patch, surrounded on the eastern side by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the militia allied with the UK, and cut off to the west by the Euphrates river.
The topography has made it easy for the SDF to keep an eye on its enemy, but has also made the final battle the most difficult in the three-year war against the jihadists. “You see those women just over there?” asks Heval Khalid, the local commander, as he points into the near distance. “Daesh [a pejorative term for Isil] has put them between our forces and theirs, using them as human shields so we have not been able to advance.
“They make the women and children walk outside the houses, collecting firewood and water, leaving us with no choice but to change tack.”
The SDF says it has halted fighting to protect civilians, though reports suggest the real reason for the pause is that negotiations are taking place over a number of hostages held by the jihadists, including dozens of SDF fighters captured several months ago. Whether this includes John Cantlie, the British photojournalist kidnapped in 2012 whom Ben Wallace, the security minister, said this week may still be alive, remains unclear.
Kurdish officials have said Isil may be claiming to hold high-value captives to gain a stronger hand in the negotiations. It is understood they are yet to provide proof of life, but have been asking in return for safe passage to Idlib in north-western Syria – the only remaining rebel stronghold.
The fact the SDF feels comfortable enough to take journalists to a rooftop within striking range of Isil suggests a de facto ceasefire is in place.
Commander Khalid estimates that some 1,000-1,500 hardcore fighters remain – most of them foreign – and as many as 2,000 civilians. Another commander, who declines to give his name as he is not authorised to speak to the media, says there are three groups left: “The local Syrians who believe this is their land and it should be up to them to decide what to do; the Iraqis who see themselves as acting in the wishes of their caliph Abu Bakr al-baghdadi (himself an Iraqi), and the foreigners who believe they are the most important and that others should be taking orders from them.”
He adds: “The locals want to surrender, while the foreigners want to stay and fight until the end as they have nothing to lose.”
The towns leading up to Baghuz are a grim portend of what is in store if a deal is not reached. Hardly a building is left standing in Hajin and Shafaa – once important strongholds for the group. Air strikes have left craters two-storeys deep, suggesting the coalition may have used its notorious 500lb Paveway bombs.
While Isil has threatened those who try to flee, civilians continue to stream out. More than 36,000 people have escaped since December, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, and every day hundreds more are being received at a screening centre just outside Baghuz.
The Daily Telegraph finds families arriving at the centre cold and
‘You see those women just over there? Daesh has put them between our forces and theirs, using them as human shields so we have not been able to advance’
‘We have seen some patients who appear to have been treated in an Isil clinic. It’s medieval stuff, people have had metal rods drilled into broken bones’
shivering. The babies are in nappies made out of bin liners, the children in sandals despite the winter chill. The biscuits and rice given out there are the first food most have eaten in weeks.
Those who have made it out in recent weeks and months have been treated with suspicion over potential links to Isil. Those believed to be high-level are taken to American special forces stationed at the post.
All the men say they did not fight, but were simply mechanics, cooks or shop owners. “I was just selling tea in the market,” says Ali Halawi, an 18-year-old father of two young children. He says he had been a farmer in Raqqa, which had been the capital of the jihadists’ self-declared caliphate, and paid $100 (£77) to a smuggler to get his family out past Isil’s checkpoints on a motorbike.
“There was nothing left to eat in Baghuz,” he says. “People with money are buying one kilo of rice for 12,000 [Syrian] pounds (about £18), but those who cannot afford it like us have been eating just barley mixed with animal fodder.”
The scene is chaotic, with women and screaming children crammed into trucks bound for detention camps. Many have suffered injuries from earlier fighting. One mother begs on her knees for the SDF to help her son, four-year-old Mohammed, who has a gaping wound in his stomach where he was hit 10 days earlier by shrapnel.
“You see how swollen his stomach is, it’s filling with liquid. He could become septic soon and will likely die if he doesn’t get to a hospital,” says Jason Torlano, an American volunteer medic working with the Free Burma Rangers, a humanitarian group.
“Most of the injuries we’ve seen here have been caused by mortars, bullets and IEDS,” he says. “We have seen some patients who appear to have been treated in an Isil clinic. It’s medieval stuff, people have had metal rods drilled into broken bones.”
After an agonising half-day wait, Mohammed, by now virtually unresponsive, is lifted into a pickup truck bound for the medical point.
“Children are the innocents in all this, no matter who their parents are,” says Mr Torlano. Tearing up, he adds: “I’m sorry, I don’t know why I’m crying. I’ve been doing this for 10 years and never cried. It’s just we lost a little boy like him the other day and I can’t watch it happen again.”